Our current Reader Meter features questions about the use of social media by frequent flyers. We ran a similar poll in March 2011.

In 2011, 47.5 percent of those responding said it is extremely important for staff from the various programs to be present in online communities like Milepoint and FlyerTalk. This year, 50 percent said it was extremely important, confirming that a good portion of people find this type of interaction by the programs important.

When it comes to the programs creating their own online communities, 23.5 percent in 2011 saw this as extremely important while 18 percent see it as extremely important this year.

Comparing the two years, people are still not likely to reach out via Twitter or Facebook to address a concern, at 82 percent in 2014 and 76.9 percent in 2011 saying they have not done so. If our rather unscientific polls are a true indication of the time spent online chasing down information about frequent travel programs, then people aren’t spending as much time as they did in the past–only 4.5 percent this year admit to spending more than five hours per week visiting online communities, while in 2011, 11.5 percent admitted to spending more than five hours per week. In both years, approximately 10 percent of people didn’t have a clue how much time they spent.