- LBi's work with Virgin Atlantic and Kuoni picks up awards for Best Airline Website and Best Search Engine Marketing

London: Global marketing and technology agency LBi's expertise across a variety of digital disciplines has been recognised at the 2012 Travolution Awards, with the agency's work for Virgin Atlantic and Kuoni picking up awards for Best Airline Website and Best Search Engine Marketing.

The two award wins demonstrate LBi's ability to link bought, earned and owned media to power customer journeys from acquisition through to conversion and retention.

Virgin Atlantic and LBi received Best Airline Website for www.virginatlantic.com, which has seen a 15 per cent improvement in engagement with the homepage, as well as an increase of 54 per cent in the number of customers checking their flights and a 40 per cent jump in visitors to the Virgin Experience section.

The accolade of Best Search Engine Marketing was given to Kuoni and LBi for their bespoke 'multi-signal' search strategy, which places SEO, social media, online PR and community engagement at the core of customer communication activities. Kuoni now outperforms its closest competitors by up to 10% and traffic from non-branded organic search is up about 100% year-on-year (Source GfK Ascent).

Judged by a panel of proven business leaders, experts and entrepreneurs, the Travolution Awards recognise companies, brands and individuals that have excelled in the fields of online travel distribution, digital marketing and technology. They are regarded as the UK travel industry's highest accolade for innovation and excellence online.

Allison Wightman, Head of eBusiness at Virgin Atlantic, commented: "We wanted to set the standard for airline websites in the future so we are doing a root and branch overhaul of the website using a user-centric design process with customers testing every step of the way. This is to ensure that we deliver an experience which is unique, intuitive and simply works. We have more pages to do but initial results suggest that customers love it"

"We're delighted with the design, feel and success of the new site which has been evidenced by our engagement and conversion metrics to date - and to have our work recognised in this way is just fantastic."

Mark Fleming, SEO & Affiliate Specialist at Kuoni, said: "'We switched to a multi-signal search strategy about a year ago, focusing strongly on a broader range of digital and social channels. We've been incredibly pleased with the results that have been generated by LBi, and it's fantastic to know that our campaign has also received recognition from our peers and those within the travel industry."

Anil Pillai, UK Chief Executive at LBi, commented: "The Travolution Awards are the gold standard of digital marketing for the travel industry, so we're really proud to have won two major awards for two very different pieces of work - both have which have created fantastic business results for our clients. Being recognised for delivering these best-in-class customer experiences pays tribute to the diverse skills we have as an agency, as well as our ability to link bought, owned and earned media to power customer journeys."

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