Private school is a business and attracting enrollments are as important as gaining customers. But the issue there is many schools are still relying heavily on traditional local media such as newspapers, TV, radio, and billboards.
Online marketing strategies can target your audience, are measurable, and are considerably cheaper and more sustainable than traditional media – read more on the pros of online marketing. So let’s discuss some online marketing ideas for schools to increase enrollments.
1. Improve Your Website Experience
The importance of a good website for your school cannot be overemphasized. The website is the first point of contact for most parents and it will be good to leave them with a positive first impression.
Your website should be able to do the following things:
- It should be fast and responsive. Attention span is very short and if a parent is finding it difficult to load and navigate the website, they will move to another one.
- Ensure users find easy access to any information they are looking for. Do not get it all muddled up with aesthetic designs neglecting its main objective.
Read more features of a good website.
Note: Your school website is going to be more complex than the traditional small business website, so I would strongly encourage you to look for a design and development agency with proven industry experience. Particularly if you’re in Australia, check out Beyond Web.
2. Build an Online Community
Social Media is great for business, considering the fact that most parents are users. For a school, Facebook and Instagram can both be vehicles to convey information to parents and students. Videos, pictures, news, event, reviews, and the question can be shared to enhance better communication. Using social media does not end at just creating an account, it is even more effective when you share content (blogs, images, and videos) of your school through them.
3. Communicate Regularly via Email Newsletters
Email newsletters are low-cost, promotional, and communication tools. You can take a basic approach and send a weekly or monthly email newsletter to existing parents. That’s easy.
4. Start Sharing Videos Online
Like people will say, seeing is believing. This saying also applies to parents that seek to enroll their wards in schools. Using videos is the best way to gain applicants that are not living in the same area as the school. Place the videos on the right channels like YouTube, your school website, and on the social media channels, when people see this they then redirect back to your school website to read more about your school.
Ensure that the videos are professional, and videos of different types can be taken; videos of special events in the school, tour guides around the school, videos of interviews of staff and students, and also videos of testimonials from parents.
5. Use your Offline Methods to Promote your Online Activities
Surprisingly, traditional marketing is still effective if used appropriately. For instance, let us assume you are a new school trying to run a campaign to increase traffic to your website and your overall brand awareness. Using a traditional marketing tactic like radio, TV, or local print ad can help generate brand awareness and also drive people to visit your website and visit your school.
The combination of both traditional and digital methods gives a boost that most schools are now taking advantage of. Split your budget between the two while weighing more towards the digital method. Take advantage of the increasing online trends while still maintaining your offline presence – this is the key to a perfect marketing strategy.
6. Have a Blog, produce Valuable and Engaging Content
Blogging is one of the quickest ways to start an Inbound Marketing program. Blogging for schools is very effective as it helps the school put out more information about themselves and what the applicants should expect. This all results in another important factor which is the use of the content, these contents are used to convey the keywords and phrases that help your website to rank higher and also provide useful information to your audience.
There are various topics a school can blog about; like their environment, the facilities they have, their extra-curricular activities, special events happening in school, and so many more like that. Doing this helps you utilize keywords that will help you rank higher, and also increase the interest of parents and prospect applicants.
7. Third-Party School Marketing Platform
In the case of third-party school marketing platforms, an example is SchoolsCompass, an online community where schools are able to reach out to parents. The combination of the listed methods can also work for some schools, using these third party online platforms also serve as means of marketing your school, eliminating the cost involved in putting up the billboards and printing paper flyers
It is undeniable that online marketing is paving way for schools. The future is now, do not miss out by being ignorant. If you have questions or guidance on how this works, contact us at SchoolsCompass, we are happy to help.
