I love thinking to myself, “Self, I wish someone would put out an easy to read graph/chart that proves your point.” In this case, my point was that Twitter is at least as important for marketing your SCUBA business as Facebook. Yesterday, we talked about how important Facebook Fans are, but check out this great chart:

Oh really? It looks like Twitter followers are more important when it comes to creating buyers and brand advocates than your Facebook Fans!

Is Your SCUBA Business Marketing on Twitter?

I’ll be the first to admit, if you live in a very rural area with no dive tourism, you can safely avoid Twitter for now. If your SCUBA business does not match that criteria, why are you not using every free/easy marketing tool at your disposal?

With Great Power Comes Great Responsibility

Be it a blog, Facebook or Twitter, you now wield unimaginable marketing power. You used to have to own a printing press and a radio station to do what you can now do for free. But please, use it for good.

Being a spammy member of any social network is like being a telemarketer for this new decade. Don’t ruin it for all of us and don’t make your SCUBA business look spammy. No one likes spam.

So What Do I Do?

Engage.

Talk to people. Ask questions. Share links (not just your own). See what people are talking about.

DO NOT repeatedly spam your message out (there are gray areas on this one I’ll discuss later). DO NOT exclusively talk about yourself. DO NOT pretend to be an expert.

You’re probably thinking, “Nick, by telling us what to do and what not to do, aren’t YOU proclaiming to be an expert?” There’s honestly no such thing, but I have been doing this a bit and have seen quite a few examples of what works and what doesn’t. These are all recommendations, not rules.

If your SCUBA business is on Twitter, let me know in the comments and I’ll be sure to follow you!

Photo via Severin Sadjina

In honor of St. Patrick’s Day, I want to talk about…Facebook. Sorry, couldn’t really come up with anything St. Patrick’s related. There’s some liquor ads in this vintage SCUBA ads article if you’re so inclined

Anyhow, yesterday I shared with you that Facebook had overtaken Google in the US for weekly traffic. We’ve had a couple of people share links to their SCUBA Fan Pages, if you haven’t done so yet, take a moment to do so.

Facebook Fans are Buyers and Brand Promoters

For those of you who have already made the commitment to setting up a Page, great job! For those who haven’t, here’s a couple of reasons you should:

That’s right folks, people become Fans of Pages (and their associated businesses) because they intend to buy from those companies and recommend them to their friends. Sounds pretty good, especially since promoting your SCUBA business on Facebook can be completely free.

Why People Become Fans on Facebook

I’m a bit stingy with becoming a Fan of many Pages, so the following graph is incredibly accurate for my usage and apparently I’m not alone:

Even if you don’t offer discounts and promotions to your SCUBA diver (why not?), they still want to connect with you because they’re a customer of your SCUBA business, they want to show support, it’s fun, to stay up to date and to feel like part of a community.

Setting up a Page is incredibly easy and in the coming weeks, I’ll be taking you through a guided tour from first signing up to some advanced customization techniques.

Sounds like an ideal customer to me, so what are you waiting for?

Photo via kern.justin

There are still some of you (you know who you are) who think that using social networks to build your SCUBA business is just a fad and that it doesn’t really work.

However, many of you naysayers are the same people promoting Google ads.

Let me ask this: does it make more sense to advertise your SCUBA store in the stores bathroom or out on the curb? If you said the bathroom, please subscribe, you’re going to need help

If you agree that advertising where people can see your business makes sense, then shouldn’t we do the same online? If you’re still with me on this idea, the latest information from Hitwise tells us we definitely should be on social networks:

Click to enlarge

That’s right folks, Facebook has officially received more visitors in a week than Google.

Is your SCUBA business on Facebook? Share a link in the comments!

Photo via inju

Originally, this months contest just went out to email subscribers. I’ve had a few people tell me my emails have been blocked by their corporate spam filters, so I’m opening this up to everyone.

If you are interested in winning some cool stuff, be sure to check out the contest.

You have until the end of today to get your entry in, so be snappy!

Photo via D.Begley

Sorry gang, I’ve been a little absent the last couple of weeks working on a couple of the largest projects of my life. Real game-changers for me. Thanks to everyone for the support, without you, these projects wouldn’t be in my lap.

