These are the top 16 resort marketing lessons I want to learn in 2016.
Gregg Blanchard /
Back when I first started SlopeFillers I used to share lists of topics I hoped to study, learn about, and eventually master.
This included things like pricing, product strategy, and branding.
But despite feeling more and more novice the deeper I get into the world of resort marketing, I haven’t shared one of these lists publicly for a while. So today, I am.
#1) Social “Lurkers”
I recently shared how many people are active in terms of posting, but I’m hoping to learn more about the rest. Are there lurkers who still see your tweets?
#2) Impact of Weather
One thing I’m hoping to understand better is the tradeoff skiers make between weather risk and advanced-purchase risk.
#3) Video Play Counts
With each platform (YouTube, Vimeo, Facebook, etc.) measuring play counts a little bit differently, I want to better understand how 1,000 plays on each stack up in terms of value.
#4) Psychology of Trail Counts / Acreage
I keep hearing skiers talk about getting “bored” at smaller mountains. I want to better understand the psychology behind why when the data show most skiers ski the same runs/lifts over and over.
#5) Pricing Strategy
It was on my first lists and it’s still there: I simply want to get better at the dynamics of pricing strategy.
#6) Content Curation
One big one I want to learn is if there’s a place for resorts to do more real content curation and less creation.
#7) Bloggers
I’m a blogger, yet I often feel less-than-confident as I talk to and deal with other bloggers in a marketing or partnership situation. I want to get more views and better education on this outreach.
#8) Resurfacing Old Content
Just like you, I have a lot of old content that still carries value. I want to learn ways we both can extract that value.
#9) Email as Distribution
On that note, I’m intrigued by ways email is being used as a content distribution channel and I want to better understand the best practices within that.
#10) Paid Social Reach
I’ve dabbled, but many of you are pros. Through both more experimentation and learning from you, I want to better understand the ins and outs of paid social promotion.
#11) Press Releases
It’s something I’m not the best at but can be huge when done right. I want to learn more about what goes into a really successful press release and release distribution.
#12) Web App Lessons
Web apps and SaaS have become a massive, well-tuned industry. I feel like there is a lot we can learn from that movement and, as you guessed, I hope to learn it.
#13) Scaling Great Service
Some resorts, even tiny operations, have it dialed. Others simply lack an semblance of guest concern. I want to better understand how/why which is which.
#14) Print Media
This list is clear evidence of how web-heavy I am with my efforts. I really want to better understand what resorts are doing that’s working in print media.
#15) TV Commercials
Same with TV. I know resorts put out commercials, but they are so hard to find when ads are so hard to see outside of a specific market. I want to understand who is doing TV and how they’re succeeding.
#16) Why People Ski
I feel like we all think we know why people ski but the deeper, hidden reasons are just that, hidden. There’s some powerful stuff in our motivations to shred, and I want to learn more about them.
Have any personal learning goals you hope to tackle in 2016?
Let’s hear ’em!