Must Read Presentation Tips is a post from: The Resort Marketing Blog written by Eric Hoffman.

Pretty slick eh, and it shows how the fourth and first quarter of the year look like ski jumps up and down to a point just before the end of the calendar year. Another neat component to this chart is the smaller graph on the bottom showing news reference volume – how often “ski vacation” appeared in news stories indexed by Google. It doesn’t show the trend I would expect of stories appearing slightly before the ski season.

Another nifty function is the ability to compare multiple terms (separate them using commas in the search box) at the same time. I decided to compare a couple of Vermont resorts over the past year and got these results:

Scale is based on the average traffic of stowe from United States in the last 12 months.
stowe 1.00, killington 0.50, sugarbush 0.18, okemo 0.25

I think this chart shows both the positive and shortcomings of this service. First, isn’t it awesome how you can compare brand specific keyword searches on the biggest search engine? On the other hand, simple comparisons like this can expose issues, like how I’ve managed to capture a bunch of town of Stowe related searches in this comparison, while the others are more centric to resorts. This isn’t something that can’t be overcome, but you need to be cognizant of other potential reasons people might be searching for our terms before reading too much into results.

One last really useful trick to use with Google Trends is to switch from comparing searches to comparing websites, this is a bit more difficult in the ski resort business as there aren’t many resort website with enough traffic to appear consistently in these results, but I highly recommend keeping this as well as the other trend related searches in your bag of tricks

Google Trends Ski Searches is a post from: The Resort Marketing Blog written by Eric Hoffman.

Digging a little deeper, VR reveals that they’ve done some serious work in bringing their RFID pass scanning technology to the real-time web as a way to bypass some of the issues that Ski Resort have with LBS (Location Based Service). Namely:

• The lack of consistent cell service
• The difficulty of using mobile device GPSs
• The trouble of battery drain with electronic devices in cold weather.
• The fact that only a certain number of consumer will have smart phones with GPS technology with them.

Of course, RFID cards have been in use for Track Your Turn type services by many resorts for quite some time now, see:

• Mt Bachelor
• Solitude
• Alta

What Vail has done is make their database accessible in a more real-time environment via web and mobile interfaces along with giving users the ability to share their “on-mountain” information very readily to social networks. They’ve also taken the “gaming” component of the major Geo-location services and added “several hundred” badges to be collected by users.

A big component that isn’t available via RFID, or at least how Vail appears to have setup their system is knowing exactly what run a customer has traversed, at what speed and if they’ve gotten lost and are stuck on the mountain – unless of course the customer is stuck at the base of a lift, because that, at least from the sound of it, it the only place that a customer is physically scanned. Once a customer is scanned at the base of a particular lift, it’s simple to calculate that they’ll reach top of that lift and then have X number of options to ski or ride to any other lift – of course you could ride to the base and off the mountain, but unless you make sure to check in somewhere or walk off through some sort of scanner, the system will have to assume that you wound up at the same base that you originally started at. Just a bit of conjecture, but it does show some of the limitations of just using RFID.

I imagine that VR could face some of the challenges that many LBS companies are working through, which is the fact that many people, probably a lot of the higher worth folks that spend the most money on ski vacations, don’t like sharing their location. Perhaps they’ll enjoy tracking their vertical on their own, but I do wonder if this app can move past the “geek love” stage and into a place where it’s able to demonstrably show ROI? That said, I’m a “geek” and very happy to see a large resort operator with resources like VR’s making a strong commitment to developing socially centric and unique to ski resort applications – kudos!

Doing a Little “Mixing” is a post from: The Resort Marketing Blog written by Eric Hoffman.

Resorts can only have some much influence what their guests do. The opposite is true of their employees and the resorts I have knowledge of are very conscious about HR policies in this regard and, at least in my opinion, have really done a fine job of separating the element of drug culture that there is in resort towns, from the resort workforce. I’m sure the Australian resorts where this bust happened have controls in place, but should and how could they react to show that they have taken measures to try to prevent people involved in theses sorts of things from gaining employment at their resorts?

Photo credit: Flickr user Aschaf (hmm, are those clouds, or….?)

Ski Area “Sting” Down Under is a post from: The Resort Marketing Blog written by Eric Hoffman.

