This blog post originally appeared on the Darlington School blog. We thank Tannika for allowing us to use it here.

Tannika Wester
Director of Media Relations
Darlington School

This week, I’ve been fortunate enough to attend the AISAP Leadership Summit: Inbound Marketing for Schools and after only one day, my mind is already spinning with ideas. Today’s session was an overview of inbound marketing, the major takeaway being that blogging is one of the most critical components of a school’s marketing effort – and if it’s not already, it should be.

The fact is, Google likes new content. The more often you post the content, the more often Google will troll your website and index new pages, and – in theory – the better off your site will be when it comes to showing up in online search results. Blogging is also a simple and easy way to push out key messages.

But blogging is scary, right? Well, it doesn’t have to be. Here are 12 easy steps to blogging for your school:

1. Keep it short. Blogs should be 300-600 words at the most.

2. Choose one topic. If you find yourself venturing off subject, save it for another blog. And remember, the purpose of your blog should always be to either educate or entertain.

3. Keep it conversational. Writing for the web is different than writing for print. People do not want to read technical jargon, so keep your language simple and casual.

4. Break up your text. Think about how you digest content. Do you read every word of your local newspaper or online news site? Chances are you jump around based on interesting subheads or bulleted lists. Use these in your blog to organize your information in a user-friendly way.

5. Choose a “sexy” title. It could be argued that the title is even more important than the content of the blog itself. Choose something that incorporates important keywords about your school and/or something that will grab the reader’s attention.

6. Upload a great image. Google cannot read images, but if the image title contains keywords it will help you rank higher for those words. People are also more likely to read something with an interesting graphic.

7. Include links. Many times, your blog will prompt readers to look for more information. Use links within the text of the blog to link them to areas of your site or other online resources that might be useful.

8. Keep the content fresh. A new blog should be posted at least once a week. Be consistent. Pick a day of the week to upload a new blog so that readers know when to look for your latest content.

9. Let someone proofread your blog. I have found that the main thing holding most people back from blogging is a lack of confidence in their writing or the fear of making an embarrassing mistake. In most cases, the communication/marketing department will review and edit your blog before it goes live. The more eyes on something, the better it will be in the end.
10. Keep an eye on comments and don’t be afraid to respond. Some schools are hesitant to start blogging because they are afraid of relinquishing control of their message, but the fact is people are already talking about you. Blogging is a way to initiate and be part of these conversations.

11. Include a call to action. Give your readers (and potential customers!) a way to engage further with your school and hopefully they will eventually want to convert from prospects to real inquiries.

12. Let data help guide your efforts. Use analytics to see which topics resonate with your readers and do more of what does.

So now that you know the tips of the trade, you have no excuses – it’s time to start brainstorming topics. I hope to see you in the blogosphere very soon!

This blog post originally appeared on the Whole Brain Marketing blog. Louis Gudema is the Vice-President of Business Developemnt for ISITE Design. We thank Louis for allowing us to use it here.

This week LinkedIn has been running a feature in which its commentators are writing about the best advice they ever got. I got mine on my second day as a freshman at the University of Michigan. (If I had realized at the time that my college education had just peaked, I might have saved myself four years and a lot of money.)

The dormitory resident advisor for my floor was telling us freshmen about not just surviving, but thriving in a university with 35,000 students and at one point he said, “Michigan is a big bureaucracy. And when you want to do something, the first person you ask will often tell you No. So just keeping asking people until you find someone who says Yes, and take that as your answer.”

Whether in sales, or running a business, or dating, or so many other things, that simple, optimistic phrasing of persevering has been invaluable because much of the time, maybe most of the time, people won’t initially agree with me. (Every great idea starts out with a following of one.) In some cases I can convince them to change their minds. But in many cases that’s a dead end and it’s simply faster, easier, or more successful to move on to find the people who do agree with me, and ignore the naysaysers.

That doesn’t mean that it’ll necessarily be easy, of course. When I decided I wanted to break into the professional video field in Boston in the ’80s, in which most of the jobs were short term jobs whether on  a crew, writing a script or directing a piece, I started to network. And one person I met early on said that it typically would take 18 months for a new person to get their career going. That was about what it turned out to be for me, too, because with so many other young people trying to also get jobs I had to be seen more than once and get known before people were going to take a chance on hiring me. But eventually some people did start to say Yes, and I was off and running.

So don’t be afraid to ask. And if it’s important to you, don’t take No for an answer. Find someone who says Yes.

Matt Steiner
Director
Launch Education Group

As a provider of ISEE preparation services to students in Los Angeles (LA) and New York City (NYC), I have become intimately acquainted with the independent school landscapes of these major cities. Arguably, LA and NYC contain the largest variety of private school options in the country. Because of the vast number of choices, parents must discern the kinds of educational programs that will best suit the needs of their families.

For many parents, the process of navigating the private school admissions process is like traversing an alien planet. While attending school fairs and open houses, parents are inundated with unfamiliar words like, ‘Montessori-based’, ‘Reggio-inspired’, ‘Developmental’, ‘Traditional’, and ‘Progressive.’ They are also dazzled by tours through well-appointed technology labs, lush school gardens, and state-of-the-art theaters.

In order to help parents weigh their options and write effective applications, a new profession has emerged: school placement consulting.

For the purposes of this post, I interviewed six different school placement consultants in Los Angeles – each with her own set of specialties and preferences. My interviews revealed how school placement consultants demystify the admissions process for parents and partner with admissions directors to make appropriate placements.

