Hopefully you’ve already started marketing your camp for summer 2023. Just in case you’re looking for additional tips, we put together this list of the Top 10 Marketing Strategies you can use to fill your camp to capacity this summer.

- Create a strong and consistent brand identity. Develop a unique and compelling brand that resonates with your target market and differentiates your camp from others.
- Use Social Media. Building a strong online presence on social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok is important for camps. It’s the best way to connect with potential campers and their parents. These platforms enable you to showcase camp activities, testimonials, and share behind the scenes look at camp life.
- Optimize your website. Make sure your website is user-friendly and provides all the information potential campers and their parents need to make an informed decision. This is crucial since parents and kids use the internet as an initial step to find and compare camps these days. decision. Spend time making sure your SEO (search engine optimization) techniques are maximized to improve visibility in search engine results like Google, Bing and others.
- Utilize video marketing Creating videos to showcase the camp experience, including testimonials from previous campers and their parents, is an important strategy for filling your 2023 summer camp enrollment to capacity. Share your videos on social media platforms and your website. Make sure you have a YouTube account!
- Leverage email marketing. Building and maintaining an up-to-date email list of past and potential campers and their parents — and using it to keep them informed about your camp and upcoming programs and events –is one of the best ways to generate instant enrollment. You can expect several (if not more) new enrollments to come in immediately upon sending a well-crafted email message.
- Use influencer marketing. Partner with popular influencers in your target market to promote your camp and reach a wider audience. Influences can make a video or send an email on your behalf to their followers and fans. This kind of 3rd party endorsement can be a huge opportunity to pick-up reach a wide audience you couldn’t otherwise engage with and pick-up new enrollments fast.
- Offer early bird discounts. Offer discounts for early registration to encourage people to sign up early. Every camp is different, so choose an early bird cutoff date that works best for.
- Leverage referral marketing. Encourage satisfied parents and campers to refer their friends and other families to camp. Provide an incentive for them to do so. (You might already be getting lots of word-of-mouth referrals, but implementing a active referral program as a marketing strategy is better than waiting around for people to refer.)
- Participate in local events. Attend and participate in local events such as camp fair and school festivals by setting up a booth to promote your camp. This is a great way to meet and connect with new family prospects in person.
- Create a sense of community. Want families to feel a deeper sense of connection to your camp? Create a sense of community among campers, staff and parents through online groups, social media, and virtual events.
We wish you the best of luck filling your camp with kids this summer!
Great tips Eric!
Related to point 3 – optimize your website – make sure it’s easy to see your camp location on your website. Some websites put the address (at least a city, state) above the navigation bar and some put it in the footer. Emphasizing your city name will also help with SEO as people search for ” summer camp”.