JetBlue Airways has hired Rokkan as its digital agency of record. The firm will handle e-commerce, mobile and social media work for the airline.
JetBlue hired Rokkan after a three-month RFP process that involved seven agencies, said Michael Stromer, director of e-commerce and interactive marketing at the airline. He declined to comment on the size of the account.
The hire took effect in the first quarter and the formal contract was signed “a few weeks ago,” said Stromer. He said JetBlue chose Rokkan “first and foremost” because of the agency’s “portfolio of work.”
Rokkan’s first work for JetBlue will roll out in late 2011, said Stromer, who declined to comment specifically on the work.
“As you can imagine, we are refreshing JetBlue.com. We are working on an extensive mobile strategy. We’ve been in the mobile space for a few years, but we really are kind of supercharging our efforts in that space,” he said. Rokkan will also work with JetBlue to integrate social into the company’s e-commerce platform, he said.
Rokkan will work with JetBlue creative and media AOR Mullen. This is the first account on which the two agencies have worked together, said Rokkan CEO John Noe. JetBlue works with the Rimm-Kaufman Group on search engine marketing, Stromer said.
Interactive agency Huge handled JetBlue’s digital marketing for the past six years.
“We’ve been working with [Huge] for six years, and we wanted to step back a bit and take a new, fresh approach. Sometimes you need to do that with new folks. For us this meant finding a partner that could help reinvigorate the process, get us reenergized and excited about the work we are doing,” said Stromer.
“It was a mutual and amicable decision to go in different directions. We’re still very proud of the work we did for JetBlue and are excited to take on the next big challenge in the airline industry,” said Sam Weston, communications director at Huge.
Noe said Rokkan’s prior work as Virgin America’s Web AOR contributed to the JetBlue win.
“With Virgin America, we came into that assignment without having any experience doing travel, so it really helped to develop our process,” he said.
Earlier this year Stolichnaya Vodka named Rokkan its digital AOR, and Chipotle Mexican Grill assigned the agency digital marketing work.
