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How offering campers choice got rid of so many common camp problems A bad plan, some unlikely friendships, and a new outlook When I decided to take a job at a new camp 3 years ago, I had a very sneaky plan. Quite simply, I planned to change the camp where I was moving into the camp I was moving from. I knew they’d be resistant to these changes at first. After all, change is hard. But I came from the best camp that ever existed, and even though change would be hard for them, I knew it was in their best interest. I called a respected friend in the camping industry, and he gave me what I now know is “best practices” sort of advice. “James,” he said, “your plan stinks.” (paraphrased this, but the idea is the same) I was bewildered. My plan did not stink! This camp needed saving, and here I was, ready to save! This camp couldn’t wait! It needed to be changed right away! I continued listening, and rolled my eyes (which he couldn’t see, because we were on the phone). He continued. “They’ll hate you if you change everything right away. No matter how good your ideas are, the people who are still at that camp like it the way it is. If you want to change something – add things to the camp, but don’t take anything away.” Hmm. This actually made sense. I started thinking about what would be “too big a change,” and what would feel more like an “addition” to the program. I started tinkering a little bit,...
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Congratulations! You’ve decided to market your camp! You’ve figured out why a kid should come to your camp instead of going elsewhere, and you’ve figured out what each camper is worth to your camp monetarily by using our summer camp retention tool, and you’re ready to dive into what to do next. Let’s start with a few broad concepts. Did you know that the average marketing budget for most non-profits represents between 9 and 11 percent of the overall budget? And maybe your camp is different, but at the places I’ve worked, camp marketing budgets tend to fall far below that. It makes sense, to some degree. We’re a word-of-mouth enterprise. Most of our new summer campers will come because their Moms went here, or because little Jack across the street said he couldn’t wait to go back next year. If your camp is like mine, however, you’ll occasionally get a comment like this: “Oh, I found you in the pennysaver,” New Camp Mom says. “And you’d never heard about us elsewhere?” I’d ask, incredulously. “Nope. But then I went to the website, and Robin thought it looked like fun!” And just like that, your camp has added your “what each camper is worth” figure to its bottom line, and it hasn’t even accounted for the gains possible if Robin brings a friend next year, or if her family decides to hold a family reunion there during retreat season. Parents send their children to camp for all variety of reasons, but one thing all of those parents have in common is that they have heard about your camp. And...
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The best places to connect with people, and how to get your materials there. Marketing summer camps has actually never been easier. We have opportunities today that camp directors from the 1970s could literally not have even dreamed about. Unfortunately, though, a lot of us ignore a lot of the marketing approaches that got the summer camp boom going in the 1950s and 1960s. The key to marketing in the 21st century is blending both old and new practices, and I’ll explain what I discovered along the way to growing Vanderkamp from 207 kids in a summer to 418 just two summers later. There are 8 basic marketing platforms we’ve worked with, and I can give you some insight into the costs and benefits of each. I’ll give the cliffs here, and follow up with some more long-form posts on the nuances of each. But this will give you a general idea, to help you understand what worked for us, or what we want to try next. The Eight Major Camp Marketing Platforms 1) Retaining current customers – Check here for details on the 7 inexpensive tricks we used that are guaranteed to boost your retention. 2) Word of Mouth Marketing – Here are 11 easy ways to enhance your word of mouth marketing campaign. 3) Making materials available publicly (mailing brochures to churches to be put out, putting them in libraries, at the mall, etc) 4) Direct mail to cold prospects – check out a more in-depth article here: Getting first time campers with 2 easy direct-mail strategies 5) Creating a website that’s great for prospective customers and...
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