The casual outdoor participant: marketing to people who try once a year

Most outdoor businesses spend the bulk of their marketing energy on two groups: the people who’ve never tried their activity, and the regulars who book every season. The person in the middle - the one who came rafting last July, had a great time, posted three photos, and hasn’t thought about it since - barely shows up in most operators’ strategy.

That middle group is enormous. The Outdoor Industry Association counted 181.1 million Americans participating in outdoor recreation in 2024, a record. But average outings per participant dropped to 62.5 that year, the second-lowest since OIA started tracking in 2012. More people outside, each going out less often. A big share of the outdoor recreation market is people who love it - but only once in a while.

For tour operators, outfitters, and activity businesses, this is the casual outdoor participant: someone who genuinely enjoyed your trip, would probably do it again, but won’t seek you out on their own. Marketing to them requires a different approach than chasing first-timers or retaining regulars. It’s not particularly complicated - it just requires timing and intent.

Who the casual participant actually is

The research firm Watauga Group has tracked outdoor recreation behavior for years, and they break participants into three broad categories. “Lovers” are the core enthusiasts who go constantly. “Seekers” are non-participants who might be curious but haven’t tried anything yet. In the middle are “Doers” - people who enjoy outdoor activities but participate casually, juggling everything else in their lives.

Doers are your once-a-year kayaker. The family that does the holiday weekend river float. The couple who hikes a moderate trail on their anniversary trip to the mountains. They’re not gear-obsessed, they don’t follow outdoor brands on social media, and they’re not searching for your business in February. But they liked it last time. That matters.

Cost is a bigger factor for Doers than it is for enthusiasts - 60% say they’d try a new outdoor activity if it fits their budget, and 67% of the more price-sensitive subset cite cost as the deciding factor. They respond to structure: pre-planned experiences, clear logistics, “no experience necessary” framing. They respond to promotions more than core participants do.

Give them a reason and remove the friction, and they’ll come back.

The economics of the once-a-year guest

The math on once-a-year guests is better than most operators realize.

A raft trip that grosses $400 per booking, repeated annually over five years, is $2,000 in revenue from a single household - before that household brings two friends who each book twice. The challenge is that casual participants have a long gap between intent and action. They don’t wake up on a Tuesday in March thinking about your business. By the time summer rolls around, the decision is spontaneous and they’re searching for whoever shows up first.

That gap is where most operators lose them. Not to a competitor. To inertia.

The operators who convert the most casual participants into annual guests treat the 10-11 month window after the original trip as active marketing time, not silence. They’re in the inbox, running targeted ads, and showing up in local search when the casual participant eventually decides “hey, let’s do that again this summer.”

Timing your outreach around the trip anniversary

The single most effective tactic for the once-a-year customer is also the most underused: the anniversary email.

If someone booked a guided kayak trip on July 14th last year, set an automated email to send in mid-May - six to eight weeks before that date. Subject lines that reference the original experience perform better than generic promotions. “You paddled with us last July - want to do it again?” beats a blanket summer deal email.

The trigger is simple to set up in FareHarbor, Xola, or any booking platform with email automation. Use the original booking date as the trigger, offset by 45-60 days. Keep the email short. One clear call to action, and ideally a photo from that trip or a stock image of the specific activity they did.

This works because it collapses two barriers at once: it reminds them the experience was good, and it catches them before they’ve made other summer plans. Waiting until June when they’re already deciding is too late.

The post-trip email sequence you set up for the immediate aftermath of a trip is a separate thing - that one focuses on reviews and referrals. The anniversary trigger is a different tool, aimed at the long tail of the once-a-year cycle. If you haven’t set up a full email marketing system for your outdoor business, the anniversary trigger is the single best place to start for this audience.

Content that speaks to casual participants (not enthusiasts)

The language that attracts a core outdoor enthusiast can actively alienate a casual participant.

An enthusiast wants to know about conditions, gear recommendations, technical difficulty ratings, the specific section of river you run. A casual participant wants to know it’s fun, safe, appropriate for their group, and worth the money. These are different articles, different web pages, different messages.

This distinction matters most on your trip pages and blog. If your content assumes the reader is already motivated and just needs logistics, you’re writing for Lovers. If you want to reach Doers, you need content that starts at a different place: “is this something our family should try?” or “what’s it actually like if you’ve never been on a raft?”

