Good Sam - what's in it for the campgrounds?

[el_jefe1]

There are a lot of good Sam participating parks that give discounts for this very cheap membership. I'm just wondering, what's in it for the park? Is it just hoping to get a little extra business by drawing in good Sam members? Or are there any other benefits to the park owners?

[solismaris]

I finally realized I haven't used my campground directory that I've been carrying for 15 years. Threw it out. Internet and cell phones have made them obsolete. I cannot imagine a campground operator paying $1000s to stay on that list in this day and age.

(And for me, a Good Sam listing is an anti-advert; I'd prefer a more independent or primitive campground that is NOT on the list and would actively avoid the Good Sam park if given the choice. But that's just me.)

[JAC1982]

TinyoneRV wrote:

JAC1982 wrote:
Before the internet was a "thing", you had to rely on things like Good Sam or AAA to tell you which spots were the best rated. I'm in my mid-30s, and I remember my mom planning our trips using the AAA guidebook when I was a kid. Nowadays, you can go on various websites and read reviews from actual people who stayed there recently, to see if the spot is worth a stay. Once a book is published it can become immediately out of date. So I don't blame RV park owners for wanting to ditch it and just rely on internet advertising and word of mouth since that is more up to date and in many cases, free or low cost.

Reviews from real people are flawed by their impression of the campground; ie, it is subjective instead of objective. They can rate the entire campground as poor because one thing didn't meet their criteria. Also, as much as I hate to say it, people are paid for good and bad reviews. I have been in highly rated BS campgrounds that had a messy restroom at the end of a long weekend. Likewise, I've been in moderately rated campgrounds that I thought deserved a higher rating. Nonetheless, go through the rating sheets and you'll come out nearly the same as the book. Like most rating systems, it's not perfect but it's pretty good.

That's why you read the actual reviews, not just what they rated it. If they gave it 1 star but said it was because of something I don't care about (like I don't care if the bathrooms were dirty because we don't use them), then I don't really give that review much merit. But if the review mentions that there was a lot of road noise, or there were a lot of bugs during the time of year we want to go, then I give that review more weight. If a review is vague and just says "Awesome stay!" then I don't really count that either

This is a perfect example of a review I find helpful, even though they only rated this park 1 star. This is for the KOA in Laramie, WY "As a KOA RV park this is very disappointing. The slots are long enough but very narrow, couldn't extend my awning without hitting the coach next to me. The park is right on I-80, the traffice noise is horrendous all day & night. There is a nice grassy area for dogs and a small dog park. This is a good spot for an overnight but not for extended stay."

That review tells me that it's a perfectly fine place to park our camper to basically just sleep in when we go up for a football game.

[JAC1982]

westernrvparkowner wrote:

JAC1982 wrote:
Before the internet was a "thing", you had to rely on things like Good Sam or AAA to tell you which spots were the best rated. I'm in my mid-30s, and I remember my mom planning our trips using the AAA guidebook when I was a kid. Nowadays, you can go on various websites and read reviews from actual people who stayed there recently, to see if the spot is worth a stay. Once a book is published it can become immediately out of date. So I don't blame RV park owners for wanting to ditch it and just rely on internet advertising and word of mouth since that is more up to date and in many cases, free or low cost.

Internet advertising is the polar opposite of low cost and free. There is a reason Google is one of the most valuable companies in the world. GoogleAds is one of their profit centers. You pay Google for keyword Placement. Then you have to pay internet professionals to optimize your search results, to optimize your website for mobile and on and on. My internet advertising budget drawfs all the other, more traditional, avenues such as guidebooks and signage. The internet is BIG business and the cost to use it for advertising is equally large

When I refer to free/low cost, I mean when there's good reviews for a spot on the internet, whether it's TripAdvisor or RV Park Review sites, or Google reviews, or Yelp....whatever, it basically free to the RV park owner. That's where I go when I'm trying to decide which campground to pick. I rarely just Google "RV Park in XXX". I look on Google Maps in the area I'm after then read reviews that other campers have posted.

[CFerguson]

agesilaus wrote:
That's true, angry users are much more likely to post a review than happy ones. I recall a rule of thumb from my long ago business law class: one angry customer will undo the good will of 19 happy ones.

Anyway that's why I read online reviews with care to try to get a balanced judgement.

+ now you have to cope with fake reviews both pro and con.

And I might add, I don't see how anyone would like to be steered by google. I want the facts on every CG, ideally.

[westernrvparkow]

caver wrote:

westernrvparkowner wrote:
GoogleAds is one of their profit centers. You pay Google for keyword Placement. Then you have to pay internet professionals to optimize your search results,

I recently started using DuckDuckGo for 90+% of my searches as I was tired of google stalking me 24/7. The few times I need to go back to google it is funny how obvious certain companies are always at the top of the search results.

It doesn't bother me at all that certain companies are always first when searching as long as when those searches are for RV Parks in my area those companies are mine. Hence the big advertising budget for the internet.

[caver]

westernrvparkowner wrote:
GoogleAds is one of their profit centers. You pay Google for keyword Placement. Then you have to pay internet professionals to optimize your search results,

I recently started using DuckDuckGo for 90+% of my searches as I was tired of google stalking me 24/7. The few times I need to go back to google it is funny how obvious certain companies are always at the top of the search results.

