The Ryanair Story – How one airline is dictating its own online media agenda
Last Wednesday, 10th February 2010, Ryanair chief executive Michael O’Leary announced the company was to build a second maintenance hangar at Prestwick Airport, creating up to 200 new jobs. As the BBC reported, The £8m investment, supported by £1.5m from the Scottish government, would see both facilities service Ryanair’s fleet of more than 200 aircraft. The story caused barely a ripple in Ireland on the day, but since then, it has emerged that jobs could have been created in Dublin. Ryanair – and Michael O’Leary – have dominated the headlines.
A variety of political and media commentators have highlighted this as yet another PR masterclass by O’Leary and Team Ryanair. It’s rare that a week passes when Ryanair do not feature prominently in the news. Over the last 12 months, what has Ryanair’s media presence been like, online? What are the key stories that the airline has promoted, and what gets reported? O’Leary Analytics has taken the coverage the low fares airline has received over the last year in the online media and picked out the key trends and topics.
SETTING THE AGENDA
To what extent does Ryanair set it’s own agenda in the media? To analyse this, we need to look at the coverage Ryanair has generated over a period of time and see if there are any significant peaks. The graph below is a weekly breakdown of the coverage Ryanair has received globally over the past 12 months. During this time period, there were five weeks when over 3,000 news articles were published mentioning Ryanair. By cross-referencing these peaks with siginficant Ryanair stories at the time, a clearer picture of their PR campaign, and it’s success, can be seen.
Peak 1:
23rd February 2009: The announcement that Ryanair planned to close all check in desks by 2010 led to a serious spike in coverage with almost 5,000 articles being published this week.
Peak 2:
1st June 2009: Charging a pound to spend a penny – What had begun as a PR stunt earlier in the year, quickly turned into yet another media frenzy as Ryanair confirmed plans to charge passengers to use the toilet on their flights. Over 3,800 articles appeared worldwide this week as the media latched onto the story.
Peak 3:
27th July 2009: The announcement of Q1 Results. What should have been very much a bad news story – falling share prices following a revised profit announcement – was turned into a positive story by announcing that fares could fall by more than 20% this summer.
Peak 4:
14th December 2009: Ryanair announces it is cutting its order for Boeing aircraft in half. O’Leary says surplus cash would be returned to investors. His statement resulted in the share price gaining 6.5 per cent in Dublin.
Peak 5:
8th February 2010. A date the Irish government will want to forget – Michael O’Leary announces the creation of up to 200 new jobs at Prestwick Airport in Scotland. Days later, it emerged he could have created 500 jobs in Dublin had the Government acted as an intermediary in negotiations with the Dublin Airport Authority. This story continues, and the coverage Ryanair receives will only increase.
RYANAIR VS THE COMPETITION
So, how does Ryanair stack up against its competitors in the PR stakes? O’Leary Analytics compared the coverage of four low-fares or budget airlines in Europe received over the last 12 months – namely Ryanair (blue), Aer Lingus (green), Air Berlin (Yellow) and EasyJet (Red). The results back up the theory that Ryanair are well ahead in the battle for online column inches. The line graph below breaks down the coverage, month by month over the last year.
WHERE IN THE WORLD
In Ireland, Ryanair, and O’Leary in particular, enjoy a strong media profile. He has had many high profile confrontations with the government and various authorities. The airline routinely take out full page ads in Irish daily newspapers that poke fun at the government, and their competitors. Indeed, one competitor, easyJet founder Sir Stelios Haji-Ioannou, has decided enough is enough, and is to sue O’Leary. However, on a global scale, Ireland ranks fifth in the press coverage stakes. The United Kingdom is top of the list, with over 15,000 articles published in the UK over the last 12 months mentioning Ryanair. Germany are second, followed by the US, Spain and Ireland.
ONE MAN, ONE AIRLINE
And finally, when the coverage is broken down, what influence does Michael O’Leary really have? Like him or loath him, it is rare that we see a Ryanair story without his name all over it. And yet, in the context of overall mentions, his influence is limited. The line graph below compares the number of mentions Ryanair received over the last 12 months compared to Michael O’Leary. To ensure we got the right man, and not, for example, the Templederry Junior B Hurler of the same name we refined the search to articles mentioning Michael O’Leary and Ryanair, and compared that to mentions of Ryanair only. While O’Leary’s name appears regularly, it is clear Ryanair garners plenty of coverage without him.
WHAT CAN WE TELL FROM THIS ANALYSIS?
Four key points emerge from the analysis:
- Ryanair, in the majority of cases, dictate their own media agenda.
- They generate far more column inches online than any of their competitors, most notably Aer Lingus.
- For an Irish company, they generated significant international coverage in the US, UK and Germany.
- Michael O’Leary, while popular, features in a limited number of total articles mentioning Ryanair.
Tags: Analysis, Monitoring, Online Media, Politics, Ryanair
Simon Palmet
Fascinating article Stephen particularly the comparisons. Whatever I feel about Ryanair I have the upmost respect for their PR and marketing teams – what they do is phenomenal.
Cheers,
Si
February 17th, 2010 at 1:23 am
February 17, AO Press Digest “the ryanair story how one airline is dictating its own online media agenda” « AirObserver's Blog
[...] the ryanair story how one airline is dictating its own online media agenda [...]
February 17th, 2010 at 8:45 am
Stephen
Thanks Simon,
Ryanair are a bit like marmite – you either love them or hate them. However, from a PR and marketing point of view, they are clearly doing something right – the ability to dictate the media agenda is invaluable.
February 17th, 2010 at 8:52 am
Eddie Murphy
Stephen, a fantastic piece of analysis. Just goes to show how much money Ryanair save by generating all this free publicity!
