As a summer camp leader, you know the struggles of increasing summer camp enrollment. All camps experience natural turnover as kids age out, which makes developing a sustainable enrollment strategy essential.
Fortunately, with the right camp management software and approach, you can easily increase your camp’s enrollment rates. In this guide, we’ll explore top best practices for how to increase summer camp enrollment.
1. Improve your summer camp retention rates.
Continue your outreach efforts to bring in new campers, but remember that the best strategy for maintaining steady enrollment rates is to retain the campers you already have. While kids will naturally leave your camp as they grow up, there are many young campers you can count on to re-enroll as you put in the effort to retain them.
The key to better camper retention is listening to the wants and needs of your campers, their parents, and your staff members. Then, analyze their feedback to make strategic improvements.
Use your camp software to send out summer camp evaluation forms. These surveys should provide your camp’s administrative team with important information on:
Camper experience
When surveying your campers, remember that they are children and likely have one thing on their mind: fun. Your questions should center around how much they enjoyed camp and how well you met their expectations. Ask questions like:
- What was your favorite activity at camp?
- On a scale of 1-10, how well did you get along with your bunkmates?
- What activity do you wish we could do more of?
The more enthusiastic your campers are about attending your camp, the more likely their parents will continue signing them up yearly!
Parent satisfaction
Evaluations geared toward parents should focus on their experiences enrolling their children and staying in touch during your camp. Get constructive feedback by asking questions like:
- On a scale of 1-10, how easy was our camp registration software to use?
- What camp activities do you wish your child could have participated in?
- How satisfied were you with the communication you received from our camp this summer?
Parents are the ones who determine whether their child will return to camp. Use their feedback to improve your registration process, identify gaps in your communication strategy, and expand your camp offerings. To help you create your survey, here’s an example template to get started:
2. Streamline your summer camp registration process.
The more effective and efficient your enrollment process is, the more parents will complete it and get their kids registered. Plus, your enrollment process is a key opportunity to make a positive impression on parents entrusting you to look after their children.
Reassure them that your camp is a professional organization that takes excellent care of campers by designing a streamlined, efficient, and trustworthy enrollment process. Your camp management software can help you accomplish this by providing:
easy-to-use summer camp enrollment forms
Your summer camp enrollment forms set the tone for your entire registration process. They should be straightforward and provide clear directions for parents to fill out. Make sure your forms:
- Are short and simple. Only ask for the information you need. Avoid rambling or asking unnecessary, irrelevant questions. Focus on collecting vital information, such as emergency contacts, medical and allergy information, and basic personal data.
- Provide all pertinent camp details. Registration forms should share information about your camp, like general camp contact information, session dates, and the camp leader’s name and contact information.
- Outline pricing information. Your camp pricing likely depends on the number of kids enrolling, the children’s ages, and the session they choose. Make sure your registration forms walk parents through the pricing structure so they can select the options that work best for them.
A Centralized Database
Registration doesn’t need to be a hassle for your camp’s administrative team. Camp management software allows you to house all of your camper registration data in a single, centralized location. This enables you to better understand who your campers are, access emergency information quickly, and plan future activities aligned with their interests.
To increase your summer camp enrollment, prepare your administrative team to handle registration data efficiently. With the right tools, they should be able to expertly store, organize, and use your campers’ data to promote future engagement.
Multiple Registration Options
Often, parents want to register all their kids for camp simultaneously but have to tediously fill out individual forms for each child. This can be incredibly time-consuming and dissuade some busy parents from completing registration.
Use camp management software that enables parents to add multiple enrollments to a single registration transaction.
3. Refresh your website.
Your website is your top marketing tool for bringing in new campers. After all, the first step curious parents will take is browsing your website and using it to assess if your camp is the right fit for their family.
Ahead of the camp season, assess your website and make any necessary updates to make a positive impression on parents. For instance, be sure your website includes:
- Essential informational pages. While reaching out with questions should be easy, parents should find all the information they need on your website. Ensure your website includes informational pages for your camp’s activities, logistics, safety procedures, parent communication plans, and any other crucial details.
- Integrated registration forms. Your registration tool should appear as an extension of your existing web presence rather than navigating parents to a separate site. This increases trustworthiness and creates a streamlined experience.
- Consistent branding. Maintain coherent, uniform branding across all parent-facing content. From registration forms to website interfaces, parents should never feel misdirected or led away from your primary site.
Your online presence should appear professional, engaging, and cohesive. As parents and site visitors explore your site and start the registration process, they should feel more confident enrolling and sending their kids to your camp!
4. Keep in touch with parents.
Maintaining open communication is a vital component of your summer camp enrollment strategy. After all, parents have to know when and how to register in order to enroll their kids in your camp.
Your communication strategy should be multifaceted and occur in three different stages:
- Leading up to enrollment. Spread the news about your camp’s enrollment period well before registration opens. Allow parents to consider your camp thoroughly, work out their schedules, and decide that your camp is the right choice for their child.
- During the enrollment period. Remind individuals who have started the registration process to finish before the deadline. Follow up with parents in increments throughout the registration period to ensure they finish on time.
