When it comes to your summer camp's online reputation surprises are NOT fun

[EDIT LIST:
10/31/22 - added Glassdoor.com
12/11/17 changed up the Yelp section based on an experience one of our camps had
11/23/17 removed Yik Yak (thank goodness!), added some more to the monthly list]

Although it is yet ANOTHER thing you need to add to your calendar, this is an important part of running a business in the modern world. In fact, in a business where we ask parents to trust us to look after their children, trust is essential.  Online reviews and your reputation need to be actively managed.

You know how Google Suggest works?   You start to type words into Google and it offers suggestions of the most common searches for that word.

It might look like:

<search>: william ...and Google will offer you:

• william shatner

• william shakespeare

• william hurt

• william baldwin

Well, on about 50% of the searches I conduct using the camp name the top suggestion is "camp name reviews".

Actively Managing Your Online Reputation

What do you do once you've found your online reviews (good or bad or both)? Actively manage those reviews.  Put out calls to action to your community (with a link to one of the review sites at a time and some suggestions of the best techniques for leaving effective and honest reviews).

Here's the To Do list that I recommend all camps follow:

Check these sites WEEKLY:

1. Yelp
2. Campratingz
3. Facebook reviews
4. Google Reviews

MONTHLY Ask for honest reviews on:

5. Google Maps / Google business listing (how-to down below!)

6. Yelp.com or Yelp.ca (or your local Yelp) *NOTE: we had a camp talk to Travis about their experience with Yelp.   They had put out a big Call To Action to about 15 people to help get more honest reviews on Yelp.  Because so many happened at once, Yelp didn't allow all the reviews to be posted.   Our new suggestion: only ask 2 or 3 people per month to add to your Yelp reviews. 

7. Foursquare.com <yes, that's still a thing>

8. Your Facebook Page -  Not all camp Facebook Pages are setup to accept reviews. Make sure you give them the direct link to the reviews page. Like this: https://www.facebook.com/pg/CampHacker/reviews/

9. Trip Advisor (if there is a listing there for your camp)

10. Angi

11. Better Business Bureau

12. Glassdoor - Glassdoor is a hiring site that invites employees to rate their experience as a worker (and often to share their salary). Your camp may or may not be on there now but we definitely recommend you check for it monthly or to monitor your listing monthly.

Camp Specific Review Sites:

• CampRatingz.com

• Choice Camps

• Activity Hero

• My Summer Camps

• Camp Navigator 

• Retreat Central (if you rent out your site) 

Instructions to send to your camp community to show how to write reviews for your Google Business (*fair warning: These services change CONSTANTLY. You're best to check our methods and adapt them for the current setup instead of just copy/paste): 

• Write a review

  • Go to google.com/local and sign in with your Google account.

  • Search for the name of our camp, then click on the name of the business to open up our listing.

  • Click the "Write a Review" button next below the cover photo. If there are already reviews, click the "# reviews" - at the top of that new box there will be a "Write a Review" button

  • Rate our camp using the 1 to 5 star scale, and write any information that you think will be helpful to another family looking for the perfect camp for their child in the text box.

  • When you’re done, click Post. Any reviews that you write will be public and attributed to your Google+ name.