Castle Mountain Case Study

Castle Mountain Ski Resort has been home to some of the driest powder and most challenging ski terrain in Canada for over
50 years. Owned and operated by skiers for skiers, competing with much larger, corporate-owned resorts presents a daunting
uphill battle. Due to low ridership and limited resources, Castle Mountain had closed prematurely two years in a row.
Castle Mountain Ski Resort
Alberta, Canada
www.skicastle.ca
“I had to learn to compete with much bigger resorts that had much bigger budgets. NUVI
helped me to not only identify influencers, but easily reach out to them through our various
social networks. These influencers have made a huge difference in our business.”
-Jason Crawford, Director of Marketing
Challenges:
• Competing with a small budget against resorts
that have much larger marketing resources
• Declining ridership increasing the risk of
premature closing for third consecutive season
• Overcoming poor reputation issues and low
brand awareness
• Declining social audience
Solution:
Castle Mountain used NUVI’s reporting and
monitoring tools to:
• Track competitors’ social media channels and
strategic keywords for market research
• Identify key influencers in the outdoor recreation
industry as well as competitors’ influencers
• Engage with influencers by inviting them to
experience Castle Mountain first-hand
• Discover their most influential customers and
provide VIP experiences when at the resort
• Report on ROI of social media marketing
campaigns and social outreach programs and
incentives
Results:
-Jason Crawford
Director of Marketing
• Ridership increased more than enough to
keep the lifts running all season saving tens of
thousands of dollars
• Increased the social media conversation around
their brand by more than 100%, and increased
social reach by 4x
• Improved sentiment around brand through
new relationships with social media audience,
bloggers, and influencers
• Lured social influencers from the competition to
become Castle Mountain ambassadors
• Demonstrated a high ROI of social media efforts
leading to a larger allocation of resources for
future marketing campaigns