It can be so much fun to plan camp fun and carry out your summer camp programs.  But often camp directors have to leave that to program staff. Their main activities usually revolve around camp budgets, raising funds, managing the managers, and marketing.  Even full time program staff members may get involved in these necessary camp activities as well.

There are many ways to increase camp income.  You may be developing new programs that meet the needs and wants of people in your community.  Many residential camps are adding day camp programs because summer child care is an increasing need in their communities.  This works for camps that are within a reasonable driving distance of populated areas.

Probably you are advertising and attending community events in order to make people in your area aware of what your camp has to offer.  You may also be coming up with incentives, new activities, and new facilities to attract more campers and retreat guests.  The more campers and retreat guests you can bring in, the more income your camp will have to work with.

Of course, various forms of fundraising are necessary for nonprofit camps.  You need to keep in contact with donors as well as find new ones.  And fundraising events can be huge time consumers, but very worthwhile when it comes to keeping your camp afloat financially.

Some camps have been rather slow to jump aboard internet advertising.  They put up websites, but do not know how to optimize them for search engine traffic or how to drive traffic to their sites.  One of the difficulties is that full-time camp staff are already overworked, and taking time to learn and put into effect internet marketing would be very difficult.  For that reason, it’s often more effective to pay for services from an internet marketing specialist who can do work for the camp on an as needed basis.

Just because someone knows how to make a website, he or she does not necessarily know how to optimize it for traffic or how to drive traffic to it.  Because I have a background in camping and in internet marketing, I am now making myself available to work with camps on a free lance basis to help them build free traffic to their websites.  I can help camps get listed on Google maps, run Adwords campaigns, and raise their organic search engine rankings.  Also I can help them add content to their sites that will help those looking for camps for their children to recognize the benefits of your camp program.

If you’d like to discuss this, contact me:

Karen Roberts
610-955-4724

Be Sociable, Share!