Beyond Clicks and Likes: Measuring the True Impact of Your Camp’s Marketing Efforts

Embarking on a journey to promote your camp can be both thrilling and challenging, especially if marketing is uncharted territory (cue ‘Into the Unknown’ from Frozen). Marketing is a test of patience, especially for camps in their infancy, undergoing repositioning, that have new leadership, or as simple as establishing a footprint in a new geographic area.

 Before you can expect to “sell” your camp, your target audience must:

·       Know about it

·       Consume relevant messages somewhere between too little and ad nauseam

·       Understand how you solve a problem or creates awareness of a problem they didn’t previously know they had

·       See why it’s different from others in the space

Seems easy, right? Wellll…..

In order to develop resonant messaging and accompanying promotions, you must also understand how your current marketing is performing and how much/if your audience is engaging.

A few thoughts to ruminate over (but don’t lose sleep):

·       You don’t need to spend hours and days in GA4. There are top-line source, traffic, and engagement metrics that yield outcomes.

·       What does your transactional vs. value-added content split look like on social media? Are you just posting about open houses and registration?

·       Are your welcome series emails being opened? And do readers take subsequent actions?

·       Do you conduct an end-of-summer survey and/or focus groups, as well as gather feedback from families who leave your camp or inquire but don’t enroll?

Why do you need this data? Because it can and will help you create an informed strategy and plan, which might include:

·       Stories to be told (we all know that camp is magical, let’s show it)

·       Social media + email marketing

·       Video (Snack-size, e.g. 2 ½ minutes or less)

·       Digital + community publication advertising

·       Unique content (blogs, podcasts, spotlights)

·       Website copy enhancements

·       Editorial + content calendar templates

·       Recommendations for recurring measurement

Yes, it’s work. Yes, it’s time consuming. However, it sounds like a better use of everyone’s time to produce campaigns, content, and communications that are rooted in data rather than pulled out of the sky. Otherwise, not only might you be screaming into the void, but constant ideation and churning also means quicker burnout. And no one has time for that!

Laurie Ehrlich is the founder + chief strategist of Elevate Marketing Strategy and the fractional CMO for Capital Camps. Learn more about data-driven marketing strategy at the ACA Tri-State Conference on Tuesday, March 12, at 3:00 PM when she presents alongside Capital Camps’ family + community engagement director, Melissa Grossman