From the slopes to the screen, Lena Niedzielin’s marketing journey is anything but predictable. Growing up skiing in New England, Lena never imagined she’d be managing an indoor ski facility in London. But as the manager of Skieasy, she’s traded her skis for spreadsheets and discovered a passion for connecting people with winter sports, all year round.
However, marketing an indoor ski center presents unique challenges. How do you reach an audience that may not even know your business exists? On this episode of Be A Marketer, Lena shares her secrets to success, including her innovative use of Constant Contact to build customer relationships and drive off-season sales. “It’s a huge challenge to find one specific strategy that would work for all our customers,” Lena explains, highlighting the need for targeted marketing.
Tune in to discover how Lena leverages email marketing, community engagement, and local events to grow her contact list and keep skiers coming back for more, even when the sun is shining. On this episode, Lena and host Dave Charest, Director of Small Business Success at Constant Contact, unpack practical tips for data-driven decision-making, crafting engaging newsletters, and maximizing your marketing ROI.
⛷️ What she does: Lena Niedzielin is the manager of Skieasy, an indoor ski facility at Duke Meadows in West London. Passionate about skiing and connecting people with winter sports, Lena leverages her marketing skills to grow the business and overcome the challenges of promoting a niche market. She is a Constant Contact customer.
💡 Key quote: "I've learned so much, definitely the importance of graphics and the layout and I've always been very creative. So I think this is one of my biggest advantages I had from the very beginning. I was looking for things that would work and being creative, trying new things, trying to see what works, get that feedback from your customers."
If you love this show, please leave a review. Go to RateThisPodcast.com/bam and follow the simple instructions.
Chapters
From the slopes to the screen, Lena Niedzielin’s marketing journey is anything but predictable. Growing up skiing in New England, Lena never imagined she’d be managing an indoor ski facility in London. But as the manager of Skieasy, she’s traded her skis for spreadsheets and discovered a passion for connecting people with winter sports, all year round.
However, marketing an indoor ski center presents unique challenges. How do you reach an audience that may not even know your business exists? On this episode of Be A Marketer, Lena shares her secrets to success, including her innovative use of Constant Contact to build customer relationships and drive off-season sales. “It’s a huge challenge to find one specific strategy that would work for all our customers,” Lena explains, highlighting the need for targeted marketing.
Tune in to discover how Lena leverages email marketing, community engagement, and local events to grow her contact list and keep skiers coming back for more, even when the sun is shining. On this episode, Lena and host Dave Charest, Director of Small Business Success at Constant Contact, unpack practical tips for data-driven decision-making, crafting engaging newsletters, and maximizing your marketing ROI.
⛷️ What she does: Lena Niedzielin is the manager of Skieasy, an indoor ski facility at Duke Meadows in West London. Passionate about skiing and connecting people with winter sports, Lena leverages her marketing skills to grow the business and overcome the challenges of promoting a niche market. She is a Constant Contact customer.
💡 Key quote: "I've learned so much, definitely the importance of graphics and the layout and I've always been very creative. So I think this is one of my biggest advantages I had from the very beginning. I was looking for things that would work and being creative, trying new things, trying to see what works, get that feedback from your customers."
If you love this show, please leave a review. Go to RateThisPodcast.com/bam and follow the simple instructions.
What is Be a Marketer with Dave Charest?
As a small business owner, you need to be a lot of things to make your business go—but you don't have to be a marketer alone. Join host Dave Charest, Director of Small Business Success at Constant Contact, and Kelsi Carter, Brand Production Coordinator, as they explore what it really takes to market your business. Even if marketing's not your thing! You'll hear from small business leaders just like you along with industry experts as they share their stories, challenges, and best advice to get real results. This is the Be a Marketer podcast! New episodes every Thursday!
Dave Charest:
On today's episode, you'll hear from a marketer who took her passion for skiing and turned it into a mission to help others hit the slopes indoors. This is the Be A Marketer podcast.
Dave Charest:
My name is Dave Charest, director of small business success at Constant Contact, And I help small business owners like you make sense of online marketing. And on this podcast, we'll explore what it really takes to market your business even if marketing's not your thing. No jargon, no hype, just real stories to inspire you and practical advice you can act on. So remember, friend, you can be a marketer. And at Constant Contact, we're here to help.
Dave Charest:
Well, hello, friend, and thanks for joining us as usual. Now my big question for you here, are you a skier?
Kelsi Carter:
So I guess I am, technically, but I'm not, like, a avid skier.
Dave Charest:
You sound very confident in that assessment.