- After the summer camp ends. It's never too early to get a headstart on enrollment for next year. Encourage parents to get ahead of the game and enroll their kids in your camp for the following summer. Add incentive by offering an early registration discount.
Your camp software should enable you to track prospective camper leads and keep tabs on where they are in the registration process. Monitor when someone requests more information, abandons a registration form, or indicates that they are interested in other engagement opportunities, like volunteering.
5. Highlight Your Camp's Unique Features.
Few parents just enroll their kids in the first camp they find. Most do their research, comparing multiple options to find the right fit. If you want your camp to stand out, make sure you emphasize what makes it special.
With camp management software like CIRCUITREE, you can provide a wide variety of convenient features that parents are sure to appreciate, such as:
- Automated housing. Match campers with the perfect roommates based on their age, gender, interests, and any other housing priorities your camp sets. This ensures kids will find friends as soon they arrive. Campers can also make roommate requests that are automatically entered into your management system when approved by both campers.
- Transportation tracking. Keep parents in the loop by maintaining up-to-date records on all charter buses, shuttles, and flights managed by your camp. When your campers travel by an approved mode of transportation, parents will know that their kids are safe, and you will know your camp is running efficiently.
- Activity scheduling. Allow campers to control their activity schedule before arriving at camp. All you need to do is enter details about each activity, such as description, time, location, extra costs, and capacity. Then, campers can design their own schedules. Campers will love this, and parents will enjoy seeing their children get excited about their planned activities leading up to camp.
- Camper check-in. Emphasize how efficient and accurate your camper check-in process is by ditching the stacks of loose papers and clipboards and adopting a digital check-in tool. Design camper profiles with identification photos so your team can easily check campers in on the first day and keep tabs on them throughout the season.
- Electronic health center. An electronic health center keeps all of your campers’ medical information in a secure database. Each camper wears an identification wristband with a barcode that counselors and medics can easily scan to access their medical information.
By emphasizing these and other unique features, you’ll ensure that parents will jump at the chance to send their kids to a camp as well-organized and safe as yours.
6. Leverage Social Media.
Get in touch with new camp families by marketing on social media. Maintaining an active social media presence gives your camp several opportunities to reach a larger audience, including:
- Organic posts. Post a range of content on your social media profiles to show users that your camp is active and provides a fun, memorable experience for campers. When parents enroll their children, get their permission to feature their children in marketing materials so you can freely take and post pictures of camp activities.
- Paid advertising. Paid digital advertising is an effective strategy for some camps. Consider your audience, their preferred platforms, and your ability to create quality ads. Social media sites with precise marketing tools can get your ads in front of likely prospects, leading to boosted enrollment numbers.
- User-generated content. Parents and kids are likely to post about their camp experiences, helping do some of your marketing for you. Share and comment on these posts to spread your reach and other post viewers to check out your camp’s account.
When it comes to what social media channels to pursue, consider both children's and parents’ browsing habits. Ultimately, parents are the ones making the decision, but a child spotting a fun video of exciting camp activities and showing it to their parents can be incredibly persuasive as well.
7. Follow SEO Best Practices.
Many parents find activities for their kids simply by heading to search engines like Google and typing in “summer camps for kids” or similar keywords. Increase the chances these searches bring parents to your website by following SEO best practices.
SEO stands for search engine optimization, and it’s the practice of improving your website to follow factors popular search engines use to rank search results. Here are a few common ranking factors and how you can create content that aligns with them:
- Location. Search engines consider where users are located when delivering results. This helps users connect with local organizations they can easily access, like your summer camp in their town rather than one several states away. Fill out a Google Business Profile to share your location data with Google and provide detailed information to parents who discover you online.
- Recency. Search engines want to provide users with up-to-date information and active websites. Regularly update your site by refreshing outdated pages, updating calendars, and posting routine blog posts.
- Keyword focus. Keywords are the words and phrases users enter into search engines. To ensure your content ranks for keywords parents are likely to search, perform keyword research. This is the process of examining a potential keyword’s search traffic, the type of content that ranks highly for the term, and what other organizations rank for it. This will help you determine if a keyword is worth trying to rank for and if doing so is possible.
When it comes to SEO strategies, create valuable content and ensure you use keywords strategically, such as in your headers. However, avoid keyword stuffing as it creates a poor user experience, and search engines may penalize websites for doing so.
Additional summer camp enrollment Resources
Encouraging enrollment at your summer camp doesn’t need to be a stressful ordeal for your administrative team. Simply adopt camp management software that will streamline your camp’s registration process, help you encourage parents to enroll their children, and offer unique features that will appeal to parents and campers. You’ll see increased enrollment numbers in no time!
Check out these additional resources to learn more about improving your camp today:
- Summer Camp Registration Forms: 5 Top Tips + Free Template. Need help designing your registration process? Explore these tips and get a free template.
- Best Camp Management Software: A Buyer’s Guide. Management software helps your camp stay on track and create a positive experience for campers. Boost your enrollment efforts with these top platforms.
- 10+ Summer Camp Marketing Strategies to Find More Campers. Marketing is essential for increasing enrollment. Discover tips for connecting with your audience.
