Using Students to Market Your School

The fall months offer your team the most optimal time to consider your enrollment marketing plan. For many of you, especially if you have rolling admissions throughout the year, the summer months are filled with last-minute inquiries, visits, and applications. But for most, by October, the dust has settled on who will be in your seats for this year’s academic year. Now what?

LOOK BACK

Take some time to evaluate your numbers, your processes, your tactics, and your wins and losses. Examine where your strengths were but also where you fell short.

• Analyze enrollment data, trends, and gaps
• Are there any new emerging patterns?
• Why did we fall short of our enrollment target for that grade?
• What is the most likely factor in our great numbers in those grades?
• How did we spend our budget last year? Best return on investment?
• Was our messaging clear? Did our personas hear us talking to them or was it a mass message?
• What feedback can we attain from new families who got accepted and are now enrolled?
• Can we ascertain anything from families who chose to go elsewhere?

These are just some of the hard things to look at with your team.

Now, let’s look forward.

LOOKING AHEAD

Having done the hard work above, now it is time to anticipate next year. There doesn’t seem like enrollment coordinators have much time to rest because it is time to start thinking about next August. If you have rolling admissions, you know the work never stops. Sometimes you have a few families even join after Christmas. But even if your enrollment to future families doesn’t open up until spring. now is the time to look ahead.

• Where are our largest enrollment gaps for this upcoming school year?
• Are their enrollment patterns in other grades that concern you?
• Do we know who our ideal family is?
• While a mass marketing message is important, how do we target our communication?
• What programs do we need to highlight better for these personas to take note of?
• What stories do we need to curate that will resonate with these personas?
• What written stories can we tell better?
• Are there good audio interviews or podcasts we can record to tell a better story?
• What is our video strategy for telling our school’s story?

TIME FOR A COMEBACK!

If your enrollment numbers were a challenge this year, it’s time to look forward to this spring and bounce back! You can stage an enrollment comeback if you have the right system, strategy, and tactical approach!

I love to help Christian schools – how can I help you?

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Have you done an honest assessment of the families who are enrolled in your school? I’m talking about an honest assessment.

• Are they 100% mission-appropriate? Are they aligned with your mission?
• Are they misfits who, according to the definition above, are students (and their families) “who fit badly” or are “poorly adapted”?

Regardless of the type of school you are (covenant or evangelical), you have to be selective in who sits in your seats. If you are a Christian school, there are some in your community will find that word “selective” as repugnant. They will equate your existence with that of the Lord’s church where we are to be loving, accepting, and welcoming to all. But as a school, you are a not-for-profit business that must think of the “product” you are providing. If families look at your school and do not perceive the fruit as being sweet, they will pass. If current families start to feel that “one bad apple spoils the bunch” (to stay on the fruit metaphor), they will leave before they are damaged.

There is not one algorithm or list of factors that you must use to ensure you are selecting mission-fit families. But here are a few of the most common and most important:

• Do they agree with your school’s mission, vision, and core values?
• Do they agree with your school’s approach to discipline from actions in or out of the classroom?
• Do they agree with your school’s approach to monitoring and correcting behavior even at home?
• Do they not only agree with but also consider themselves ambassadors for your school’s mission?
• Do they help you market the school via word-of-mouth?

In a time when enrollments can trend downward (as the price tag increases and the value of private education is often debatable among your market), it is easily justifiable for a school to loosen the evaluation and accept anyone with interest and the bank account to afford the school. If you do not mandate mission appropriateness, you will find yourself pulling your hair out in the future.

You may have a much more detailed list of factors when determining whether a student is accepted or not (based on their academic assessment, behavioral history at other schools, letters of recommendations, etc.), but one of them has to be whether or not this student and their parent(s) are mission-fits with your school.

If you need help in ensuring your school has an effective marketing system to ensure you have the most mission-fit families, I want to help. Click the link below and let’s start a conversation.

When your Head of School, Board, or even a parent asks, “how many of our families are returning next year?”, do you start to squirm in your seat? Even as hard as schools do to recruit new families, that pesky re-enrollment number is often so frustrating. Families often choose not to re-enroll because of a few common reasons:

• MONEY – probably the most common reason given (true or not)
• MOVE – don’t you hate hearing that a good family is being relocated?
• MALCONTENT – while you hate to see them go, sometimes it’s for the best
• MAYBE – these fence-sitters are some of the most common culprits

So what can you do about these reasons?

• In terms of MONEY, it is likely not really the COST of tuition/fees, but the VALUE they perceive they are receiving. Even a 4% increase in tuition does not usually make it suddenly unaffordable. It just happens to be the straw that gives families a reason to jump ship because of a lack of perceived value. To minimize this, showcase student successes, especially in graduating seniors (scholarships and college acceptances) and alumni (have them testify to their preparedness for the university-level of work).
• On those who are MOVING or in the group of MALCONTENTS, there is not a lot you can do here. However, conduct personal exit interviews face-to-face so you can tone down any frustration they may have (the latter group for sure). By offering a listening here, you are absorbing their rage/frustration so that they are less likely to rant on Twitter or give you a negative 1-star review. Give them a voice. On the flip-side, if someone is happy but forced to move because of a job out of state, invite them to give a glowing 5-star review as they leave!
• As far as the MAYBE group, these fence-sitters must be identified, by name. Ensure each division leader (principal) has a list of every student in their grades who yet to re-enroll. Enact a swift communication plan for personal phone calls and hand-written notes (don’t just send emails). Find out the reason behind their hesitation. Sometimes, they are waiting on a tax refund or a summer bonus. But do not assume, only to find out in August that there was something else behind their not re-enrolling.

With these three ideas, I hope you retention numbers climb back up!

If I can help you with installing a recruiting, retention, and referral (word-of-mouth) marketing system, contact me so we can have a free phone consultation to see if we might help you.

Randy