Quova, Inc., the leading provider of Internet geolocation data services, today announced that Continental Airlines, is using Quova’s IP geolocation data to localise Web content and promotions and streamline its online sales process. Knowing the geographic location that Web visitors are logging in from has enabled Continental to more efficiently connect new and existing customers in 56 countries to relevant deals and discounts.  In the six months that Continental has been working with Quova, it has improved click-through rates of homepage banners by as much as 200 percent.Prior to selecting Quova, Continental tested data from several geolocation providers and based their selection on four criterions: granularity, accuracy, frequency of updates and ease of integration.  Quova data scored the highest on all accounts.  Quova provides IP address location data down to a metro area (25 to 50 miles) and is the only geolocation provider to submit its network collection and accuracy methodology to an outside audit firm.  In 2008, an independent audit by PricewaterhouseCoopers attested that Quova’s data was 99.9% accurate at a country level.  In addition Quova updates its database of information about more then 1.8 billion IP addresses on a weekly basis and see a change rate of near 7% a month.  Implementing Quova’s data is a simple process of setting up an API to query the database and can be installed very quickly.

“The ability to immediately make your Web site relevant to your online customer is a fundamental tenet of marketing in today’s Internet culture.  With the geolocation data from Quova we’ve been able to shorten our sales cycle by matching an IP address location with the correct country homepage, which funnels people directly to the information they want and need,” said Ken Penny, managing director of Internet planning and development at Continental Airlines.  “Quova’s geolocation data has all of the attributes we were looking for in a geolocation partner.  Fast, accurate, reliable and granular, Quova’s solution has already helped us significantly improve the customer experience for our international customer base and we’re only scratching the surface of what’s possible.”

 

One of the immediate benefits of integrating geolocation data into the Web site was eliminating the need for many customers to self-identify a country.  Prior to working with Quova, every visitor to continental.com, regardless of physical location, landed on the Web site’s homepage.  This forced many customers to self-identify their country and language, which slowed down the buying process and added steps to the sales cycle.  Geolocation streamlined this process.  In addition, Continental is localising the marketing banners and placements on its Web site based on country-level geolocation, and in the near future will begin to target its marketing placements at the metro level.  These changes have helped Continental improve the click-through rates of its homepage marketing banners by as much as 200%.

 

“Continental is a great example of the immediate and long-term impact that our geolocation data can have on improving Web site performance,” said Marie Alexander, CEO of Quova.  “In just a few short months, and with very little overhead, Continental was able to improve the customer experience on its Web site for customers around the world.  Increasing homepage banner click-through rates by 200% is a massive achievement and we’re proud of the role we played in that accomplishment.”
——-