United Airlines is rolling out pre-order food and beverage service across its domestic planes, a smart move for improving the customer experience (CX) that gives travelers more say over their meal. This directly solves the old problem of not getting your first choice on board. Other businesses can learn from this playbook to get their own CX improvements off the ground.
Key Takeaways
- Get into your customer feedback and operational data to find the exact pain points that are ready for a new solution.
- Map out the complete customer journey, including every touchpoint, to spot the friction points where a pre-order system or something similar could really help.
- Test new CX features with a small pilot program on a specific route or with a select customer group before you go all-in, so you can gather real-world data and make adjustments.
- Build new services directly into your existing website or app to make the experience feel connected and easy for people to use.
- After launch, keep a close eye on performance metrics and what customers are saying so you can continuously tweak and improve the service.
1. Pinpoint Customer Pain Points Through Data Analysis
Any good CX project starts with knowing what’s actually making your customers mad. United didn’t just guess that people were annoyed with limited meal choices or finding out their preferred snack was gone. That insight came from digging into years of direct feedback and flight operations data. To do this yourself, you have to bring all your customer feedback channels into one place.
You can use tools like Qualtrics or SurveyMonkey for post-flight surveys, but the real gold is often in unstructured data. Run call center transcripts through NLP platforms to spot recurring complaints, and pay attention to social media sentiment. The key is to collect and then categorize everything. Are people upset about wait times, a lack of options, or confusing information? United’s pre-order system specifically fixes the “lack of options” and “availability” problems by letting people lock in their choice before they even get to the airport.
Pro Tip: Set up a tagging system for all your customer feedback. When you can categorize every complaint and suggestion, you can run the numbers to see how often a specific problem comes up and how bad it is. If 30% of your service complaints are about items being out of stock, for example, a pre-order system suddenly looks like a very obvious fix.
2. Map the Existing Customer Journey
Before you bolt on a new feature, you have to map the customer journey as it exists today. This means you need to document every single step a customer takes with your company, from the moment they think about booking to when they pick up their bags and head home. For an airline, that’s booking, check-in, the security line, boarding, the flight itself, and baggage claim. United’s pre-order feature fits neatly into the “pre-flight” and “in-flight” stages, improving the flow instead of breaking it.
I’ve used visual tools like Mural or Lucidchart to get this on a ‘wall’ where everyone can see it. You’re looking for the key moments that make or break satisfaction. Where are customers getting stuck? Where are they forced to make a quick decision? Offering a pre-order lets a passenger decide on their meal calmly at home, which is a world away from being asked what they want during a bumpy climb-out on a short flight.
Common Mistake: Only mapping the digital side of things while ignoring what happens in the real world. Your journey map has to include both online and offline interactions to be worth anything. The physical act of a flight attendant delivering the correct pre-ordered meal is every bit as important as the app’s ordering screen.
3. Design the Innovation with User Experience (UX) at its Core
Once you know the problem and where it happens, you can start designing the solution. United was smart to build the pre-order function right into its existing mobile app and website. Passengers don’t have to learn a new system or download another app. It’s just there when they manage their booking.
When you build your own CX feature, make simplicity your guiding principle. If you were building a pre-order system, you’d need a clear menu, real-time stock availability, and a dead-simple payment flow. This involves actual UX design work, like A/B testing different screen layouts to see what works best and making sure the feature is accessible to everyone. I’ve seen so many good ideas completely tank because the user experience was treated as a final coat of paint instead of the foundation of the entire project.
4. Pilot and Iterate in a Controlled Environment
United didn’t just flip a switch and offer pre-ordering on every single flight at once. They almost certainly started small, testing on a few specific routes or aircraft to get feedback and work out the kinks. This kind of phased rollout is just plain smart for any new CX project. A pilot program lets you test your tech, find bugs, and see how customers actually use the thing without blowing up your whole operation if something goes wrong.
You need to define what success looks like for the pilot. Are people actually using the feature? Are complaints about meal availability going down? Are satisfaction scores going up? You have to collect the hard numbers (usage rates, order volume) and the soft feedback (customer interviews, open-ended comments). Then you have to be ready to change things fast based on what you learn. Maybe the order window is too short or the menu options are wrong. You only find that out with real-world testing. In fact, a Gartner report on CX trends found that companies using this iterative, feedback-driven approach have far more success with their CX projects.
5. Integrate with Existing Systems and Marketing Channels
A new feature is useless if it’s an island. For a CX innovation to work, it has to be deeply integrated with your existing operations and you have to tell people about it. United’s pre-order system has to talk to its inventory management, its catering contractors, and the passenger manifest to make sure that the meal a customer orders online actually gets to their seat.
Then there’s the marketing side. You have to tell your customers about the new feature over and over. Use your email lists, send push notifications from the app, and post on social media. Explain the benefit in simple terms: “Get the meal you want,” or “Order ahead so you don’t miss out.” Your customer service staff also need to be experts on the new system so they can handle questions. The integration has to be organizational, making sure every team is aligned to support the new offering. Without that internal buy-in, even the best ideas just fizzle out.
6. Monitor Performance and Gather Continuous Feedback
Once you launch, the real work begins. The project isn’t over. United’s team will be watching usage stats, satisfaction scores, and the new service’s effect on their operational speed. You have to set up your own key performance indicators (KPIs) from day one, tracking things like adoption rate, average order value, CSAT scores for in-flight service, and even how it affects food waste.
Build some automated dashboards in a tool like Tableau or Microsoft Power BI so you can see these numbers in real time. But don’t just stare at charts. Keep asking for feedback through post-flight surveys and listen to what your customer service reps are hearing. This constant monitoring is what lets you make smart adjustments to the menu, the ordering window, or anything else. An effective CX strategy is always evolving.
United’s push for pre-order meals shows they get what modern travelers want: convenience, choice, and a bit of control. By analyzing pain points, designing for the user, and rolling out changes iteratively, any business can deploy similar improvements that make a real difference to the customer journey and earn genuine loyalty.
What is CX innovation?
It’s creating or implementing something new (a process, a technology, a service) with the specific goal of making a customer’s experience with your company noticeably better. It usually solves a known frustration or adds a new kind of convenience.
Why is customer journey mapping important for CX innovation?
Journey mapping gives you a complete picture of every interaction a customer has with you. It shows you exactly where things are going well and where they’re going badly, helping you find the perfect spot to introduce an innovation that will have the biggest effect.
How can businesses measure the success of a CX innovation?
You measure it with a mix of metrics. Look for higher customer satisfaction (CSAT) or Net Promoter Scores (NPS), better customer retention, and high adoption rates for the new feature. You can also look for a drop in complaints about the specific problem you were trying to solve or even gains in revenue.
What role does technology play in CX innovation?
Technology is usually the tool that makes the innovation possible. It’s what enables things like a mobile pre-order system, personalized suggestions, or AI-powered support bots. Tech is what allows you to deliver these better experiences efficiently and at a large scale.
Should CX innovations be rolled out company-wide immediately?
Almost never. It’s much safer and smarter to start with a pilot program. Testing your idea in a limited way (like on one route or with one customer group) lets you find and fix problems before a big, risky launch. It’s how you learn and adjust for a better final result.