Kelsi Carter:
Well, because I grew up going skiing. You know, living in New England and New Hampshire. I grew up going to Attitash and Gunstock, and our middle school used to have ski trips. I definitely grew up skiing, but I haven't actually skied in, like, a good 5 years, but I've been trying to learn how to snowboard. Oh.
Kelsi Carter:
So the past 2 years, I've gone snowboarding, and it's a little tricky for me at least to pick up the turning. But, you know, it's it's really fun, but very different from skiing. Did you ski?
Dave Charest:
Well, funnily enough, I have never been skiing.
Kelsi Carter:
Oh, wow.
Dave Charest:
Nor have I had the desire to do skiing or any winter sport for that matter.
Kelsi Carter:
I can understand.
Dave Charest:
Yeah. I'm just not a winter sport type of person, unless that sport is sitting at the lounge around the fire having a beverage.
Kelsi Carter:
See, that was what my mom did. Whenever she took us, she would just get comfy in the lounge, have a few drinks, and then go about her day.
Dave Charest:
Yeah. So skiing, not for me. But our guest today has been skiing, what, since, you know, 3 years old? And as I've had mentioned, I've been actually avoiding skiing, probably even longer than that. Right?
Dave Charest:
But she started as a ski instructor, which is the reason for my line of questioning today. Sounds like she would be of great benefit to you in terms of your snowboarding, efforts. But, Kelsey, what else can you tell us about our guest today?
Kelsi Carter:
Yeah. So today, our guest is Lena Njegenny. She is the manager of Ski Easy, which is an indoor ski facility at Duke Meadows in West London. Now Duke Meadows is a premier pay and play venue for all ages, and they feature sports facilities, but not just for skiing. They have golf and tennis as well, and they also have scenic views, nature views, nature walks.
Kelsi Carter:
So it's a good place for a lot.
Dave Charest:
Yeah. Very cool. So just to give people an idea of what this is, I guess the term for it is a revolving slope. Right? Which basically means it's essentially like a ski treadmill, if you will.
Dave Charest:
And Lena manages everything on the ski side of the business. And so she manages about 20 to 20 5 instructors at the facility. She manages the operations. She offers, the offers that they send out, the training, the instructors, all of that. And, of course, the marketing pieces of everything there.
Dave Charest:
As you might imagine, she wears many hats, not just to keep her head warm. And, you know, like many Constant Contact customers, right, Lena came into the role without a ton of experience in marketing. And she has this personal mission, and maybe she can try to to sweep me up in it, but to make sure that everybody who wants to have the opportunity to ski or snowboard really gets that opportunity. And there are things she loves about that quest, of course, but it's not without its own set of challenges. Let's go to Lena.
Lena Niedzielin:
I love people and I love skiing, so it's always a common topic where you can talk, to everyone about. It's a huge variety of people as well. It's interesting. But skiing is a sport that attracts many different type of people, different actors, and to we do tend to have our customers in a big range of ages and abilities, different societies or professions they're doing. So being able to meet everyone and have such an amazing team as I have and be able to grow our business.
Lena Niedzielin:
We're currently opening a second slope, so it's our huge time now to expose ourselves, to get that recognition. We're going on a London snow show, which is one of the biggest trade
Dave Charest:
shows Oh, cool.
Lena Niedzielin:
Within ski industry. It's happening this weekend. So we're expanding. The demand is higher and higher. People wanna ski, and that's what is my mission, I think, is making sure that everyone who wants and, wants even to try, if they're gonna enjoy it, have opportunity to ski or snowboarding.
Dave Charest:
So what do you find then most challenging about your role?
Lena Niedzielin:
It's definitely making sure we tailor our offer and our lesson to different type of people. In terms of marketing, it's a huge challenge to find our target audience, which is so diverse. It's very difficult to find one specific strategy that would work for all our customers that we are trying to reach. As a business that is not very well known globally as an idea for a ski center, This is a one thing. So, you know, people are not searching for us.
Lena Niedzielin:
People are not aware that something like that does exist. Mhmm. So the first thing is, promoting our business concept and our slope itself. The second thing is to promote skiing as a and snowboarding as a fantastic sport and get people to get comfortable and confident before they hit the mountains so they enjoy the ski trip a lot.
Dave Charest:
So I want to get into some of the stuff that you're talking about here then, just in terms of marketing the business. And so you mentioned you were going to business school. Where would you say you're coming into the role anyway? What was your level of experience with marketing when you started?
