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Today, I am starting a short series on how to make your Facebook posts more engaging. The first part of the series is going to cover imagery. Luckily, summer camps have great images from their summer photographers, which means they always have an arsenal of photos to use for Facebook posts. Still, I see camps all of the time using images that don't perform well on Facebook. Here are five quick tips to make your Facebook images more engaging: 1. Pictures...

Facebook insights for your Facebook page

Posted on July 23, 2013

Almost every summer camp has a Facebook page and it is extremely important to take advantage of the insights that Facebook provides you to grow and optimize your page. I am going to quickly walk you through my page's insights so you can see what metrics are important to track. On the main page of Facebook insights there are three panels available: page likes, post reach and engagement. The most important of these three to take a deeper look at is post...

How often should you update parents during camp and where?

Posted on July 19, 2013

in Social Strategies

During camp it is absolutely imperative for camps to keep their parents and community updated, but it can certainly become a daunting task when you have to update your internal camp software (campminder, bunk1, etc.), Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube and the list goes on. I've posted before about how to best create content during camp, but I wanted to share a few additional tips on how much you should be updating your social entities. 1. Update twice a day, collect content...

How-to set up Twitter ads for summer camps

Posted on July 18, 2013

Watch this video to learn more about how-to set up Twitter ads for your summer camp. Email blake@socialsummercamp.com with any questions! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ekOvwQSUAw&feature=youtu.be...

Google Search Insights for Camps

Posted on July 10, 2013

Google offers summer camps some great tools for learning more about what prospective parents are searching for. One tool, Google Trends, allows you to see what search terms are being searched for at certain times of the year. The image below shows last year's trend for searches using the following terms: summer camp texas (red), summer camp maine (blue) and summer camp new york (yellow). Understanding Google Search Insights could help you boost your website's traffic. The trend lines show what...

Updated – Save time by hiring a social media consultant for your camp

Posted on July 3, 2013

in Social Strategies

Social media marketing for summer camps is a full-time job! In fact, when I built out the chart below to estimate how many hours per month a camp should spend on social media, I was stunned to see my estimations top out somewhere around 55 hours per month! This is why hiring a consultant to do social media is so important. In general, the services of Social Summer Camp can take the time spent down to around 15 hours per...

Measuring social media success for summer camps

Posted on July 2, 2013

in Social Strategies

As part of the Social Summer Camp social media program for summer camps, I work with each camp to put together a short, medium and long-term measurement plan. A solid measurement plan is one of the most important aspects of a great social media program. Many summer camps are using social media, but have not figured out how to measure success. If you are running a social media program and not measuring results, try some of these short-term measurement ideas: Using Google...

Growing your camp is possible with social media

Posted on July 1, 2013

in Camp Inspiration

Many camps tell me they aren't interested in social media consulting because they aren't looking to grow their enrollment. While this is a great problem to have, I'm disappointed to hear about camps that aren't interested in growing past their current state. Of course, it is normal for camps to be comfortable with their current size, and it's true that growing a camp past its capacity can be time-intensive and expensive (more staff, more buildings, etc.) But what I want...

Twitter Advertising for Summer Camps

Posted on June 21, 2013