The Campground Owners Expo (COE) hosted a unique influencer event on Thursday (Dec. 4) morning that featured travel influencers with a variety of experiences.
Influencers included Green Bay Packer Hall of Famer Donald Driver, who is also a New York Times best-selling author and content creator and his son, Christian Driver, a football player and content creator for the Minnesota Golden Gophers and his fiance, Maggie Golder, an influencer and college lacrosse player who has over 300,000 followers on TikTok.
Other influencers that took part were Sara Broers, a cofounder of the Midwest Travel Network who also has her own travel blog at TravelWithSara.com; Dannelle Gay, a travel writer, podcast host, publisher and producer of “The Traveling Cheesehead”; Brandy Gleason, publisher of Gleason Family Adventure; Lori Helke, a Wisconsin-based author and travel writer with a blog titled “Lori Loves Adventure“; Dorsey Levens, a retired Green Bay Packers Superbowl champion and current CEO of The ReMind School of Life where he provides mindset training; Eugene Robinson, a Pulitzer Prize-winning Washington Post columnist and associate editor, and current MSNBC commentator and contributor to other outlets, including The Atlantic; and Mark Rose, an Emmy Award-winning CEO at Discover MediaWorks who can market parks under three brands, including Discover Wisconsin, Boondock Nation and Into the Outdoors.
All of the influencers met with COE attendees and discussed some of the keys to starting a relationship with influencers for marketing purposes, including the importance of properly vetting an influencer before working with them.
The influencers also highlighted the vetting process they go through to make sure that any working relationship is going to be a good fit.
Brandy Gleason noted that influencers are there to help a business grow and that the relationship should be beneficial to both sides.
The session also tackled common issues influencers and parks face when beginning a marketing relationship, some misconceptions about what influence marketing achieves and how parks can set themselves up for success when it come to hosting influencers.
COE also wrapped up its expo, with traffic remaining steady throughout the two-day expo, according to vendors.
COE hosted networking roundtables and more state association meetings during the afternoon.
Today, COE is planning another full day of educational sessions, along with a Behind the Scenes special event at The Sherperd of the Hills, a unique murder mystery dinner theatre.
More information about COE is available at CampgroundOwnersExpo.com.