Lena Niedzielin:
I must say it wasn't big. I didn't have loads of experience with marketing, for a business. I've been working a lot with Airbnb, landlords or owners and administrating departments for them for many, many years. And I always liked the part of creating a listing in a way that will attract everyone, making sure that the room itself, the apartment itself is what people are seeking for their trip, to accommodate variety of people, and, obviously, to get something to attract them just purely through one picture or our name. And making sure that works, the combination of the main picture, the name of the apartment of the or the place is such a key for us to just come up as, at first few listings.
Lena Niedzielin:
There are different people, of course, but you don't go through more than 20, 30 apartments, I guess. And back in Poland where I worked in Krakow, it's a 100, thousands of apartments for Airbnb. So getting getting people to even notice you, it was such a big part. And I really liked it, the whole, business degree I've done with Spanish that did emphasize a lot the importance of marketing, especially for smaller business, which I knew I always wanted to go for, to work in a smaller environment, have challenges that are different in bigger sizes companies.
Dave Charest:
So when you think of starting relatively kinda new to the marketing space as you begin the role, are there any particular skills that you've developed? We're, what, 4 years into this now. What have you developed from a marketing perspective? Where would you put yourself on that scale now? Are you where would you be there?
Dave Charest:
And what what types of things have you learned over the years?
Lena Niedzielin:
Oh, I've learned so much. Definitely, the importance of graphics and the layout. And I've always been very creative. So I think this is one of my biggest advantages I had from the very beginning. Mhmm.
Lena Niedzielin:
I was looking for things that would work and being creative, trying new things, trying to see what works, get that feedback from your customers. This is so important because they they will tell you how they could find out about us. Learning what they know, what they work, then just trying new things and see what works for our target audience and making sure we get the feedback from people, which probably that part is one of the biggest breakthroughs I had with making sure I choose the right marketing strategy while it's based on a data that I have got myself.
Dave Charest:
How important are local events, community relationships, those types of things in terms of what you're doing from a marketing perspective?
Lena Niedzielin:
This is very important. There's not many. The London snow show is one of the biggest one, it and it really brings together all part of that industry from travel agency, indoor ski slopes, or equipment brands. We are not organizing many events as a center focusing on the ski industry, but as a big center with cafe area as well, we often have massive events. In terms of my marketing, I just know I need to make sure that they know being the for the first time completely randomly in our center.
Lena Niedzielin:
It's a center that there is a skin center. So making sure that the posters are very clear, very attractive for clients, or just the guests or visitors. Coming back to your question, the newsletter, and making sure it's, I'm reaching out or this is my why Constant Contact is absolutely my favorite tool for that. It makes the graphics part easy, the layout part very easy. It helped me a lot for a person who hasn't worked with programs like this before,
Dave Charest:
who
Lena Niedzielin:
hasn't really sent off, newsletter before. So for that, I'm very grateful. But, yeah, we have a very specific timeline in our business. It's winter sports, so we're obviously very busy during winter when people want a refreshed lesson, when people want to get few lessons before they go for the first time or whatever the reason is. Majority of that is to go for a ski trip eventually.
Lena Niedzielin:
But we are open all year round. For us to keep those clients, for them to come back to us during the summer, and in general, to get people to come in during the summer, this is our biggest challenge as a business and something we've been working on the most. And the correct marketing strategy hours is the only way to get there, to be fully booked throughout the whole year, not only throughout that winter season. And one of the biggest tool is a newsletter. Me sending off with the good, amount of emails a month because I don't wanna I wanna make sure that people are not getting bombarded with emails from a ski center.
Lena Niedzielin:
But us maintaining the contact with clients from winter is a key part for them to realize that the offer for summer is back on. When March is coming, the sun hopefully is, is coming out as well. Most of the time, we forget skiing. We don't think about, snow sport during it's, but it's absolutely understandable.
Dave Charest:
Right.
Lena Niedzielin:
Yeah. If we can remind people about it and get them to practice when our prices drop down, when we get more way more discounts and courses, packages, and making sure we communicate that well with our community, but also community of the whole center.
Dave Charest:
Well, I'm curious. What are what are the types of things that you're sending then in your newsletters? Is it strictly promotions? Are you, like, doing educational emails as well? Are there just updates about what's going on?
Dave Charest:
You're building relationships? Like, how do you approach, like, what you're actually sending to people?
Lena Niedzielin:
It's usually updates or some additional offer we might have for the specific time. It's a reminder of something that's coming up. We have done in the past, couple of educational videos which we posted for social media. But in terms of the newsletter, it's mostly updates and our offer reminder of the offer, Christmas wishes, but obviously around Christmas, we we have a lot going on. Also, some events, we partner with loads of other ski related companies.
Lena Niedzielin:
We're trying to promote each other as well and support each other, share our clientele because it's the same mostly it's the same audience.