Enjoy:

Video not loading? Click here to view.

Post image via Jared Kelly

So far, we’ve looked at why we should be using email marketing, how to collect addresses and generating content, now we need to look at how to get your message out to your SCUBA customers.

Using Your Email Program

You may already have Outlook, Thunderbird, Mail or some other email program on your computer, so you could just use that, right? Wrong. You could use that – if you wanted to look like an amateur.

There are a few problems with trying to do it yourself:

1. Your design will not be consistent. The built in design tools rarely follow true HTML email guidelines, so your message will appear different across the many systems (not just the desktop programs, but GMail, Yahoo! Mail, Hotmail, etc) that your subscribers may be using.
2. You will not be able to track your success. We always need to keep ROI in mind, so we need a tool that will tell us how many people received our email, how many opened it, what they clicked on, etc.
3. You will not be able to send easily. Most ISP’s (Internet Service Providers) use something called throttling. Throttling limits the number of emails you can send in a certain period of time. Most ISP’s don’t publish these numbers to discourage spamming. That makes for a lot of trial and error.
4. You will not be able to easily manage subscribes and unsubscribes. People will have to reply, you’ll have to mark them somehow and hope you don’t message them again.

Using An Email Service Provider (ESP)

ESP’s fix all of the aforementioned problems. The only possible downsides are a learning curve and expense. We all know the SCUBA industry is a little slow right now, so we’d like to avoid any unnecessary expenses.

Luckily for your SCUBA business, I’ve tested quite a few ESP’s including AWeber, Constant Contact, Vertical Response, MadMimi and MailChimp.

I <3 MailChimp

I use MailChimp and LOVE their service. Here are a few of my main reasons:

1. Their Forever Free plan allows you to have up to 500 people on your list for…you guessed it: Free. Most SCUBA stores won’t need more than that.
2. They’re funny people. Humor is scattered around the site everywhere. I can appreciate that.
3. TONS of design options. They can mimic your site, they have basic templates you can customize, professionally designed templates or basic yet eye-appealing templates. Options are always good.
4. Their email marketing system is easy to use. It’s all wizard-based so you just follow the steps. If you need help, they have great instructional videos at every step of the process.
5. You can use existing lists as long as you captured the email addresses legitimately. Other providers won’t let you use lists unless they are built using their systems.

There are tons of advanced features in their email marketing platform we’ll discuss later.

Sign Up Now

Go get your free account, try it out. I’ll be giving some getting started pointers soon, but you’ll need an account to try them.

About the MailChimp links: in the name of full disclosure, the links to MailChimp are affiliate links. If you use the Forever Free plan, which I expect most SCUBA businesses to use, I get nothing. So, affiliate yes, retirement no If you think I’m recommending them because of their affiliate program, you’d be mistaken. All of the other providers offer real cash money affiliate incentives, MailChimp doesn’t.

Photo via Mzelle Biscotte

Fun Dive: as much fun as us SCUBA professionals love teaching, a fun dive is one without students or any type of professional SCUBA diver-related work.

I always hated getting homework over the weekend, so I’m going to try to not give you any online marketing related chores for your SCUBA business on Fridays.

Instead, we’ll do a fun dive

Take a trip down memory lane since Popular Science made their entire archives available via Google Books.

Peruse through the results of a search for SCUBA amongst the archives.

I particularly like the first result:

Post image via Jared Kelly

Email marketing is incredibly powerful and, now that you know how to collect email addresses, it’s time to generate some content. Generating content for your newsletter should be the easiest part of this process.

Your SCUBA Business is Busy

I don’t care what you may think about the economy, your business (as long as you’re running a real SCUBA business) is busy. You’re teaching classes, getting new equipment and going on dive trips. This is all content for your newsletter.

Give ‘Em What They Want

Your email newsletter subscribers gave you their address because they want to hear from you! So tell them everything going on with your SCUBA business. Independent SCUBA instructors, stores and dive resorts can all do this!

Tip for the Independent SCUBA Instructors

If you are an independent instructor and don’t have as much activity as a store, another great place to get content is from the Internet. Share articles you find interesting. This creates a personal connection between you and your students.

