Jack's Camp Friends Newsletter |
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2 (Very) Quick Notes
- The automated emails your camp sends when parents show interest are crucial. Been writing and auditing camp lead sequences all spring. Put the biggest takeaways into this free guide: 7 Camp Lead Sequence Fixes to Make Right Now
- This week's Write From Camp on Substack was all about what to send and post during the summer.
Which is very much on theme for what comes next.
It’s Wednesday, June 17th at 12:46 PM. This was not the plan. The plan was for Jack to post his thoughts about staff training, which he's running right now.
I (Doug) haven’t heard from Jack in 72 (but more like 96+) hours. Normally, this wouldn’t be a huge deal for anyone, except that Jack and I trade about 100 messages a day (give or take 50) on Slack or text. What can I say, we like to send messages.
Except now it’s been days and days (and days). Could screenshot the one-sided nature of this, but worry about coming off looking needy. Swear it’s all business-related, but it’s still just a sea of me, me, me and nothing from him. Sigh.
If you’re on this list and he’s messaged you, congrats. You rate higher.
Regardless, what’s happening here is some version of what’s happening at camps everywhere. This week is likely some mix of leadership training, staff training, and first campers arriving.
That’s a lot. It’s more than a lot. It’s pretty much everything. 9 months of buildup for a summer sprint, where everything else rides on crushing this one short window.
So, no, won’t be doing a wellness check on J-Schott, but it pays to think about how to handle this kind of thing come summer.
The Camp Director Capacity Cliff
I made a VERY accurate and EXTREMELY mathematical chart describing what’s happening right now.
Originally drew this up around outreach to families and proxied it for how I’m feeling.
Andy Pritikin (Hey Andy!) reached out last week about something we’d written for Write From Camp on Substack, essentially saying that we should republish it in the fall when camp people had more bandwidth to read it.
From the safe confines of my home office, I thought and then responded with, “Ok, we will. But open rates and engagement don’t drop off during the summer according to our data.”
Andy said, “Open rates are one thing, actually reading them with a clear head is another thing (my belief).”
I thought. Hmm, ok. That makes sense. I’ll talk to Jack about this. Which, in a cruel twist of irony (I think this qualifies), was right about the time that Jack stopped responding to me.
Andy was right!
Camps are in a tough spot. The people running them have decreased capacity for outreach right now. The families they serve have plenty.
Because look again at that (very accurate) graph above. Families want to hear what’s going on at camp now more than ever.
Because their kids are there.
Because their kids might be about to be there.
Because they are getting into summer and thinking, hmm, maybe camp would have been the right choice this summer. Let’s see what’s out there so I know what to do next summer.
Whatever the motivation, engaging with the “real world” matters now more than any other time of the year.
So having a plan on how to keep the output flowing even when capacity for outreach hits the downward slope or the cliff is important and pretty much mission-critical.
K&E’s weekly issue went out this week, one I think most camps could use. It’s about THO (Total Hours Outside). So we feel covered on that front. Feel free to just redo the math for your camp and send a version of it.
There’s a plan for this and more all summer. But it's still tough.
What the heck to do about it?
Having a plan is a good first step. But if you’re in the muck and the mire right now, I’d say this:
Get an MVP (Minimum Viable Post) version of public-facing outreach going ASAP.
Personal videos showing what’s happening at camp each day. I know camps doing this and parents absolutely love it. Post them on YouTube (not Vimeo).
Grab one story a week from something that happened at camp. Doesn’t have to be Pulitzer Prize-worthy, just specific, earnest, and honest. Describe what happened and why it was awesome. Hit send to the whole email list.
This capacity signaling, even if it’s by the skin of your teeth, has compounding effects later. And if you’re in this story and moment-finding mode, there’s going to be a treasure trove of content.
It’s worth it. Parents want it.
And if you talk to Jack, tell him to text me.
You got this,
Doug (and Jack probably)
PS - The latest Talk From Camp Episode was with ACA's Cory Harrison. What a get! We talked about running camp, thinking about sales, bringing camps into the ACA sphere, and more. YouTube below and on Spotify.