Dave Charest:
Audience. Yeah. You mentioned, of course, right, finding that balance between bombarding people with too many emails. So a couple of things. I mean, you've got a really good open rate.
Dave Charest:
Right? I think you're, like, 50% in terms of your open rates. You get a really good click through rate too, which is around 2%. How do you find that balance? What are you finding in terms of, like, how often are you sending to people?
Lena Niedzielin:
As we are a small business, a Skizi itself, but as a center, the amount of emails is quite similar. I would say we do keep it within 1 or 2 emails a month.
Dave Charest:
Okay.
Lena Niedzielin:
With not more than 3 information included. So there could be a month when we need to send those 3 separate emails because we do wanna prioritize different people or different information we wanna emphasize, at time. So it does depend on what we're trying to communicate with our clients the most, but I'm trying to keep it under 3 emails a month.
Dave Charest:
Got it. I guess, what are you doing with your contact lists itself? So you've got the overall group of people that are on your list, but are you using smaller lists to send specific things to specific people? Like, are you using segmentation at all? Talk me through that.
Lena Niedzielin:
Yes. I do. And, thankfully, again, Constant Contact is very helpful about making that happen. I do have groups that were part of the membership we were offering over summer. There might be few information I wanna share directly to them and only members.
Lena Niedzielin:
That happens quite often, and me being able to just, decide on the group I wanna communicate something with is incredibly helpful, saves so much time. Working with all good programs or systems, starting from the online booking system, being able to generate reports quickly, efficiently, and then simply upload the file into Constant Contact, and I've got a mailing list done. It's a dream come true because I have way more time for other things, for making sure we expand, we open up. 2nd slot, as I mentioned before, very useful tool.
Dave Charest:
So are there any other things that you're doing to grow that contact list at all?
Lena Niedzielin:
We're quite lucky because we in terms of, I guess, loads of service businesses is able to do that, but we require every, participant to sign a disclaimer form, which means that we can also put down, the form if they would like to receive a newsletter or not. That brings us the big part of our main list. I think it is very important to make sure you have a very easy access to the button on the website that takes
Dave Charest:
you
Lena Niedzielin:
to, signing up for the mailing list as well, which we do. And also simply QR codes around the center. I think many people, especially parents, when they are watching, they might look around the center a bit more than someone who comes in for it. But even then, you know, we take time to talk to the client before the lesson, making sure we understand what they need from the lesson and always finishing with the feedback. So we're hoping they have enough time.
Lena Niedzielin:
And if they want to, QR code is such a great idea to make it very simple for them to do that. That's how we go with and cooperating with our other departments.
Dave Charest:
Gotcha. What type of results are you seeing from the work that you're doing with Constant Contact?
Lena Niedzielin:
Oh, I think it's a game changer in terms of making sure that our regular clients, our loyal clients wanna come back where the offer is on receive are receiving this information as the first one before it can go to social media. So let's say they they are on a newsletter and they are also, following us for different channels. That makes them feel like we treat them more personally, you know, it's a smaller business. We often I often know the clients, remember them. I think getting them to find out about the offer as the the first part is what makes them feel like we appreciate that they are our customers as well.
Lena Niedzielin:
I think it's a mutual recognition and appreciation for what they can get from us, what service we're giving, and for them to be part of the community and receive lessons from us, which we love to. We love to. We everyone in the in the center loves to stay and do good about it.
Dave Charest:
Are there any numbers associated to what you're doing with Constant Contact in terms of results? Are there any specific things that you're looking to track and to measure?
Lena Niedzielin:
Yes. I definitely look the, the reports are very helpful. The open rate is very, very useful to have an idea of how many people are, receiving the emails, if it goes to the spam box, if if they're not interested at all, being able to see if it's a reoccurring situation or it is a one time thing. But, also, what I find very helpful in terms of the content in the newsletter itself is what people are clicking. And the fact that I can see which button was clicked the most, which information they scrolled until, down to.
Lena Niedzielin:
So everything that's that that feedback that I get from Constant Contact may is what makes the process of creating the next one easier. And I think it's more and that's what data show. We do we only grow the number, and the number of email addresses getting bigger. Open rate as well. Also, the amount of content people are actually reading or at least opening up, which is a key for them to actually have a look what the offers or what the newsletter says.
Dave Charest:
Is there a particular or a roundabout percentage that you would say of sales or businesses coming from the activities that you're doing from Constant Contact?
Lena Niedzielin:
The sale itself, yes. It depends on the season. Constant Contact mostly helps us to grow loyal customers on the majority. That would be around 70% of people, but, therefore, our sales during summer. So it really helps to raise up the sale during summer when we are reaching mostly to our loyal customers.
