Comments on: Earning Miles with Delta and Partners

By: jaydeeus13

jaydeeus13 — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 15:00:59 +0000

I was recently on the hiltonhonors website and noticed that you can exchange Hilton honors points for Skymiles but not vice versa. It would be pretty nice to have the option to exchange Skymiles for Hilton honors points. Just a suggestion!

By: deatkins

deatkins — Tue, 19 May 2009 23:42:20 +0000

So here is something I would like to see discussed. I get varying answers from Delta and NW. How will the Elite levels for customers be determine for 2010. There are statements on both Delta and NWA website implying that if you have both NW and Delta accounts that the elite quality miles will be combined together to determine status for 2010. But I can’t get anyone to say this on the phone. I know several people who have been assuming this to be the case and thus assuming they could you either account during this coming year and that it made no difference. But if this is not the case then some one with 49,000 miles on Delta and 49,000 on Delta would end up Silver.

Please clarify and let especially NW Elite customer know.

By: Jayo Z

Jayo Z — Sun, 25 Jan 2009 02:54:46 +0000

As for how the “Ways to Earn Miles” section is laid out, I absolutely love it. It’s clear and really well organized. I recommend that you leave it as it is; don’t change a thing. The current notifications are good; it would be nice, I guess, to be informed when new partners are added.
Now for actually earning miles:
I’m already using eMiles and eRewards to get miles; I really like them because they’re easy and rewarding.
In general, the best solutions must benefit Delta AND the customer. While earning SkyMiles would be the customers’ reward, Delta must earn something in return as compensation for the earned miles.
Right off the bat, I would say hold a contest or two – but rather than on delta.com main site, contain them to specific groups, such as those on the email newsletter mailing list or (better yet) here on the blog. Yes, a lot of conditions would have to be worked out, but I think it would greatly increase web traffic to all branches of the delta.com domain (I’d offer some more ideas, but I need to finish something and I also don’t want to write more than a page here (I’m planning on getting close ). Can I email you?) Note that you used to have something like this: the Reader Reward in the Delta Sky Magazine (off-topic question: WHAT HAPPENED TO IT?? ): Though contests would not immediately produce huge rewards for Delta, web traffic is almost guaranteed to increase; with that added publicity, there is potential for more sources of revenue.
Other things that work are refer-a-friend schemes, where one specific user (in this case, a SkyMiles program member) informs a non-member individual of the program; that individual joins the program and indicates that the aforementioned user informed him/her of the program. I’m pretty sure you’ve had things like this in the past, but they’re really great sources of new membership and easy miles. You should require that the referred members earn at least 500 miles (equivalent to one flight, or these could be earned in other ways) before the referring user is rewarded in order to make sure that people don’t just create new email accounts and sign up just to earn free miles; in other words, have a minimum accrual requirement before rewarding in order to ensure the integrity of the accounts.
I have so many other ideas, but I’ll let my fellow readers give theirs. After all, great minds think alike!

By: paparazzi1983

paparazzi1983 — Sat, 24 Jan 2009 21:31:04 +0000

um, I guess the biggest problem I have with SkyMiles is using them is sorta hard. And somewhat complicated.

Also trying to earn miles with partners outside the airlines is iffy. Having to remember which merchants take the skymiles card, and under what condition, doesn’t really make for an easy experience. I could recommend that maybe setting up a quick mobile-phone (prefferably iPhone) compatible SkyMiles site (say, a m.skymiles.com) with quick access to ways to get miles -> show businesses and have them in either alphabetical order or categorized.

Notifications on when a new vendor is added would be nice, maybe by email with very limited information? Like just a quick note mentioning you added this vendor and what kind of miles you can make with them.

I hope that helps… Aloha

By: HWGeek

HWGeek — Sat, 24 Jan 2009 03:07:04 +0000

I do this all the time with 1800flowers.

But I am a bit confused by the wording.

1-800-FLOWERS.COM
Earn:

10 miles for every $1 spent. Mention code 43M with the order.
50 miles per order for Silver and Gold Medallion® members. Mention code 43S with the order.
100 miles for Platinum Medallion members. Mention code 43P with the order.

So does that mean, if I use 43M, I will get 10 miles per 1 dollar spent?
If I use 43S (which I have been but so far hasn’t updated) do I get 50 miles per dollar spent or 50 miles for the order or 10 miles per 1 dollar spent plus 50?

Also the Samsonite link works but it says the offer has expired

By: FlyDelta

FlyDelta — Fri, 23 Jan 2009 22:52:34 +0000

There are many ways to improve the “Special Offers” section of Delta.com. Just look at Continental.com. Once you log-in to Continental.com, you can see all the available offers and easily register for those of interest. On Delta.com most of the offers are never posted. The Delta special offers that are listed on MileMaven.com, can not be found on Delta.com.