Another digital tool has emerged that will enable the snow industry to attract and retain a new pool of riders...

TTR Snowboarding has a brand-new, free App for the iPhone and iPad. The App gives you access to rider profiles and rankings as well as a look at all the current contenders for the TTR World Tour Overall, Halfpipe, Slopestyle, and Big Air titles. Head over to the iTunes App Store to download it for free.

I've said for a long time that technology has the opportunity to serve as a bridge between an online/offline existence. The marketing resource for cultural and lifestyle brands to attract new customers. Sports, especially snowboarding, would be able to address participant gap via new media technologies. It is after all the way to reach young urban consumers. Based on The Creators Project posting I read this morning, we aren't too far off from seeing the content that can deliver on this idea...

Step into the fray, media artist and keen snowboarder Trent Brooks who’s developed an open source project called AntiMap to take that data indexing experience to the slopes, gathering real-time rider data while you’re out skiing or snowboarding. It then analyzes your numbers and even syncs it to video footage of you riding around, so you can marvel at your sick moves while enjoying some après-ski downtime.

First mentioned the role that digital technology would have on the action sports category back in Nov. of 2008. It wasn't too hard to see where things were trending. It become obvious that mobile devices would lead the charge in introducing digital content, like snowboarding, to urban youth. Thus digital would introduce a new generation of enthusiasts to the ation sports lifestyle and culture.

Fast forward to today, and the business opportunities are still there. Apple released the Ipad2 this week and there are some sleek new features for marketers to leverage. And again, why does this matter in relation to the youth market, especially Hispanic? Well look at who's buying all these consumer electronics. Proof I've been right for a few years now...

Interestingly the AdAge article highlights retail transactions in all of this, which is increasingly valuable for the action sports industry.

Hispanics' engagement with the digital world comes full circle when analyzing e-commerce transactions across all categories during the month of June 2010. Hispanics in general spent $103.19 per transaction, compared to $90.82 for non-Hispanics.

So...kind of a no brainer right? Mobile is key to reaching the U.S. urban youth segment. It significantly impacts sales of action sports companies in the all important 18 to 34 year old segment.

According to Mark Grondin, SVP of Marketing at Shopatron, “Brands with younger customer groups, like Spy Optic for example, are getting as much as 5%-9% of their traffic from mobile devices. Of those mobile visitors, about 2% are currently purchasing, but that number is also steadily increasing.”

Recent studies, including one by Google, indicate that mobile is a must for reaching the U.S. Hispanic market. 2011 will be the year that more brands follow the rabbit down the digital hole.

Just think about these stats:

• 93% of U.S. Hispanics use a mobile phone regularly
• 45% of U.S. Hispanic mobile phone users have smartphones compared to 34% of general market
• 87% of U.S. Hispanic mobile phone users have contract plans and only 8% have pre-paid plans