Seatfrog board · Wednesday 23 September 2026

Marketing update

Sheran Gale, Head of Growth Marketing

Where we started, and what changed

March 2026, when I joined: one message to everyone across 68 automated sends, and the two biggest campaigns held nobody back to measure against
Efficient today: three specialists hired, ten journeys designed, Marketing’s email and push moving onto one platform; one journey is live and six more ship in Q4, a quarter later than the June plan
Effective by the end of Q4: every channel on one platform and personalised in real time on the churn-risk score; in Q1 2027 the AI 1-to-1 decisioning engine takes one decision per customer

March 2026when I joined

We are here todayTodaySeptember 2026

End of Q4 2026December

Q1 2027

Customer experience

The message

Channels

People and process

Data and models

FragmentedLaying the foundation

“You don’t know me”

One size fits all: one message to everyone

Email and push, each on its own

Teams operate in silos; no specialist skill set

No model behind a send; 7,074 customers reached, nobody held back

EfficientBuilding capability+£115k net a year, modelled; ships Q4

“You know my stage, and what I just did”

Right message, right group

Email and push through Braze; Campaign Monitor, the app’s code-sent pushes and its own marketing cards still send on their own

Specialist skills hired; a cross-functional team, processes starting to form

Life-stage segments, personas and recency-frequency-value scoring; a 5% global holdout reads all marketing over time

EffectiveScaling efficiently+£164k net a year, modelled; churn prevention live

“You knew before I did”

Right message, right customer, at the right moment

Every channel on one platform, the in-app cards included: real-time orchestration and personalisation across email, push and in-app

Established process and turnaround times; end-to-end delivery run with AI agents

Churn-risk score live, propensity-to-return score Q4; every journey read against a 20% control group, the holdout

AgenticOne decision per customer, learning from every resultNot yet sized

“My personal travel agent”

Right experience: one conversation across every touchpoint

AI orchestration across every channel

End-to-end automation of the process and the ways of working

Real-time data and machine learning; the AI 1-to-1 decisioning engine, built in-house (needed)

The foundations

Ten journeys stand on six foundations: four built in-house in one quarter, two landing in Q4

The layers a mature CRM operation runs, from insight to attribution, in our words and with our status. The build layer is new: an AI pipeline Engineering built with Design, so a journey goes from brief to built email with a person approving each step.

Know the customer

Every send audited: 804 campaigns and automated messages, 68 live, across three systems. The funnel read from the warehouse, four leaks. Customer feedback read every week. 60 moments across the customer’s life, each with its job, its barrier, its number and the customer’s words.

Built

Decide who gets what

Life-stage segments, personas and recency-frequency-value scoring. The churn-risk score, scored nightly; the propensity-to-return score from Analytics in Q4. A 20% holdout on every journey and a 5% global holdout.

Built; the second score Q4

Ten journeys in four programmes

Each moment assigned to one journey; each journey briefed and designed across email, push and in-app. Email and push on Braze today; the app’s cards and Campaign Monitor join in Q4, which brings real-time orchestration.

One live; six by December; three in Q1 2027

The right message and offer

Each moment’s job, barrier and the customer’s words set the message. Win-back offers wait on the propensity score; one decision per customer comes with the AI decisioning engine, built in-house, in Q1 2027.

December to Q1 2027

Build and deliver

Campaign Studio, the AI pipeline Engineering built with Design in under three weeks, live since 7 September: a journey pack in; the brief, copy, wireframes, images and HTML out; a person approves each step. A new email design system in October; every journey built in Braze behind its holdout.

Live; design system October

Read the lift

Every journey read against its holdout, one measure each. First reads in November; the model re-sized on them in December. The global holdout reads all marketing over time.

First reads November

Built or live Ships in Q4 Waits on a model or a date

Campaign Studio: Engineering and Design, kick-off 20 August, version 0 live 7 September, a week ahead of plan; the email design system plan of 16 September. Journey dates as the roadmap carries them.

How the journeys were built

60 moments and ten journeys, mapped and designed in-house in one quarter

Agencies sell this map, and the Booking.com version below is one. Ours was built here, so the capability stays in the team.

The moment map, all 13 stages of the customer's life — **Ours** · 60 moments across the customer’s life, built in-house in a quarter from the live record.

Booking.com experience map, VML — **The agency version** · the same map, built for Booking.com by VML.

One journey in depth · churn prevention, live from 22 September

Before this journey, a customer could go quiet for 49 days before anything happened, and then it was a timer, not a signal

Nothing at allDays 1 to 49

For the first 49 days of a slip nothing watches the customer and nothing is sent.

The slip is invisible to us while it is still cheap to fix

The same push to everyoneDay 50, on a calendar

09:41

Seatfrog nowGot a trip coming up soon?

