Thank you for everything!

Out&About Marketing is going through some exciting changes. Stay tuned for more in the coming  weeks and months.

Enjoy your Thanksgiving!

The time has come to close this chapter and open another one which is pursuing my marketing and entrepreneur dreams, and helping other companies in the world achieve similar and bigger successes through clever marketing, smart social media and connecting with customers online – the purpose of Out&About Marketing.

I’m very proud of what Diamond Peak has accomplished in the past 10 years. It took an incredibly strong team to make all of this possible and I’m proud and fortunate to have been a part of it.

• Branding – Your Tahoe Place for Kids was born and grew to be a perfect match for the ski resort resonating extremely well with our guests. Lila Lapanja, who learned to ski at Diamond Peak at the age of 2, featured for years on our billboards is now a part of the U.S. Ski Team’s Development Team — an honor bestowed on only 10 women in the country. Someone once said: “Marketing is too important to be left to the marketing department alone”. Many, many people were involved in this process from within as well as from the outside, EXL Media and Whistler Creative to mention a couple.

• Happy Customers – Happy customers is why businesses continue to exist not because of billboards or marketing. Diamond Peak is fortunate to have many happy customers who relate to the branding message and enjoy their time at the resort. The resort has received hundreds and thousands of positive testimonials over the years: “…your employees are the BEST!”, “the view will amaze you”, “great skiing for everyone”, “this place is wonderful”, “five star experience”, “kid friendly”, “This is a fantastic place for new skiers and especially families with kids to come and enjoy the beauty of the Sierras together!”

You can read all of the reviews on Yelp here. Our guests love Diamond Peak and they keep coming back for more. It’s not unusual that we will see 3 generations on the mountain. All these testimonials just confirm what we, the staff at Diamond Peak already know – it’s a special place. I will definitely miss the view from the top of Crystal, loving referred to as the “office view”:

• Record Breaking Revenues – all that love and positive feedback has resulted in great business for Diamond Peak. Without sharing our numbers, I just have to say we had a fantastic 3-4 years ride during tough economic times in the midst of two bankrupt states.

• Major Capital Improvements – I saw a few gigantic projects at Diamond Peak, starting with a new high speed lift, a major upgrade to the Base Lodge and a brand new Skier Services Building last year.

Top Station of Crystal Express

Base Lodge Remodeled

New Skier Services Building

• Multiple Marketing Awards – throughout the years, we enjoyed receiving many marketing awards for creativity, cohesive marketing campaigns and social media from the American Marketing Association, ADDY, Hermes. Again, it took a great team to make this possible!

• Special Events – we had so much fun creating and executing from wacky (Dummy Downhill), to fun (Poker Run), as well as competitive (Vertical Challenge), early morning races (Uphill Race), cause related (Special Olympics, Race to Beat Cancer, MS races), kids focused (terrain park comps) and of course a ski resort is not a ski resort without some alcohol related special events (Absolut party, restaurant promotions and Last Tracks).

• Friends for Life – I’ve met amazing people over the years and too many to list them all here.  Just to mention a few from the main crew at Diamond Peak: Ed Youmans, our fearless leader, who’s off to a new challenge in New Jersey, Mike Bandelin, happiest guy on the mountain, a natural born leader whom I admire, Bee Ferrato, the ever smiling, kids loving Kiwi, Jay Abdo, our super sales manager with a dry sense of humor, Barb Archer, whose fate brought her to Diamond Peak and the sport of skiing and she’s mastering marketing and web, PK, Jack, Brian, Tom, Dave, Dennis, Carl, Walter, and many other folks from the entire company. You guys all rock. It was a pleasure to work with such professional and happy people. Keep up the positive attitude and don’t let a couple of bad characters get to you.

As for me, it’s time to move on to what I have always aspired to do in my life and run my own business. I’m going full speed ahead with Out&About Marketing and pursuing my other passions in life of being in the outdoors, staying healthy and fit and enjoying life to the fullest.

Chao for now.

I found this valuable ebook compiled by Seth Godin that contains short and to the point thoughts from some of the best known leaders in business and marketing. It’s a must read for people who need to stay focused, figure out their priorities and stay clear with their objectives.

My recommendation is – find time to disconnect, recharge and sleep. Concentrate on what’s really important to you – like your health, family and well-being. Without them, you have nothing.

Download the book now. You deserve it.

Enjoy!

1. The Cause -  Special Olympics. Special Olympics provides year-round sports training and competition in a variety of Olympic-type sports for children and adults with intellectual disabilities.

2. Special Olympics history – The concept for Special Olympics was born in the early 1960s when Eunice Kennedy Shriver started a day camp for people with developmental disabilities at her home in Rockville, Maryland. The first International Special Olympics Games were held in 1968 at Soldier Field, Chicago with 1,000 athletes with intellectual disabilities from 26 states and Canada.

Mrs. Shriver’s vision has grown into one of the largest and most successful sports and volunteer organizations in the world. There are Chapters in every state of America and in more than 140 countries worldwide serving more than one-million Special Olympics athletes.

