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I love the idea of creating holiday-specific messaging for your camp. Most camps have a good brand voice, but don't often change their brand voice to focus on timely events. We talked yesterday about how to set long-term and short-term holiday goals for your summer camp. Once you have completed that, it's time to figure out what messaging you are going to use to reach your goal. Usually when creating messaging I recommend figuring out the following first: What three main...

Holiday planning for summer camps

Posted on September 25, 2013

It may only be the end of September, but camps should definitely be thinking about the holidays already. Why is that, you ask? Because most moms decide what they are going to get their kids in the months of October and November. We all know that a summer at camp makes an amazing holiday gift, so it is very important to stay in front of these moms. I'll be doing a series over the next few weeks about how to...

Social media and summer camp video trainings

Posted on September 23, 2013

I have a lot of video trainings available on my YouTube channel and I wanted to make sure that you all had access to them. I'm uploading more each day, so make sure and check out my channel here. Here are some of the most useful video trainings available: Top three ways to target Facebook ads for summer camps How to track social activity using the Google Conversion Tracking Pixel and the Facebook Conversion Tracking Pixel How to build Twitter ads for summer camps...

Thoughts on “marketing” as a bad word

Posted on September 16, 2013

in Camp Inspiration

A lot of camps I talk to don't want to prioritize marketing as one of their main goals for their summer camp. I hear a lot of people say that it just isn't a priority, or they don't have time to fully focus on it and a number of other excuses for why marketing isn't that important to them. But the more and more I think about camps who think that "marketing" is a bad word, the more and more...

How much money should a camp spend on ads?

Posted on September 6, 2013

Most companies, all the way from start ups to huge corporations, don't feel like they need to pay anything for advertising. I'm sure this stems somewhat from all of the awesome free social media tools that are available to companies. Even though these tools can be extremely powerful in driving results, I feel very strongly that summer camps should at least be spending a small amount of money on ads. Well, how much money you ask? As much money as...

Social Media Roundup for Camps- September

Posted on September 4, 2013

in Social Media Roundup

Here are some interesting articles on social media and summer camps from this past month! Mashable: A marketer's guide to retargeting on Facebook- This is a great beginners post on how FBX (the Facebook Exchange) works for retargeting. American Camp Association Blog: Famous campers and camp staff share thoughts on character- Did you know Michelle Obama went to summer camp? Me either until I read this blog post! Mashable: Social media project monitors keywords to prevent suicide- This is a very interesting article...

Why Facebook ads for summer camps?

Posted on September 2, 2013

I've written a lot in the past about how to use Facebook ads and how to track conversions on Facebook using their conversion tracking pixel. Still almost daily I get asked why any camp would want to run Facebook ads, so I decided to write up a few quick notes. Remember that I worked at Facebook for almost three years before starting Social Summer Camp, so I feel pretty confident in the following reasons that Facebook ads really work for...

Marketing your personal brand

Posted on August 28, 2013

Yesterday I wrote about how to cultivate your personal brand as a camp director or assistant director. Today I am going to quickly cover how to promote your personal brand (if you wish!). Like I mentioned in my previous post, having a personal brand in non-negotiable, you have one even if you don't want one. Which is why it always makes sense to think through your goals both short term and long term in regards to your brand. You don't...

Personal branding for summer camp directors

Posted on August 26, 2013