A great place to start is by subscribing to our list of SCUBA blogs.

Content Length

I haven’t seen any real scientific studies discussing the perfect length of your emails, but I like to keep mine short – no more than 2 pages when printed, preferably 1. People have short attention spans and are inundated with email, so being brief works to your advantage.

I also strongly recommend only sharing an intro to your content via email and linking out to the full article (preferably your blog). This not only keeps your emails even shorter, but it provides an excellent tracking opportunity we’ll discuss later.

I Can’t Write

If you can read, you can write. If you can operate a computer to read this article, you can hit the spell check button. That’s good enough for most people. If you really have a phobia of writing your own unique articles, use the method described above for independent instructors and just share information you find interesting.

What kinds of content do you share in your email newsletter?

Photo via churl

Email marketing can be an incredibly powerful tool, but some people see it as spam (even if done correctly) or incredibly difficult to begin. As we saw last time, email marketing has an incredibly high return on investment and should not be avoided. Both independent SCUBA instructors and SCUBA stores should be actively collecting email addresses.

Collecting Emails

Your SCUBA store or instructor business should be collecting email addresses immediately and at all possible opportunities. While the US Federal CAN-SPAM Act is actually fairly vague and doesn’t do much to protect consumers, we should all still abide by a common sense stance on email marketing: If you would hate the email marketing message you receive, don’t send it yourself.

“Harvesting” email addresses is the main legal issue we’re looking at today for our SCUBA business emails. Using email addresses that you (or a paid list provider) have simply found instead of having been given is considered harvesting and is in violation of SPAM guidelines.

Independent SCUBA Instructor Email Address Collection

As an independent SCUBA instructor, I find it incredibly easy to collect email addresses. The PADI student record folder has a line for email addresses. Be sure to tell your students that you MAY email them about upcoming classes or promotions. This disclaimer makes it legal. Simple, huh?

SCUBA Store Email Address Collection

SCUBA stores have a variety of options to collect email addresses:

• Have your SCUBA instructors get them from students with the disclaimer that they’re going back to the store too.
• Place a sign up form on your checkout counter. Offer discounts, promotions or local diving news.
• Create a customer database to help your customers track their purchases, trips and maintenance. Get their email address to help keep them up to date.
• When doing outside events, offer contests if people leave their email address.

Online Email Address Collection

In case you hadn’t noticed, here at New SCUBA Marketing there are a variety of ways to subscribe to the email newsletter:

• The link to the right.
• On the Facebook Page.
• For new or search visitors, there’s a popup.
• Contests.

EVERYWHERE

Give your students and customers the opportunity to give you their email address as many ways possible.

How have you built your SCUBA email subscriber list?

Photo via KirrilyRobert

I had an email marketing related article planned for today, but Duane at Precision Diving forced my hand.

Duane wrote an article discussing a very simple, yet incredibly powerful technique to market yourself as an independent SCUBA instructor: go SCUBA diving.

“Duh” You Say?

I was fortunate to “grow up” in a SCUBA program that focused heavily on SCUBA diving skills, but I frequently ran into SCUBA instructors from other dive centers while teaching classes that couldn’t teach their way out of a wet paper bag.

The only dives they ever did were with students.

They didn’t talk to anyone outside of their group.

By virtue of being mediocre SCUBA divers, not diving regularly and not engaging with other divers, they told people do take classes somewhere else.

Go read Duane’s article, he’s completely correct.

Online Vs. Offline Marketing

I know I focus on the online marketing side of your SCUBA business, but the bottom line is that if you’re not out in the world and available and are a mediocre (at best) instructor, all of the online marketing in the world won’t help you.

Get your SCUBA diving skills figured out first, then market yourself.

Photo via tracer.ca

Twitter, Facebook and Buzz are the talk of the town, but if you aren’t connecting with your SCUBA customers via email marketing, you are missing one of the most lucrative opportunities available to your SCUBA business.

The Statistics Behind Email Marketing

According to the Direct Marketing Association, Return on Investment (ROI) of email marketing was $43.62 per dollar spent in 2009. The next highest ROI came from Internet search advertising at only $21.85 per dollar spent.