3. Special Olympics Northern California is proud to serve more than 13,000 individuals with intellectual disabilities.

4. Diamond Peak and Hyatt Regency Lake Tahoe have been the proud sponsor for Special Olympics two years in a row. This event receives support from the community and many IVGID and Hyatt employees.

5. My pledge - My goal is to raise at least $5,500 for this organization and I’m counting on your support.

6. It’s a party! – On March 6th, come to the Hyatt pier and watch me jump in the freezing waters of Lake Tahoe. Temperature is around 40F (4C). Brrrrrrrr!!!!!! Bring your cameras! I will need your support.Even better, sign up to jump in with me.

7. Please, donate. Every little bit will help me reach my goal. You can donate online here.

8. Spread the word. We can do it together. Let’s use social media, online and personal networks and let’s raise some money. These kids need it. We can all help.

Are you in?

For those of you that are not aware of the situation described here, the original post is located here. After a few Tweets with the Chrysler Twitter team and the blog post, I was personally contacted by Chrysler’s Customer Service department which was definitely a step in the right direction.  A few emails and phone conversations with them later, they offered us to replace the truck, and expedited the build and the delivery. The end result is, we are back in a new Dodge truck we absolutely love and very, very satisfied with the way Chrysler handled the entire process from the initial phone call.

I would specially like to thank the Chrysler’s Twitter team and the Customer Service Department at Chrysler Corporation with one individual whose name should remain a secret for privacy issues. This person completely understands customer service and acts on customer’s behalf. Everyone we had contact with at Chrysler believes in the power of social media and how it could affect a company of their size.  I hope to be able to generate ten times more positive outreach for them than the original negative post I wrote.  Based on this personal experience, it’s clear to me that Chrysler is committed to delivering great customer service.

A few lessons learned from this:

1. Social Media has provided a new medium for people to voice their opinions and corporations now need to listen and respond accordingly in new places.

2. A company should be consistent across all channels when it comes to dealing with customers. Certainly, social media participants may expect a much faster response than a snail mail or telephone call but they should all receive the same customer service regardless of the channel used.

3. Only 2% of people will voice their opinions online. Perhaps there’s a need for more “citizen journalism” and people fighting for their rights as consumers which will put more pressure on companies to stay engaged online.

Thank you Chrysler! You kept us a loyal and happy customers. Well done!

Photo credit: PeterSpain.com

This is one of two posts on how small businesses can use social media to their advantage. I got particularly interested in paddleboarding and decided to track the entire process of how social media is affecting the bottom line of a small business.

Adrift Tahoe is located in Kings Beach, Lake Tahoe, CA and they offer rentals, sales, fun special events and merchandise. It’s all about paddleboarding and surfing with very friendly staff.

My interest in paddleboarding started with a Facebook post by a friend – sharing her excitement about this addictive and fun sport. I decided to check it out for myself. It is a great sport, an excellent full body work out and a phenomenal way to spend summer time on the water in Tahoe.

I offered to create a short video about the shop and the sport and post it on YouTube. See it below.

Click here to view the embedded video.

So far, I know that I have hooked a few friends and family members on the sport. They are interested in getting more involved, would like to purchase paddleboards and continue to spread their passion about paddleboarding in Lake Tahoe.

The second blog post will tell you how a Facebook update and a You Tube video delivered real dollars for this business. Interested? Stay tuned. Whether you are a small business or a big one, are you able to identify dollars from your social media efforts?

Have you tried paddleboarding yet?

In summary, I had to deal with a delayed plane, a sick passenger, a well deserved and expensive  shower, new clothes and a long delay at the airport, a lost bag for 7 days, a damaged suitcase and missing items from the bag and COUNTLESS hours emailing, talking to and collecting paperwork for Lufthansa.

Today I received a check from them for $1,732. This is the maximum amount they will issue for a lost bag. (Policy)

All and all, I’m OK with this. It certainly didn’t make up for the lost hours dealing with the company. It can’t make up for the inconvenience, the hassle, my niece’s disappointment when her new iPod was missing, etc.  At least, I feel like I have been somewhat compensated for the expenses.

Ultimately the question is – Did Lufthansa keep me as a customer?

Most likely they did. At the bottom of the pyramid.

During the entire process, I was contacted only once on this blog from someone in their “social media” department.

The worst part about Lufthansa as I discovered is that you cannot contact their customer department by phone. Only by email and by fax.  I suppose you can visit them personally in their office on the East Coast. It felt too much to me like they didn’t want to deal with customers.

Again, did they keep me as a customer? Probably so. Can they work on improving their customer service? Absolutely. Can they start to move people up the pyramid?Definitely so. It would have taken them very little to move me up. Maybe next time.

This concludes my Lufthansa story. Now, I’m ready for new travel adventures with happier experiences and better airline service.  Oh, and anyone from the customer service department of Lufthansa reading this blog, I can consult you on how to improve your customer service. Call me for a free conversation.