Makes the long hours of late summer seem not so bad…I can’t wait how about you?!

Are you ready? is a post from: The Resort Marketing Blog written by Eric Hoffman.

Ski resorts. Some resorts focus more on family activities than others. Among the most popular amenities is a slope-side “village center” that offers skating, dining, rentals, ski school and kids’ club in one convenient location. Beaver Creek, Colo.; Whistler, British Columbia, Canada; Northstar, Calif.; Stowe, Vt.; and several other resorts have them. Beaver Creek’s elaborate system of escalators in its village is frequently cited by parents of ski-boot-wearing children as their favorite feature. Beaver Creek and Colorado’s Snowmass, with its huge “Kids’ Treehouse,” were ranked in the top five family-friendly resorts by Ski Magazine. Beaver Creek is one of the priciest areas. Snowmass offerings start at $500,000-plus and run into seven figures. More-affordable options: California’s Northstar-at-Tahoe ski resort has a new village center with ice rink and “Mommy, Daddy and Me” ski school packages. Condos in the Village at Northstar start just under $300,000.

Are family-centric offerings key to a successful ski resort, or are they just one more pricey gimmick that may lure in a few people but isn’t truly a way to build a long term and sustainable business?

Photo credit: Flickr user dhgoodman

Second Home Market Rebounding? is a post from: The Resort Marketing Blog written by Eric Hoffman.

I know that these people are doing a lot more that Tweeting, but I find it interesting to see, at least on one social network, a rudimentary gauge of reach (followers) and a self-described gauge of influence (Tweetlevel). Only in the case of MTV does it seem as though the person is really making inroads, at least on Twitter.

This fairly meager success hasn’t slowed companies from trying to leverage social mediaites by offering “jobs” or opportunities to be a “blogger”. Here’s a quick rundown of a few options:

*I did a quick check on a suite at the WA and at $500/nt that’s over $60k just in lodging!

What does this mean? I’m not sure, perhaps these sorts of contests are really successful and more companies are following suit because of the success? Or are companies not completely sure of what direction they should take in the social space and these sorts of promotions are relatively easy to create and manage? Or, is it a something else? If you have an opinion please share it in the comments section below – I look forward to hearing your ideas!

Interesting “Job” Postings is a post from: The Resort Marketing Blog written by Eric Hoffman.

I would bet that there are a lot of people that wouldn’t be thinking of Urbanspoon when they think about social networks – I would also bet that those people are not in the restaurant business. With their iPhone, Android and widget (see below):

Urbanspoon has set the bar for apps that allow users to choose where to eat based upon their location and some fun user selectable, or completely random options. BTW, the widget doesn’t allow for settings outside most major metropolitan areas, so you’ll need to select Park City and lock it in the first column to see the options for here.

If you haven’t used Urbanspoon, it is a fun way way to choose dining options, even where you live, but even better when you’re travelling. It’s ability to select a restaurant and then see reviews is unique and this is what, in my mind makes it appealing to ski resorts that wish to add another dimension to how they market their food and beverage options online. Particularly once a visitors is leaving the mountain, they are no longer captive to the food choices at the on-mountain restaurants, so why not ensure that your restaurant is listed in Urbanspoon?!

In terms of ski resorts, I’m not sure of any that have made a concerted effort to get their dining properties listed on Urbanspoon, if you know of any, please let us know in the comments!

Social Networks for Ski Resorts – Urbanspoon is a post from: The Resort Marketing Blog written by Eric Hoffman.

As Dolphins cornerback Vontae Davis, whose grandmother is one of his Twitter followers, told the Sun-Sentinel: “I’m not going to put anything on there that my grandmother won’t want to see.”

This certainly is just another reason for ski resorts to ensure that they’re putting together appropriate guidelines and resources for their employees, because this winter will only see more people posting to social media from their workplace on the mountain, whether it’s playing in powder, people dangling from lifts, getting caught up on them or nearly getting blown off of them.

8/18/10 edit – Just wanted to note that I wrote this post last weekend, well before the recent Brett Favre “un-retirement”.