A calendar timer, not a signal: it fires whether they slipped or not

The same email to everyoneDay 50, the same day

Today’s day-50 email, the same to everyone

The same to everyone, and the weekly seasonal email lands the same week

1 in 4 active buyers goes quiet every month, 40,276 in August, and until this journey the slip went unnoticed for 49 days.

1 in 4 and 40,276: Marketing’s read, August’s active buyers at the measured monthly rate of going quiet, for Analytics to confirm; 49 days: the Journey 8 audit of today’s sends.

Churn prevention, live from 22 September · one personalised save the day after the score rises, one reminder if unseen, then silence to day 60

What ships next · turning losing bidders into returning bidders, November

Today every losing bidder meets the same four things, whoever they are and however they lost

The pushesIn the auction

17:41

Seatfrog nowYou’ve been outbid.

Seatfrog nowJust a few minutes left to bid.

Seatfrog nowBidding has ended.

Three fixed pushes, built into the app before Braze, the same words whatever they bid

The lost screenAt the close

One closed screen, the same for everyone: a buy-now price, and no reason to bid again

The recovery email30 minutes after

One message, whoever lost and however they lost

The campaignOn a schedule

Sent to everyone on a calendar, unrelated to the loss

Losing reads as a dead end: 81% of customers do not bid again after one loss*, and the one recovery email reached about 20 of the 14,800 who lose an auction each month, because its entry rule let almost nobody in.

*81%: Marketing’s read from the Journey 4 pack, for Analytics to confirm the population and window. 14,800 a month: Analytics’ figure, Q4 2026 Marketing Model.

Losing bidders into returning bidders, from November · a straight account of the close and one reason to bid again, from their own history

What ships when

The first of ten journeys is live and carries about £39k of the £64k the Q4 launches drive, £43k of it landing inside Q4; the first seasonal wave has been sent; six more journeys ship in November and December; sized at benchmark lift rates

Live Ships Waits on a model or a date

Upgrades only; incremental over a 20% holdout; Q4 2026 Marketing Model, 21 September; lift rates confirmed by Analytics; nothing measured yet.

October

November

December

Q1 2027

ActivateDrive the First Win: turn intent into a first transaction

Turn losing bidders into returning bidders

Prompt the first purchase

Recover the abandoned upgrade

GrowBuild the Habit Loop: turn one win into a habit

Turn the first win into a second

Deliver the First Class experience, and referrals: sizing with Analytics

DefendReactivation: catch the first slip while a save is cheap

Churn prevention: catch the first slip

RecoverReactivation: win back the lapsed

Seasonal reactivation: the never-bought wave, sent

Seasonal reactivation: the buyers’ wave

Win back lapsed customers: offers wait on the propensity-to-return score

AcquireScale Efficient Acquisition: capture the demand that exists, then create it

Search and AI visibility on the current site, 31 October

App store page

Boosted organic social: £2,500 a month

Rebuilt website, phase 1, 19 December

Partner launch go-to-market, Trip.com first

What the engine needsBuild the Lifecycle Engine: who builds each piece, and what it makes possible

Churn-risk score: live, scores nightly (Analytics)

Propensity-to-return score: sizes the win-back offers (Analytics, Q4)

Live data feed, warehouse to Braze: real-time triggers

AI 1-to-1 decisioning engine, built in-house

Net revenue driven: £64k in Q4, £43k landing inside itby month of launch, modelled

£13.7k

£20.3k

£29.7k

the rest lands in 2027

Q4 2026 Marketing Model (21 Sep): net revenue driven by each month’s launches, the journeys and acquisition together, and by each programme. Journey dates as the strategy page’s journey table carries them.

The marketing funnel

29,665 sign-ups in August, all organic; the gap is the middle of the funnel, where people decide to try us, and nothing of ours works it yet

The plan

Awareness

Not in the plan

Consideration

Boosted organic social from November: a boost budget of about £2,500 a month behind the posts that already travel, ours and creators’; a creator programme paid per referral, proposed after the first read

Conversion

Search and AI visibility in October, the app store page in November, the rebuilt website on 19 December

Loyalty loop

The full lifecycle engine live by the end of December, every journey behind a 20% holdout

What customers already post about us, unpaid

752,000 playsMay 2024 · @holidayexpert on InstagramA creator with 660,000 followers on our Secret Fares with TransPennine Express: “I’ve found another secret train hack”

204,300 playsMay 2025 · a customer on TikTokA customer’s first-class upgrade, filmed for her followers, with her own Seatfrog referral code in the caption, unprompted

63,500 playsOctober 2023 · a customer on TikTok“The only way I want to travel from now on. It made my trip so much better”

The second source of growth: distribution partners, Trip.com first, sell the upgrade where the ticket is sold.

Sign-ups: the Data for Board Reporting sheet, August 2026. Plays and dates as shown on TikTok and Instagram on 21 September 2026; none paid for by us. The order is the plan’s: the loyalty loop first, consideration next.

Appendix