Furthermore, Merkle found that Social Networkers actually use email MORE than their non-social networking counterparts. 42% of respondents who use social networks check their email 4 or more times a day. The great news is 63% of those users use the same email for their social network notification as they do their permission-based email newsletters.

Over the coming weeks, I will discuss how to build your subscriber list, what tools to use to distribute your email newsletters to your SCUBA customers and ideas for generating content.

Are you using an email newsletter? How is it working for you?

Image via Yandle

We all go through busy periods in our life, I happen to be right in the middle of one. As these events happen, we need to reduce distractions to be as effective as possible. Personally, I’ve been spending a little extra time cleaning up my Twitter account to eliminate noise as much as possible.

I Have a Billion Followers

It’s Ashton’s fault for racing CNN to one million followers. This created a complex amongst some people that makes them think followers are the most important thing ever.

I disagree.

Making connections, which will hopefully either turn into friendships or business is what is most important.

Simple Math

If you can use a SCUBA dive table (no Wheel needed), this math should make sense.

Let’s say you are one of those Twitter “Rockstars” who has 2,000 followers.

If those 2,000 followers update once every two days (this is just an assumption, not based on any real statistics), that’s 1,000 updates per day.

If you sleep 8 hours per day, that leaves you with 16 hours to be on Twitter (please, don’t stop to eat, shower or go SCUBA diving).

That means you need to be reading 62.5 tweets per hour, a little over one per minute.

Sure, they’re only 140 characters (max), so that should be easy.

But now factor in the idea that you may want to REPLY or CREATE your own original content (you know, to actually ENGAGE), that minute gets really short.

Now lets say you are one of the small handful of EXTREME “Rockstars” and you have 20,000+ followers. Multiply by a factor of 10.

If you wanted to truly ENGAGE all of your followers, you’d need to be reading 625 updates per hour or almost 10 and a half per minute.

I Think this is Absurd

If you have and mention/flaunt that you have 5, 10 or 20 thousand followers you are simply showing me that you don’t understand Twitter as a communications tool and only see it as a marketing tool.

If that’s you, I’ve probably unfollowed you

What do you think? Do you want to be one of 5,000+ followers?

Our first contest has officially come to a close!

Since I don’t require the use of names when registering for the email newsletter, all I can tell you is the winner is Chris! Thank you all for entering.

First Monthly Email Newsletter

For anyone on the list, you will receive the first monthly email newsletter this coming Wednesday. Each month, I will offer my perspective on some topic related to marketing for your SCUBA business that won’t immediately (or perhaps not at all) appear on the main site.

For anyone not on the list, you may want to sign up because the next contest announcement will appear exclusively in the email newsletter. Not only will there be a tangible prize, but also some free publicity for your SCUBA business.

Thanks again to all who entered!

Tuesday night, I attended Portland’s PADI Member Forum (disclaimer: I am a PADI Master Instructor).

If You Didn’t Attend DEMA, You Should Attend Member Forum

There is a lot that is new in the professional world of PADI. The Undersea Journal can only do so much, being able to see the materials in person and hear about success stories is incredibly valuable. However, much of this information was discussed at DEMA last November in Orlando.

If You DID Attend DEMA, You Should Attend Member Forum

Yes, you read that right. Even if you went to DEMA or attended an IDCS/CD update elsewhere, you should still attend. Not only is a refresher of everything worthwhile, but being able to network with your local dive professionals and hear specifically what they are or are not doing is worth the time.

Barry Dunford

Barry is my PADI guy. I don’t know about your PADI guy/gal, but Barry is awesome. He knows his materials, is comfortable in front of the group and is easily able to deal with questions thrown at him. You’re probably thinking every dive instructor should have these attributes and you’re right. That’s what I like about Barry, he is a SCUBA instructor, knows the things I’m supposed to know and uses a proven presentation system/style.

The other great thing about Barry (and all of the PADI people I encountered at DEMA) is they get people (at least some) excited. My wife isn’t current with her teaching credentials, but I dragged her along and she told me halfway through that she’s going to get back to active status ASAP. That’s Barry’s doing.

