How to Translate Your Website Into Other Languages and Serve Customers From All Over the World

If your goal's to get as many people as possible -- from all over the world -- to easily read your blog and website, consider offering language translation for your online visitors.

This summer, campers from Japan, Germany, Italy and other foreign countries signed up for Aloha Beach Camp. Most of them said they found, and navigated, my website via Google Translate, and they appreciated the convenience.

You too can be one of the few camps anywhere offering a translation option on your website. This could be especially helpful if you run a sleepaway camp since you're more likely than a day camp to serve customers from all over the world.

Here's a link to the Google Translate tool. It's not perfect, but it's better than nothing. It's also pretty easy to install, just cut and paste a little code.

You might just find yourself landing new campers from all over the world sooner rather than later.

Blogging: The Most Bang for Your Marketing Buck

I've never met a camp director who couldn't use more credibility or visibility for their program. You can get that, and you can get tons of potential camper leads, through blogging.

It doesn't take much. Just create a blogging plan and stick to it. Follow these steps and you'll be on your way to blogging success.

• Post at least 3 times a week. (Even if you're tempted to cut back, don't. The internet is LOADED with abandoned blogs. So don't just start a blog and quit. Someone might find it, which reflects badly on your camp)
• Your posts can be long or short, pictures or video, text or whatever you want. The format doesn't matter - consistency does!
• As I mentioned, if your blog is interesting, people will read longer posts. But remember, the most valuable thing people have is time. If you can say the same thing in one paragraph I can say in two, you're a better blogger than me.
• "How-to" information and bulleted or numbered lists are a great way to engage readers. So is stuff going on in your personal life. (Great way to include a human element to your blog.)
• Make sure your post titles include keyword-rich content, then include the same content in the post itself
• Leave at least two or three comments on other camp, kid, and family-related blogs each week
• Post a prominent link on your blog so people can subscribe to it via email or RSS feed. This way they can read your posts even when they're not visiting your actual blog site.

I don't know about you, but my feeling is consistent blogging gives you the best bang for your marketing buck because you can start a blog and maintain one absolutely free. Surely it's the easiest way to stay at the top of the search rankings, too. (Type "summer camp marketing" into Google to see what I mean.)

Who knows, a newspaper or media journalist looking to do a story on summer camp might come across your blog and contact you, simply because you've got a regular posting schedule with interesting content.

Now that camp's over, start a blogging schedule and stick to it. You'll be pleased with your results!

Camp Counselors: Your Best Marketing Tool By Far

Sometimes we get so consumed marketing our camps the traditional way (website, blog, print advertising, etc.) we overlook our absolute best marketing strategy: hiring superb camp counselors and staff.

Skilled camp counselors know how to connect with kids like no other marketing tool I know. Sure, you can get a kid to sign up for camp the traditional way. But your counselors, man, they're the difference makers. A good camp counselor who your campers look up to can be responsible for keeping the same kids at camp year after. And that means high camper retention rates, lower marketing costs, and phenomenal word of mouth referrals.

I don't know if there's any such thing as marketing magic, but if there is, your staff might be the ones who create it.