Lena Niedzielin:
The ratio is very similar from social media to the website Yeah. To seeing a banner somewhere locally, or hearing about the center from a friend. But for our regular customers or someone who has been with us once and maybe forgotten. In summer, this is around 70% of people who get the offer, who get our biggest membership, has already received the email.
Dave Charest:
Got it. What do you like most about Constant Contact?
Lena Niedzielin:
How straightforward it is to work with. IT is not my biggest strength, but I'm creative, and I I like solving problems as well. So with the help of other peep people from marketing department, everything is still booked, my graphic designer again. But definitely that, it's so easy to operate it, to create campaign, to promote the campaign, the whole process of creating it and sending it over, the fact that you can so easily set the time for that, the recipients, or every feature that you would like to adjust is easy to adjust. It's very self explanatory, which I really like.
Lena Niedzielin:
And the reports are amazing. The reports are really helpful. And, again, that's what makes us, I think, reach our current clientele and, new customers, better because we under understand what information they're looking for from us and what they're interested in.
Dave Charest:
I'm curious, how often do you dig into the reports, and then how do you use that information to make adjustments? Right? Like, are you looking at that after every send? Do you do it, like, quarterly? Like, what is your cadence in terms of looking at that stuff?
Lena Niedzielin:
Usually, we're trying to track the reports and, what's going on in the first few days after sending over the newsletter.
Dave Charest:
Got
Lena Niedzielin:
it. After that, the data changes slightly, but the first 3, 4 days are crucial. If and tracking that and, keeping the record of, on which day the open rate was the biggest, and how long did it take people to have a look at this or reopen the email or click on any one of the buttons. And then I usually base that most recent report, or I base the next newsletter on the most recent report. Then annually, I like to compare all of them and see what campaign was the most successful one, what we've done well there, which one wasn't, what we've done wrong there.
Lena Niedzielin:
And, again, it does help to have a better idea of where we wanna go with our marketing strategy for the another year.
Dave Charest:
What would it be like to market the center without Constant Contact?
Lena Niedzielin:
Oh, it would be extremely difficult. It would be very difficult to create the network of loyal customers. To operate that well over summer would be absolutely impossible, and many of my instructors would have to lose their jobs because we wouldn't get enough bookings if people wouldn't get the reminder, get the invitation, get the information about the discounts and offers over the summer. That would highly, highly decrease our sales for sure. And if I have to balance with a few instructors during summer and needing a lot over during winter, and rehiring and training people and making sure that they are trained to the level that we require would make the managing part of the center extremely difficult, and it would be very, very highly cost.
Dave Charest:
What advice would you give another small business maybe considering marketing tools like Constant Contact?
Lena Niedzielin:
I think analyzing a lot what works and what doesn't. Asking clients about what they especially, they have the possibility, it's, if it's this type of a business, to get a feedback from clients, to understand if, from their perspective, their campaigns are interesting, if the regularity of emails is too small, too high. That's very important, but it does help a lot to really retain the customers and make sure they come back. Then it only grows your business and the people that know about it and are interested in coming and and using the services you're offering.
Dave Charest:
Well, friend, let's recap some items from that discussion. Number 1, get feedback from your customers. Oftentimes, the secret to success is that you must get feedback from your customers. Lena learned this early in her role. Customers will let you know things like how they found you, what attracted them, and where you should focus your future efforts.
Dave Charest:
But that means you have to look for those signals and talk to your customers. Number 2. Market for future business. Lena mentions how important it is to maintain contact with clients in the winter months so they're aware of summer classes. Now marketing often has a longer tail of awareness that makes it easier to drive those immediate actions in the future.
Dave Charest:
So make sure this is part of your communication plans. Prepare people with communications for future actions. Number 3, give your subscribers first access. Lena shares that it's important to take care of loyal clients by giving them access to things before they're available elsewhere. It allows her to treat subscribers more personally and show appreciation for letting the ski center into their inboxes.
Dave Charest:
What can you do to make your subscribers feel special? Here's your action item for today. Take a look at your reports. Find out what your subscribers find interesting and see the impact that campaigns are having on your business. When you look at your reports, then you can make adjustments based on what you're seeing.
Dave Charest:
As always, you'll find resources in the show notes. I hope you enjoyed this episode of the Be A Marketer podcast. Please take a moment to leave us a review. Just go to rate this podcast.com/bam. Your honest feedback will help other small business marketers like yourself find the show.
Dave Charest:
That's ratethispodcast.com/bam. Well, friend, I hope you enjoy the rest of your day and continued success to you and your business.