Some of the most effective content for the casual participant category is genuinely practical: what to wear, how long the trip is, what happens if someone falls in, whether kids can do it. That’s not exciting content to write, but it’s what drives bookings from people who haven’t done it before and aren’t sure they should.

Nantahala Outdoor Center in North Carolina does this well. Their beginner raft pages answer the anxiety questions before visitors have to ask: expected water levels, age minimums, how to dress for cold water, what to do if you flip. The target reader is not an experienced paddler. It’s a family from Charlotte planning their first summer adventure, trying to figure out if this is appropriate for a 10-year-old.

The article writing for multiple audiences - locals, tourists, first-timers vs. repeat guests covers how to handle these multiple voices without publishing a dozen separate pages.

Paid ads for low-frequency purchasers

Retargeting is where once-a-year participants become two-times-a-year participants, or at least annual repeats.

Someone who visited your site, looked at a trip page, but didn’t book is a much warmer prospect than a cold audience. For a business with a seasonal peak and a customer base that only plans one trip annually, retargeting campaigns that run from late winter through early summer are disproportionately valuable. You’re reaching people who already showed intent, at a time when they’re actively planning.

The budget doesn’t need to be large. A $20-30/day Facebook and Instagram retargeting campaign targeting website visitors from the past 180 days, running March through June, can generate meaningful re-engagement. The casual participant is particularly responsive to imagery that matches what they already looked at - a raft trip ad for someone who browsed raft trips, not a generic “outdoor adventures” message.

For businesses in drive-to destinations, Google Ads targeting your activity plus your region during the spring planning window hits casual participants exactly when they’re searching. Someone typing “rafting near Asheville” in April is probably planning a summer trip, not booking tomorrow. Showing up there - even if they don’t click immediately - builds familiarity that converts when they return to search later.

What doesn’t work: discounts before relationship

Most operators default to discounts when they want a casual customer back. This is the wrong move.

Discounts have their place. But sending a 20% off coupon as your primary retention strategy trains casual participants to wait for deals. It also undercuts the value of the experience. If the trip was worth $150 last year, it’s still worth $150 this year - the relationship just needs to be rekindled, not repriced.

What works better is value framing. A group package for four people at full price, promoted as “bring friends this time,” converts better than a solo discount. An add-on (cooler rental, shuttle service, photos package) gives the casual participant something new without discounting the core product.

Watauga Group’s research found that Doers are more promotion-sensitive than core participants - but that doesn’t mean every touchpoint needs a discount. It means they respond to a sense of occasion. There’s a difference between “20% off, this weekend only” and “it’s almost summer, and it’s been a year since your last trip.” One is transactional; the other builds the relationship.

Segmenting your email list for this audience

Most outfitters don’t segment their email lists at all. They send one newsletter to everyone and hope for the best. If you want to market to casual participants effectively, some basic segmentation goes a long way.

The most useful cut is by recency and frequency. Customers who’ve booked once, more than six months ago but less than 18 months ago, are your classic casual participant pool. They’re not gone - they’re just dormant. This group should get different messaging than your repeat customers, and a different message than someone who booked 36 months ago and may need a more aggressive win-back.

The article on segmenting your email list by audience type covers the technical setup in detail. The key for the casual participant segment is that your messaging should assume they remember the experience positively and just need a nudge - not a sales pitch from scratch.

We’ve seen this with operators who have a few hundred past guests sitting in their CRM, never contacted again after the post-trip review request. That’s a dormant asset, not a dead list.

The one thing most operators miss

Here’s what most outdoor businesses never do with casual participants: ask them directly.

A simple survey sent 30 days after the trip - not a review request, an actual question - can tell you why someone who had a good time hasn’t booked again. The answers are usually mundane: they moved, they had a baby, they weren’t sure which dates worked, they forgot. None of those are insurmountable barriers, but you can’t address them if you never ask.

A one-question email with something like “What would make it easy for you to come back this summer?” takes five minutes to set up and creates a feedback loop that improves your retention over time. A few respondents will book right from the email. Most won’t, but you learn something.

The casual outdoor participant doesn’t need much convincing. They already liked it. Your job is to be present, relevant, and easy - at the right moment in the year. Start with the anniversary trigger, build out from there, and treat these guests as the recurring revenue they already want to be.