February 17th, 2010 at 9:31 am
Pat Phelan
Nice piece Stephen
Very interesting feedback, puts an end to the story that its the MOL show, its all about Ryanair
good job
February 17th, 2010 at 11:30 am
Christian
Insightful stuff Stephen, really great post!
February 17th, 2010 at 12:40 pm
Paddy Kilduff
Michael O’Leary opens his mouth and the gets all Irish Nwspapers, all Irish Radio Stations and even many politicians in the Irish Parliament(Dáil) speaking about Ryanair for the past 3 days – non stop….. and it ain’t over yet. He had no interest in going into Hanger 6 in Dublin Airport just getting mor PR for Ryanair.
February 17th, 2010 at 1:34 pm
Stephen
Thanks Eddie,
They really are leading the way when it comes to generating media coverage online. The comparison with the other airlines is what surprised me most – they really are in a league of their own.
February 17th, 2010 at 2:48 pm
Stephen
Hi Pat,
I agree – the statistics tell their own story. While he’s often at the forefront of their campaigns, Ryanair generate plenty of coverage without Michael O’Leary. Thanks for the feedback, I really appreciate it.
February 17th, 2010 at 2:50 pm
Eimear NiChormaic
Excellent post! How long did this take you?
February 17th, 2010 at 3:55 pm
Antoin Daltún
1) Ryanair had pretty much unanimous support from ex-SRT workers on Joe Duffy’s Liveline on RTE1 two days this week. No one commented that Hangar 6 is way oversized for Ryanair’s announced operation (as well as for Aer Lingus’ present operation). And there was little or no mention that Hangars 1 to 4 are available.
2) Interesting that second in coverage to Ryanair (65m “earned passengers” in 2009)is not easyJet (46m in 2009), but Air Berlin (28m). Aer Lingus had 10.7m. Relative to scale, its coverage looks broadly similar to Air Berlin.
3) Ryanair coverage is very skewed compared to where it operates, e.g. US is high, Germany is relatively high (and I wonder how positive German perceptions are). Italy is low. So is its value exaggerated? US coverage may be relevant to investors there.
February 17th, 2010 at 6:30 pm
arthur mcgrail
I am bemused at Mickey O’ Leary’s interest in creating enginnering jobs and his insistence the facility he wants to use is hangar 6. Hangars 1,2,3,&4 should be adequade for heavy maintenance on RYAN AIR fleet which are all narrow body aircraft perefectly suited for the smaller hangars. Hangar 6 is basically a wide body facility. Not many years ago when he was campainging to build a terminal at dublin the same o, leary wanted to demolish hangars 1,2, 3, 4 as well as the garage facility adjacent to H 6. This was when fls/srt was in full production, job were not on his menu then get rid of the hangars for his terminal. I dont trust him in this latest media jamboree he has created no sincerity or real commitment to enginnering jobs. Thas my view I could be wrong ?????. I will agree with him on one point Aer lingus are not using the facility to only a fraction of its capacity. I look forward to the eventual solution./////////////.
February 17th, 2010 at 6:59 pm
Dermot Canavan
Boeing, having been caught once on price by FR, showed O’L the door (Negotiations ‘broke down’) Airbus i.d. result: no more ‘flipping’ of a/c before their very expensive ‘D’ check (at a very good price due to initial heavy discount) FR had deliveries of initial order coming off Boeing Prod Line so he could ‘flip’ older units/tailor/cancel routes to suit inventory. Now he has a problem.Suppliers don’t want to be bullied on price and he needs his ‘D’ checks. Suitably licensed Engineers are available in Dublin,hungry for work. FR will try to bully their way into H6, outsource the jobs to an agency (nothing to do with me guv) as many FR ‘employees’ already are and when his maintenance operation is bedded in at Prestwick, pull the plug at Dublin, bully a ‘change of use’ option from the DAA for what he really wants…..H6 as a passenger terminal on the cheap.
As a by-product he will drive up the Aer Lingus costbase and maybe hasten a hostile takeover. Ex SRT beware.
February 18th, 2010 at 3:31 pm
Starbuck
Within days of his first attack on Aer Lingus in 2006, when he succesfully scuppered Aer Lingus’flotation, he was on the phone to Bertie Aherne offerring a deal. The ‘deal’was that he’d offload his Aer Lingus shares in exchange for clearance to build his own private terminal near the Hangar 6 site.
Bertie refused to play ball, so O’Leary continued upping the pressure by further increasing his share-holding, and then launching two succesive takeover bids.
Reading between the lines, it becomes clear that his ultimate aim is total domination of Dublin Airport, not just through commercial competition in the air – but by total ownership of the infrastructure. This aim can best be acheived by neutering the DAA, and monopolising his companies grip on the airports facilities.
It’s truly remarkable that any part of the Labour movement in this country is so easily taken in by the spin, but in the present climate – it seems one only need dangle jobs and all credulity is immediately suspended.
February 19th, 2010 at 3:37 am
Stephen
Hi Eimear,
Thanks for the comment. The research was carried out over 24 hours – reports can be compiled relatively quickly, but the analysis of the results for trends and topics takes a little longer.
February 19th, 2010 at 11:38 am
Donal
Great analysis Stephen…Hope all the hard work brings in the €€€€ You deserve the rewards.
February 20th, 2010 at 1:39 am
The Ryanair Story – ‘How one airline is dictating its online media agenda’ « Steve Rawson's Media Blog
[...] A ‘must read’ analysis by O’Leary Analytics on how Ryanair optimises its online media strategy [...]
June 24th, 2010 at 4:08 pm