From: The Malaysian Reserve

THE state government of Perak signed a five-year strategic collaboration with Firefly yesterday to promote tourism and foreign investment in the state.

 The partnership is focused on achieving key objectives, one of which is to enable international air connection between Lapangan Terbang Sultan Azlan Shah (LTSAS) in Ipoh and Changi International Airport in Singapore.

 It also aimed to promote Perak as a destination for mass and premium tourism as well as encourage new investment and business developments which will spur economic development in the state.

At the signing ceremony in Ipoh, the state government of Perak was represented by State Secretary Datuk Dr Abdul Rahman Hashim while Firefly managing director Datuk Eddy Leong signed on behalf of the airline. The signing was witnessed by the Menteri Besar of Perak, Datuk Seri Dr Zambry Abd Kadir.

Meanwhile, Dr Abdul Rahman said the state government will spend RM2.4 million for Firefly to jointly market and promote tourism in the state for the first year while another RM1.8 million has been allocated for the second year.

Firefly has been marketing Perak state aggressively via the code-share arrangement with MAS in the international market, he added.

by The Malaysian Reserve

FLYFIREFLY Sdn Bhd (Firefly), Malaysian Airline System Bhd’s (MAS’s) low-cost carrier unit, is targeting a marked increase in sales numbers at the upcoming Matta Fair 2010 from previous years’ figures on the back of international holiday packages and other attractive offers, its marketing and communications head Angelina C Fernandez said. The Malaysian Association of Tour and Travel Agents (Matta) Fair is the country’s premier travel and tourism fair. The fair, which is slated to be held at the Putra World Trade Centre on March 12-14, is expected to attract close to 80,000 visitors this year.

Speaking at a press conference in Subang, Selangor, yesterday, Fernandez said the Matta Fairs were strong contributors to Firefly’s revenue and, since the firm started offering international packages via a tie-up with its parent firm, she expected a three times fold increase in sales from previous years’ contributions. “Last year, we did sales of more than half a million (at Matta Fair 2009) and that was only with Firefly destinations. About 1.5 million sales?

 Yes,” she added. Fernandez said the strength of Firefly’s offerings via its Firefly Holiday online travel portal were strong selling points for the brand. “Our competitive edge over our competitors is evident in the combination of destinations that we have, which is Malaysia Airlines, MasWings and Firefly,” she said. “That says it all, you have connectivity with all three carriers. You can fly to destinations like Singapore and from there fly off to destinations like Kota Kinabalu, Kuala Terengganu or Ipoh.

 Furthermore, at last year’s Matta, our Singapore flights were not available yet and today we’re flying five times a day,” she added.Launched in 2007, Mas-Wings is another MAS subsidiary and it caters to the air travel needs of East Malaysians. Asked on why Firefly was expected to hit the 1.5 million sales target, Firefly Holidays head Lau Yin May said at Matta Fair 2009, the low cost carrier only offered domestic and regional destinations and packages like Thailand and Indonesia.

“With Firefly Holidays going international, as of last month, we’re now talking about packages to about 100 destinations worldwide. That three-times fold target is us being very prudent, and we could even meet or exceed this target,” she added. When asked on whether new holiday packages and destinations would be added this year, given that Firefly Holidays already had links with about 50,000 hotels, Lau said no and yes.

“In terms of Firefly, not at the fair and, at this point, Firefly is quite stable in terms of the destinations that we have currently. In terms of Firefly Holidays, the new destinations will be MAS destinations. As long as MAS flys there, we will have packages there.

Take London, UK, for example, our website has 33 pages of hotels and each page lists ten hotels,” she added. The travel packages for Firefly packages available at Matta Fair 2010 are valid until Oct 2010 while its MAS packages are open until 2011.The firm is also offering prizes totalling RM500,000, which include MAS tickets to Los Angeles, Istanbul and Hong Kong as well as Blackberry phones from telecommunications

provider Maxis.

Daily Express, Page: 23
Thursday, 31 December 2009

SUBANG JAYA: Firefly has managed to achieve sales totalling up to RM500,000 simply via Facebook up to September 2009.

That has been the most effective social media advertising for the airline. Since the Firefly Facebook page was set up, the airline already has 11,756 fans.

Head of Marketing and Communications, Angelina C. Fernandez, said that Facebook was like a loyalty campaign for the airline and the nunThers were increasing daily.

“Due to the slower economic condition this year. o via the media. However, the social media advertising seems to be a good tool,” she said.

Angelina said Firefly often has promotions and contests on the social network where members can participate.

“To reward our Facbook customers, we have offers especially for them as well as competitions enabling them to win free tickets. We Angelina: Expects more also look out for talents for passengers through our advertising and corpo– Facebook from Thailand, rate video via Facebook,” Indonesia and Singapore. she said.

Firefly also has adver- our marketing tisements on the website whieb is current
tion next year from other countries in the region.

“About 60 per cent of the travellers on Firefly are from Malaysia. Through Facebook and other advertising methods in the first quarter of 2010, we are determined to expand our promotions to Thailand, Indonesia, and Singapore,” she said.

Angelina added that 80 per cent of travellers on Firefly were aged between 25 to 50-years from the working community and a high percentage of them were Internet savvy.

She said more than 50 per cent travellers on Firefly book their tickets online while others do so through ticketing agents.

Angelina said the Firefly website receives the highest number of hits