PADI

I love the new programs, partnerships and promotions coming out. But (and maybe this is just me as a professional presenter), could someone in their slide-making department pick up Presentation Zen, Presentation Zen Design, Slide:ology and The Presentation Secrets of Steve Jobs? The biggest no-no that is always violated: putting all of the textual content on the slide. Your audience reads it instead of listening to and watching the presenter, then are off what he or she is saying, then start to nod off because they’re lost.

Again, maybe just me being nit-picky.

The Crowd

This is what I really went for. I had two incredibly cool events happen:

1. Someone (Richard aka @scruffydiver) that follows me on Twitter actually was there! I’ve been a slacker in getting back to him, but we will go diving some time! See, real life connections from the online world!
2. I got a shout out from Barry.

I didn’t collect statistical data, but I would guess the average age in the room was about 45. Take away the crew I belong to and the staff of Seven Seas SCUBA and that number would go up.

Not too surprising, but further validates my point about the advancing age of the SCUBA industry.

While most people either accepted or were enthusiastic about the technological advancements of PADI (which I think could still be improved upon), there were still people in the crowd who just wanted to complain and fight back.

Prime example: why is the PADI Member Forum available online in October? It’s old news then.

It’s available in October because they want people to come to the forum so the PADI representatives can meet with the “foot soldiers”, build our local SCUBA communities and immediately answer questions. If it were available online in January, I would imagine a large number of people would just watch the video and call it good. If your staff can’t make it, take copious notes and debrief them at a later time.

Next week, when I discuss the new Google Buzz, I’ll be talking about the effectiveness of complaining about technology (thanks to a great discussion with my sister last night). The sneak peak is that there’s not much point in complaining and that we just need to figure out how to maximize the tools.

Was the PADI Member Forum Worth the 2 3 Hours?

You’d better believe it. Make sure you attend yours.

Have you been to yours? How was it?

This site has no affiliation with PADI beyond the author being a PADI professional. Don’t want to hear only about PADI? I’d love to hear from instructors from other SCUBA diving agencies!

Just a reminder, Monday I will be announcing the winner of a copy of CrushIt! by Gary Vaynerchuk. So if you haven’t entered, or know someone who may be interested in entering, be sure to check out our first contest.

Also, I just had my first article published in X-Ray Magazine. If you haven’t seen X-Ray, they put out an incredibly detailed, beautiful SCUBA magazine in an environmentally friendly and interactive PDF format. If you’d like to download the latest issue, there is a smaller (16MB) lower resolution version and a larger (21MB) high resolution version.

Tomorrow, I’ll be sharing some reflections from a PADI Member Forum I attended Tuesday night. Next week, we’ll be talking about Google Buzz, the new social networking tool from Google that integrates with GMail. I’ve been playing with it for a couple of days now, but the big flood of connections has come in today, so my verdict is still pending.

Photo via Mik Canavan

As SCUBA instructors, our job functions often include teacher, marriage counselor (for the couples in the class) and therapist (for people taking the class because they once almost drowned). An often overlooked skill set is that of a career counselor. In order to build our programs or dive centers, we need staff, therefore we need to teach as if every student wants to become a SCUBA instructor.

Push Every Student Through the SCUBA System

I’m not advocating that we create barely passable instructor generation machines, but we need to start thinking that every student that signs up for our Open Water SCUBA classes actually wants to become a SCUBA Instructor.

I didn’t know it when I signed up for my Open Water SCUBA course, but on my first pool dive, I knew I wanted to become an instructor. Luckily, I was in an environment that made that dream a reality.

The Ski Instructor Who Hates Their Job

Imagine going to a ski resort for your first time. You’re excited, otherwise you wouldn’t spend the $100+ for the lift ticket and gear rental. You decide to take a lesson so you are less likely to kill yourself. The instructor acts bored, complains about their pay and doesn’t really want to be there.

You probably won’t enjoy yourself very much and aren’t very likely to learn the skills you need.

Now imagine someone who is excited. A little too excited. It’s a beautiful day, they’re going to show you the best parts of the mountain and they invite you back when done. They don’t talk about the money, they simply love what they’re doing.