Photo credit: Flickr user xoque and modified via CC2.0 Attribution

What can Ski Resorts Learn from Professional Sports about Social Media? is a post from: The Resort Marketing Blog written by Eric Hoffman.

The key to this concept is that Twitter was built as a service that was to be updated as well as to send updates to users via text. Now the cool part about this is that Twitter doesn’t charge users to have their updates sent via text to those users who sign up for them. This has always been possible, all someone would have to do is to go to that particular Twitter users’ page and then click on the icon to start receiving texts whenever that user updates – just remember that some people tweet a lot so beware of what accounts you follow in this manner. Speaking of text, there are a bunch of commands that you can send via text to Twitter including:

Turning Mobile Twitter Updates Off and On

• ON: turns ALL your authorized Twitter updates and notifications on.
• OFF: turns off all updates except direct messages. Send STOP again to turn off direct messages too.
• STOP, QUIT, End, Cancel, Arret or Unsubscribe: turns ALL phone notifications off.
• ON username: turns on notifications for a specific person on your phone. Example: ON alissa
• OFF username: turns off notifications for a specific person on your phone. Example: OFF blaine
• FOLLOW username: this command allows you to start following a specific user, as well as receive SMS notifications. Example: FOLLOW jerry
• LEAVE username: this command allows you to stop receiving SMS notifications for a specific user. Example: LEAVE benfu

Fun Stuff: friends, favorites, and stats!

Use the commands below to send private messages, favorite Tweets, and more.

• @username + message
  

Reply: shows your Tweet as a reply directed at another person, and causes your twitter to save in their “replies” tab.
Example: @meangrape I love that song too!

• D username + message

Direct Message: sends a person a private message that goes to their device, and saves in their web archive.
Example: d krissy want to pick a Jamba Juice for me while you’re there?

• RT username

Retweet: sends another user’s latest Tweet to your followers. Example: RT Charles

• SET LOCATION placename

Updates the location field in your profile. Example: set location San Francisco

• WHOIS username

Retrieves the profile information for any public user on Twitter. Example: whois jack

• GET username

Retrieves the latest Twitter update posted by the person. Example: get goldman

• FAV username

Marks that user’s last Tweet as one of your favorites. (hint: reply to any update with FAV to mark it as a favorite if you’re receiving it in real time)

Example: fav crystal

• STATS

This command returns your number of followers, how many people you’re following, and your bio information.

The above information was found in Twitter’s Help Center.

Now, with Twitter’s new Fast Follow option, a user doesn’t even need a Twitter account to use many of these command, and all they have to do to receive, say a snow report from @snowreport (just as an example) is to text “Follow snowreport” to 40404. Then “Off” “Stop” or “Leave” to turn the updates off. Now, only some of the above noted commands will work without a setup account, but it’s certainly a great way for someone to test out Twitter. And the best part is that businesses can really easily take advantage of these features now that users don’t need accounts. All a business needs to do is say “Text ‘Follow’ [whatever account they have] to 40404″ and away things go. The last really neat part of this is that there are plenty of services like Twitterfeed.com that will take existing RSS feeds and modify them and post to Twitter so you don’t even need to crack into Twitter’s API to have something like a snow report pushed to Twitter generated SMSs. I don’t see a lot of problems in going this route aside from the fact that Twitter hasn’t ever been 100% dependable in its service, and it seems like the “Fail Whale” still shows up on a regular basis, so I wouldn’t recommend using Twitter for anything that is absolutely mission critical. But other than that, who’s up for snow reports via text using Twitter?!

How to set up a “free” snow report text message service (using Twitter) is a post from: The Resort Marketing Blog written by Eric Hoffman.

There’s a recent article in the NY Times called, “But Will it Make you Happy?” which describes people who’ve cut way back on their consumption and focused on paying down their debt and living for experiences and not for material possessions. In buying a possession we get only a momentary “buzz” when we first use the item, but then over time we become acclimated to it and need to buy something else to get our fix. For this reason, the article postulates that experiences provide us more happiness in that they,

provide a bigger pop than things is that they can’t be absorbed in one gulp — it takes more time to adapt to them and engage with them than it does to put on a new leather jacket or turn on that shiny flat-screen TV.

