As an owner of an iPhone, I’ve become very interested in web sites developed specifically for the smart phone users and even more interested in travel related apps as well as travel specific mobile websites.  As much as social networking is becoming important for airlines, I think having a mobile website is even more important.  

It’s kind of cool to be able to complain by Twitter or some other social networking media but the busy traveler is even better served by being able to access his airline of choice via a mobile website.  I may be wrong but I believe that Continental Airlines had one of the first mobile websites available and that comes as little surprise to me given their popularity with the business traveler.  

I wrote about that Continental website more than a year ago.  Since then, a number of airlines and travel related websites have now also gone mobile.  Now that we have a quorum of companies participating, I’ve added a new section of links titled, oddly enough, Mobile Sites. 

It isn’t comprehensive but it is a good slice of what we in the United States would use.  Interestingly enough, I think many of these sites were rolled out with little or no fanfare and that seems strange to me. 

Midwest Airlines has a site but Frontier, it’s sister airline under Republic Airways, does not.  That doesn’t surprise me as I think Midwest Airlines was doing a much better job than many when it comes to technology and social networking.  I do hope that that feature will be adopted over to Frontier in the near future. 

Virgin America doesn’t have one either and I think I know why.  Those folks have used an excessive amount of Flash programming on their sites and that won’t fly on many mobiles including the iPhone.  For a company that has positioned itself in the way Virgin America has, I think this is bad for the airline.  (Just like I think opening new routes to leisure destinations is bad, too.)  Virgin was an early adopter of GoGo Wireless and has its “Red” system onboard for entertainment and food/beverage ordering.  They don’t, however, appear to be embracing social networking or mobile apps yet.   It is an area that a young, agile airline should be leading in.

Are you listening Mr. Cush?  You need someone working on this as of last year!

The various sites available are robust in some cases and some offer pretty limited capability.  I expect that that playing field will level out over time and result in a reasonably consistent group of offerings. 

Quite a few airlines have offered iPhone apps and I do hope to talk about those in the future sometimes but they’re only relevant to the iPhone and while it is an amazingly popular phone, the Blackberry is the businesman’s mobile phone still. 

Web sites that are mobile capable are the way to go both because it serves the busy person with a smart phone but also because it delivers a consistent look and feel to customers who may move from, say, a Blackberry to an iPhone or an Android based smartphone to a Blackberry.   Apps, on the other hand, are either phone or phone OS specific and that means maintaining a growing collection of software. 

I’ve added a couple of flight services mobile sites as well.  Each works from OK to good and, again, I think these will be updated to offer more functionality over time.  They’re all linked on the FlyingColors blog but fair warning:  a few don’t launch to the mobile site unless you’re browsing from a mobile smartphone. 

Got an app you like or another mobile site I haven’t found?  Offer it up in the comments section and I’ll add it along with the others.

Update:  Virgin America has dumped Flash from its site and is apparently working on a mobile site to be rolled out this year.  See this PC World story.  That’s good but they’re still behind the curve on mobile sites and, from what I can tell, social networking as well.  So much for being a hip airline.

Filed under: Airline Service, Travel Hints by ajax