It would be next to impossible to keep the idea out of your head, “Wow, being a ski instructor would be incredible! Ski every day, meet lots of people, travel to all the best resorts!”

Plant the Open Water SCUBA Instructor Seed Early by Simply Loving Your Job

If you are having a great time while teaching and have a staff that obviously loves what they’re doing, you will see increases in your continuing education ratios all the way to the top of the SCUBA hierarchy.

This Works for SCUBA Resorts Too

A few years ago, I traveled to Cozumel and went diving with SCUBA Tony. Although my wife and I have an unofficial rule of not revisiting the same destination twice, we often discuss returning to Cozumel to dive with Tony because he loves diving. Not only does he love diving, but when talking about the island, we could tell he loves Cozumel. He made the trip enjoyable, his personality showed a passion for his business and it pays off in a steady stream of referral business.

Whenever I visit Hawaii (I have friends who live there, so this doesn’t count in my repeat-SCUBA-trips rule), I try to dive with Keller Laros and Jack’s Diving Locker because they enjoy what they’re doing and share that enjoyment with me.

On the other hand, we traveled to Fiji last year and have less interest in returning because the staff didn’t have the same level of enthusiasm and passion.

Start the SCUBA Career Path Early

The PADI teaching system requires promoting continuing education while teaching. Although it may not be appropriate to promote the Instructor Development Course during an Open Water SCUBA Diver course, why not start mentioning it in the Advanced Open Water SCUBA Diver course?

How quickly do you start identifying potential instructor candidates?

Photo via larryzou@

I’ve argued with myself about if I should have a little rant or talk about one of the many other topics on my mind now. It’s Monday, and I slept terribly, so it’s a rant day

A Tale of Two Twitters

I have two Twitter accounts. One I’ve had for several years and most of my connections are people in the real estate industry (my current day job). There are some that are still just posting their new listings, but for the most part I’ve stopped following them. Although the real estate industry has its quirks that can annoy me at times, this Twitter stream is fairly conversational and less marketing broadcast.

Now lets look at my SCUBA Twitter account. Since I’ve seen that the SCUBA industry is not as far along as real estate when it comes to using social networking tools (Realtors have a lot of free time, I think), I expected fewer people having more conversations. My expectations were turned upside down, and not completely in a good way.

Traditional Networking Groups

I’ve taken part in several networking groups over the years. Imagine this, if you will:

You walk in for your first meeting with a networking group you’ve joined. You’re well dressed, had an extra cup of coffee and a pocket full of business cards to share once you’ve made some connections.

You enter the meeting room and are hit by a tidal wave of noise. It’s as if everyone in the room is talking. “Great!” you think, “lots of business!” Then you start to realize that everyone is talking. Everyone. If everyone is talking, how can anyone be listening?

You start to listen more closely to see what everyone is talking about.

“Widgets for sale, $1.99!”

“Look at our newest product at www.whatever.com!”

“We just closed another deal!”

“I’m just repeating what the guy next to me said!”

“I’m just repeating what the guy next to me said!”

“I’m just repeating what the guy next to me said!”

You get the idea.

This isn’t networking, this is broadcasting. You are part of a group that yells their marketing message at each other, repeats each other for assumed personal gain and does no real networking.

Social Networking

Twitter, Facebook and other communities like them are social networks.

Think about what it means to be social and how you prefer to network.

Is it by telling people what’s new with you without listening to what’s new with them?

Is it by repeating stories you’ve heard other people tell over and over again?

How to Identify the Noise Makers

In an effort to streamline my activities online, I have tried to cut the noise to find the true value.

Here are my two big tips to eliminate noise via Twitter:

1. Login late at night. Check the timeline to see if you see anyone who is very active (their avatar shows up repeatedly). Now look to see if those are just a bunch of @-replies (they may just be having a lively conversation). If they aren’t people in conversation, odds are they are automated accounts. Stop following them (unless you like the social network equivalent of SPAM).
2. Look underneath peoples updates. It will say something like:
   X minutes ago from Application
   If it says something like Tweetdeck, Hootsuite or Web instead of Application, you’re probably safe. If it says Twitterfeed or API, the spidey senses should be tingling. Check the rest of their timeline, if it’s predominantly Twitterfeed or API, they are an automated account. Stop following them.