A few year ago I read a lovely book called, “The Geography of Bliss: One Grump’s Search for the Happiest Places in the World” (disclaimer – this is an Amazon Affiliate link) in which Eric Weiner travels around the world in search of the happiest place as well as looking into the growing field of the study of happiness itself. Probably one of the best insight’s provided is that one of the secrets of happiness is not thinking about it. Which in a lot of ways is exactly what the NY Times article is referring to – stop thinking about what might make you happy and get off the couch and go do it. Personally, I love to ski, preferably in several feet of fresh Utah powder, but in any case that is certainly a time and place where I most certainly am very happy.  I could worry about getting a new set of skis each year, or new boots or a new helmet but those are only tools to help me find the joy I have when I’m sliding down the slopes.

I wonder if ski resorts could do a better job of appealing to this side of our visitors in our marketing efforts? After all, a ski trip is definitely an experience that people will remember and yearn for well after they return home. There are many tools available to do such a thing ranging from social networks to more traditional CRM techniques. In the meantime, ask yourself this, what = happiness for you?

Photo credit: Flickr user Martina Rathgens

Skiing (or snowboarding) = Happiness is a post from: The Resort Marketing Blog written by Eric Hoffman.

It’s a pretty bad call to action to have dates that are a week past in an online ad execution, particularly when it’s so simple and easy to set flight dates and switch out creative. For ski resorts this is particularly important when promoting flash sales, season opening/closing and special events – be sure your creative is timely and either pulled or updated when it’s out of date!

Online Ad Creative – Remember to Switch it Out is a post from: The Resort Marketing Blog written by Eric Hoffman.

On the other side of the coin, the outdoor industry is booming. This can be readily seen with the recent Outdoor Retailer show in Utah drawing huge crowds of both exhibitors and attendees. According to a Salt Lake Tribune article, the Outdoor Industry Association is “…seeing six percent growth across all sectors” with some businesses seeing double digit growth! Particularly when superimposed upon the US’s economic troubles, these are indeed impressive numbers.

What do these two opposite tales mean for winter resorts and snow sliding sports? I think it’s an optimistic message with a tint of caution. From golf, we can see that we should be careful of resting on our laurels and ensure that we continue to invest in the new and different like terrain parks and snowboarding. From the outdoor industry I think we can see that people are still willing to spend and to spend on the higher end of the spectrum if they feel that they’re getting something of value – so don’t feel compelled to discount to generate volume.

Are there any other industries that you think winter resorts should be taking some lessons from? Tell us in the comments below!

Photo credit: Flickr user MarkWallace

Golf is Down – Outdoor Industry is Up – What Does this Mean for Snow Sports? is a post from: The Resort Marketing Blog written by Eric Hoffman.

A wonderful website to see the impact of online teting is a website called Anne Holland’s Which Test Won? One of my favorite tests from the site is one in which Delta tested a form vs a grid, this one was a bit obvious to me (particularly as a fairly frequent user of the Delta website), but there are tons more, along a new test to guess at each week.

As I’ve mentioned before, I look at this blog as a way to test various ideas for myself. An example of this is my posting schedule which I upped to once every other day earlier this summer. I’ve noticed that this has provided more views as well as more RSS views, but it’s still been limited to Monday through Friday with minimal traffic on the weekends. This isn’t unexpected as the topics I cover are ones that I think are more relevant to the work week. So, I’ve recently changed to posting on Monday, Wednesday and Friday to see if this schedule makes for more consistent traffic. Guess what this is – A TEST! We’ll see how it does in another month or so…I’m predicting the three posts per week schedule will have more consistent readership than once every other day – what do you think?!

Photo credit: Flickr user Horia Varlan

Do you test? is a post from: The Resort Marketing Blog written by Eric Hoffman.

I haven’t attended a PhoCusWright event yet, but I’ve heard and read many wonderful things about them, and I see that they’re promoting a chance to get $500 off the conference registration fee simply by leaving a comment on their Chaos Calls video page. If you’re still not convinced, take a peak at the full conference schedule and then tell me that this doesn’t look like a kick butt event – I hope to see you in Phoenix in November!

The Resort Marketing Blog is Going on the Road is a post from: The Resort Marketing Blog written by Eric Hoffman.