[bobsallyh]

Man, oh man, been a long time since, probably a couple of years, since WesternRVParkOwner and I agreed to disagree. Brings back old times but this raised the hackles on my neck, classic consumer vs business owner!

[westernrvparkow]

JAC1982 wrote:
Before the internet was a "thing", you had to rely on things like Good Sam or AAA to tell you which spots were the best rated. I'm in my mid-30s, and I remember my mom planning our trips using the AAA guidebook when I was a kid. Nowadays, you can go on various websites and read reviews from actual people who stayed there recently, to see if the spot is worth a stay. Once a book is published it can become immediately out of date. So I don't blame RV park owners for wanting to ditch it and just rely on internet advertising and word of mouth since that is more up to date and in many cases, free or low cost.

Internet advertising is the polar opposite of low cost and free. There is a reason Google is one of the most valuable companies in the world. GoogleAds is one of their profit centers. You pay Google for keyword Placement. Then you have to pay internet professionals to optimize your search results, to optimize your website for mobile and on and on. My internet advertising budget drawfs all the other, more traditional, avenues such as guidebooks and signage. The internet is BIG business and the cost to use it for advertising is equally large

[agesilaus]

That's true, angry users are much more likely to post a review than happy ones. I recall a rule of thumb from my long ago business law class: one angry customer will undo the good will of 19 happy ones.

Anyway that's why I read online reviews with care to try to get a balanced judgement.

[TinyoneRV]

JAC1982 wrote:
Before the internet was a "thing", you had to rely on things like Good Sam or AAA to tell you which spots were the best rated. I'm in my mid-30s, and I remember my mom planning our trips using the AAA guidebook when I was a kid. Nowadays, you can go on various websites and read reviews from actual people who stayed there recently, to see if the spot is worth a stay. Once a book is published it can become immediately out of date. So I don't blame RV park owners for wanting to ditch it and just rely on internet advertising and word of mouth since that is more up to date and in many cases, free or low cost.

Reviews from real people are flawed by their impression of the campground; ie, it is subjective instead of objective. They can rate the entire campground as poor because one thing didn't meet their criteria. Also, as much as I hate to say it, people are paid for good and bad reviews. I have been in highly rated BS campgrounds that had a messy restroom at the end of a long weekend. Likewise, I've been in moderately rated campgrounds that I thought deserved a higher rating. Nonetheless, go through the rating sheets and you'll come out nearly the same as the book. Like most rating systems, it's not perfect but it's pretty good.

[JAC1982]

Before the internet was a "thing", you had to rely on things like Good Sam or AAA to tell you which spots were the best rated. I'm in my mid-30s, and I remember my mom planning our trips using the AAA guidebook when I was a kid. Nowadays, you can go on various websites and read reviews from actual people who stayed there recently, to see if the spot is worth a stay. Once a book is published it can become immediately out of date. So I don't blame RV park owners for wanting to ditch it and just rely on internet advertising and word of mouth since that is more up to date and in many cases, free or low cost.

[sgfrye]

google pretty much is the go to for on information anything nowadays, as with amazon.com with goods and such. not sure if thats a good thing but what the public dictates.

i use the reviews on google and tripadvisor to help us make a decision on a campground we have never stayed at before and its never let us down.

[agesilaus]

I halfway think that the big book could make something of a comeback. We were doing some boondocking with no signal for the phones and of course no WIFI. I prefer to look ahead on our next planned road segment using Campgroundreviews or that free public cg site and generally drag some potential stops into a text file on my desktop. I found that it is getting very difficult to find open WIFI spots in town anymore so we used the big book to fill in those spots. WIFI security is up everywhere.

I have to say that my new, not very impressive, notebook may have caused a lot of this trouble. It was hard to connect to WIFI using it and it randomly turns off WIFI all together driving the wife mad. It has one of those hybrid SSD/HDD drives and when I got home the HDD part is gone just vanished.

[westernrvparkow]

bobsallyh wrote:
westernrvparkowner, it is only an imagination to you, a park owner. Ask the consumers to compare the rating and what is really there. Same with pictures, the pictures very rarely match what you see when you get on site. We were in a western Montana RV park several years ago when the Woodall ratings group pulled in. Had plenty of time to watch them. Next morning I approached one of the folks and asked how the laundry graded out. Couldn't tell me because they never set foot in it. Unfortunately to the consumer but fortunate to the park owner, low power so consumers just kept pouring quarters in it to get clothes semi-dry.

This is exactly my point.. The raters don't judge whether or not they think a laundry is good, bad or indifferent. The criteria is only whether or not one exists.
You may not like or agree with the policies of the guidebook, but they are pretty clearly spelled out if you were to take the time and read them. They are that way to take personal impressions and emotions out of the ratings. There isn't a way for a rater to run up the scores for parks they like and lower the scores on parks they don't. It is also why the idea that parks pay for ratings is mistaken. If the way Goodsam chooses to rate parks doesn't work for you should ignore them and use other resources when looking for a park.