Disclaimer

I believe a small degree of automation is great. I use a Twitter Publisher to send my blog posts to Twitter automatically. I use Networked Blogs to send them to Facebook. When someone leaves a comment, Twitterfeed pumps those out to Twitter.

But I am also interacting with people (when I can find someone who isn’t a bot). I’m sharing links I find interesting. I am networking for the benefit of all of us in the SCUBA industry.

Finally, a huge Thank You to the people I’ve had conversations with, who reply to their @-replies and direct messages and otherwise are connecting with myself and other. You make it enjoyable to login to Twitter.

Won’t you join me?

Photo via oliverchesler

Last night, Google announced their Ocean Showcase, an extra layer for their free Google Earth product.

The Ocean Showcase features a National Geographic tour, Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute’s US West Coast discoveries, Eco-Nova’s Shipwreck Central, dive sites from WannaDive and 3D models of wrecks in the Great Lakes from NOAA.

Integrate Google Into Your SCUBA Store

I envision a modern dive center incorporating a large projection screen with computer attached (you should have this for teaching anyway) with a wireless mouse and keyboard.

As your customers come in asking about diving in new and exotic locations, let them “drive” Google Earth on a tour of the locations they’re interested in.

This is unique, cool, modern and will get people talking about you. And might just make them want to come back to play some more.

Are you using interactive media in your dive center?

Photo via Google LatLong

There’s a boat full of divers and one PADI instructor, one NAUI instructor and one SSI instructor.

The boat starts to sink.

The NAUI instructor says, “Everybody get your BCD on, inflate it and we’ll wait for a rescue.”

The SSI instructor says, “Everybody gear up, we’ll go for a dive, then surface and wait for a rescue.”

The PADI instructor says, “Everybody sign this paperwork and pay me $200; we’re doing a wreck diver specialty course.”

The funniest part is that the same joke can be told by instructors from all three of those agencies and, to the appropriate audience, they’ll sound like the one with the right idea.

Contest Reminder

All jokes aside, today I simply want to remind everyone of our first contest. It’s super simple, if you haven’t entered already, make sure you check it out for a chance to win.

As an extra incentive, the next contest will be announced via the email newsletter exclusively.

Photo via jocelyn.aubert

Last week, Apple announced their upcoming iPad and Des was first on the scene to discuss the implications of the iPad for the SCUBA professionals among us.

Although I am seeing more and more potential uses for the iPad as the days go by, there are 4 reasons why I won’t be using one for SCUBA instruction:

1. It’s the first generation. Anyone who follows Apple knows you are taking a large risk by purchasing anything from Apple on their first attempt. (Kind of like the 27″ iMac I’ve eyeballed)
   If this is the only device you decide to bring to class or out on a dive weekend, do you really want to risk problems to be an early adopter?
2. No multitasking. When I teach, I’m often jumping in and out of the presentations to take notes, show other videos or look something up. Relaunching everything doesn’t sound very efficient to me. I can see this being even more of an issue when teaching Instructor Development Courses because I bounce around the various course materials even more.
3. No camera. How cool would it be to literally use this as your only device? Snap a photo of your student to keep on file to send with an online PIC when the course is over. As it stands, not only will I not be able to take a picture, I’ll have to carry my digital camera AND a new adapter to get the pictures from my camera to the iPad.
4. No PADI/SSI/NAUI/etc app. This isn’t actually a deal breaker, but can you imagine an app that has your instructor manuals, presentations and a PIC entry system all in one?

The iPad is Growing on Me

When I started this list, I had more items, but I’ve come to realize they aren’t true deal-breakers. Of the four items I’ve listed, only two are real potential deal breakers: multitasking and camera. There are plenty of rumors that the iPhone/iPad OS version 4 will allow for multitasking (Jailbreaking has allowed for it for some time), so that just brings it down to the camera.

I think the price, from entry-level to top of the line, is reasonable and I will not be surprised to see a few in circulation as teaching devices within the SCUBA industry.

Will you be getting an iPad for your SCUBA business?