A year ago I embarked on a new journey with Out&About Marketing. The results have been very,very positive. I accomplished many of the goals I set for myself and learned a few lessons along the way. Overall, I have no regrets and I’m proud of the accomplishments.

Thank you to all of my clients who keep me on my toes, open my horizons and challenge me to learn more. You are all the best!

Thank you to all of my readers who visit my website, read and comment on my blog. Let’s keep the conversation going.

I learned so much throughout the year thanks to all of you – my clients, my readers, my social and real life friends and the hundreds of new friends I met online.  It’s been an absolutely incredible and motivating journey. Here are 10 lessons on starting a business, marketing for small businesses and social media marketing a year later:

1. The busier you are, the more you learn how to prioritize and optimize. I learned how to filter and aggregate content and how to go from spending hours online to only a few minutes a day. Social media can be a huge time investment. Learn how to manage your time and balance your day. And the most important skill of all is to learn to balance work with life. I have to say I managed to stay sane and have sufficient time to play and enjoy my life outside of ” computer time”.

2. Learn to elliminate 80% of the time you spent on unnecessary and non-important tasks and concentrate your effort on 20% of the things that are truly important for your business and for your life. It’s hard some days but you can do it. Limit your time to what’s truly important and get rid of everything else.

3. Social networking is great and really works when done correctly. One of my biggest appeal to social networking is the opportunity to make friends in real life. It’s rewarding to know you met someone on Twitter first and eventually you got to shake their hand in person. Introduce people to each other. Never forget that the Internet just opens the door for real relationships and true networking.

4. Never stop learning. Pick a tool each month and learn it. Maybe it’s WordPress, FourSquare, Evernote, Dropbox or Groupon. Whatever it’s the latest and greatest tool, invest time in learning it and seeing how it applies to your digital life or business. Don’t jump at all tools at once.

5. Every 6 months revisit your business plan/social media/marketing strategy and adjust as necessary. It’s one thing to have a plan. It’s different to actually follow it, measure your goals and adjust your strategy. Don’t be afraid to make a mistake. Learn from it and keep moving. Don’t waste too much time on worrying about being perfect. No one is.

6. Celebrate. Small things matter. Set monthly and weekly goals that you can measure and when you achieve them, congratulate yourself. Set the bar higher for the following month.

7. Create a compelling story. People don’t care about your product. They will identify with a good story and if they believe it they will consider purchasing your product. Don’t just sell them your stuff. Provide interesting and engaging content. Ask yourself not what you are going to gain from social networks but rather what are you going to contribute. What’s your story? How do you fit it?

8. Find your niche. Find your niche and your voice. What are you knowledgeable about and have an expert opinion on? What do you know that people want to know? What can you be the “google” of? Without a very targeted niche approach your marketing will get lost. Start small and think big.

9. Before jumping in social media – educate yourself. Read blogs, learn new tools, develop a strategy and adapt it. After a few months revisit your measurements and adjust as necessary. Start small and grow your efforts as you become more proficient with each network. Social networking works. Period. But don’t expect to see overnight success in terms of sales. Be patient. You didn’t wake up one day to a full house of kids. Or maybe you did. Most likely you went through the dating stage, the wedding, and eventually the kids. It’s the same with social networking.

10. What are you passionate about? Do you have passion for what you do? Can you carry your passion online in your blog, tweets, Facebook updates? They say Content is King. If you don’t have passion, content will be a chore. If you have passion, get yourself a Flip camera, start a blog and start producing quality content. You will start building an audience. Just remember #8. Find your niche.

What would you like to get from Out&About Marketing? How are you using the site? What advice do you have for the blog and for me? What is your biggest marketing and social media challenge?

Thank you for your feedback and for your time. Now I’m going to celebrate being one year old!!!

First, the plane was delayed from Philadelphia to Frankfurt.

Second, a passanger threw up on my in the plane. The most disgusting experience in my life.

Of course, I missed my connection flight to Sofia and had to sit in line for over 2 hours to rebook. With the vomit all over me. Horrible experience.

The next plane to Bulgaria wasn’t until 9 hours later. I managed to find a shower for $8 at the airport. Washed my clothes and walked around in wet clothes until I found a store to buy some new ones. That meant going through multiple check points and passport checks.

Finally, with new clothes (another expense of about $150) and 9 hours at Frankfurt airport (another expensive stay) I got to Sofia to find out that my bag didn’t make it. Now, 30 hours later, Lufthansa still can’t find my bag. It’s not available in the system. What kind of a shitty system is that?Where is my bag? Still in Philadelphia, in Frankfurt or somewhere else in the world????

I have contacted Lufthansa in the US and in Bulgaria. They can’t seem to help me. Their online form doesn’t work. What is one supposed to do? I need my bag. I need a refund on all purchases I have made for this trip so far.

I’m taking my complaint to the social media world and I will not stop until I have a resolution. All of you Lufthansa people if you are listening on the web here’s a shitty customer experience that will damage your brand. Jump on on it. FAST!