Consultants’ Names and Professional Affiliations:

• Devra Weltman, Educational Consultant, School Choice International
• Jamie Bakal, Educational Consultant, LA School Mates
• Michelle Nitka, Educational Consultant, Author of Coping with Preschool Panic
• Sandy Eiges, Educational Consultant, LA School Scout
• Stacey Kovoloff, Educational Consultant, School Shop LA
• Wendy Zacuto, Former Educational Consultant, Head of Wesley Lower School

What is the greatest benefit of hiring a school placement consultant?

SANDY: Instead of asking your neighbors, co-workers and relatives where you should send your child, hiring a school placement specialist means having an educational expert on your team, someone who learns about your child and your family, knows all of the school options, and then gives you clear advice about which schools are truly a match for your child.

MICHELLE: In addition, a school consultant can educate families regarding the school’s philosophy and the practical implications that will correspond with that philosophy and mission statement. For example, a strongly academic school that believes in a rigorous academic course load may mean that your child will be expected to have a standard number of hours of homework per night. Is that in accordance with your expectations and your child’s temperament?

JAMIE: As a former educator (I taught first grade for many years), I am able to evaluate a student’s records and test scores. However, I also meet with and assess every student with whom I work. This process allows me to help parents find the very best educational environment for their child.

WENDY: Through my work as a school administrator and consultant, I can also assess a school’s curriculum, its approach to differentiated learning, and the general difficulty of entrance.

How can independent schools benefit from working in collaboration with a school placement specialist? 

MICHELLE: The independent schools benefit from working with us, because they will receive a wider and more diverse applicant pool. The schools will receive an increase in applications and will receive applications from families that may not have previously been aware of their school.

JAMIE: Because of my background in teaching, I can help admissions directors get an unbiased, third party, professional opinion on the capabilities of each student. I can help to evaluate whether or not the child and family are the right fit for a specific school.

SANDY: As one director of admissions and head of school said to me, ‘You’re like a super-director of admissions! I know that students you send my way are already pre-qualified for our school.’

STACEY: First off, the independent schools I work with often seek guidance for placing students whom have been rejected or wait-listed. I am able to quickly and effectively find options for these children. Secondly, I often work with students who have special needs and require accommodations. Based on the profile of the school, I am able to discern the level of its accommodations.

What are the greatest myths or misconceptions that families have about school placement specialists? How about misconceptions held by schools?

DEVRA: The greatest myth held by families is that we can get students into any school they want. Just like college counselors at high schools, we guide the process and help families to develop a good strategy to ensure success in admissions – but ultimately, the decision is in the hands of the schools.

MICHELLE: Also, one of the biggest misconceptions that both schools and families have regarding school placement specialists is that you have to be affluent, elitist, or very type A to hire one. My client base is extremely diverse with the only common factor being that these are individuals who deeply value education.  Some value it because they grew up very privileged; however, an equal number had difficult childhoods filled with obstacles and adversity.

WENDY:  Parents also are under the impression that there are ‘good schools’ and ‘less preferable schools,’ and that they will only have a successful child if the child attends the ‘good school.’ The best school is the one that provides a good match between the child and family’s needs and values. Each client’s path is different.

And to conclude…

Clearly, the value of a school placement consultant is immeasurable for both parents and schools. As admission becomes competitive and school options increase, a consultant can serve as an invaluable guide to a ‘best fit’ education. Furthermore, as independent schools vie for the enrollment of terrific families, they can utilize the referral powers of placement specialists.

For more information about school consultants, marketing strategies, and other admissions resources, please feel free to reach out to me directly! I hope this post was useful to you, and I look forward to your comments and learning more about your schools!

Mia Johnstone
Publisher
Los Angeles Private School Guide

I recently was doing consulting for a small Christian school and asked the administrator, “How often do you visit with feeder school administrators?” She told me that she had visited 8 preschools in the fall to share information about her school. My response was “Have you connected with any since?” She looked at me puzzled.

Feeder schools and the students/parents that come from them are the life of your business. You probably already see these schools’ administrators at recruitment events and probably say ‘hello’ when you drop off material. But long term networking with directors and administrators beyond regular recruitment can really help establish open lines of communication which inevitably lead to creative recruitment efforts for all parties.

Here are 6 tips on how you can create more meaningful relationships with feeder school Administrators.

1. Invite a different Director/Principal out for lunch or coffee each month. Learn about how their school is doing. This really helps you to get to know each other. It’s more thoughtful than just showing up at their school with recruitment material.
2. Create a networking event for your feeder schools at your campus. A lunch social with school administrators is always a positive community gathering. They will be grateful to connect with each other too.
3. Offer professional development for feeder school administrators. Take a poll on some topics that they would like to discuss. Find a marketing specialist that is willing to give their time to speak. This kind of event will give the specialist good exposure and also be helpful for the reps.
4. If there aren’t many recruitment events for your feeder schools, be open to hosting an event. It is quite common in Pasadena, CA (the mecca of private schools) that an elementary school hosts a high school night.
5. Write personal thank you cards when you visit a campus or establish new relationships with feeder schools. Hand written notes are so rare. When we do receive them, we feel much appreciated.
6. Keep an updated email list for all Directors/Principals at your feeder schools. Send them regular relevant emails.No need to focus solely on your school news. I always love sharing quality recruitment and advertising tips as I come across them. They will appreciate the thoughtfulness and will look forward to your emails.

When we begin to focus on relationship building instead of just sales, we build longer and more trusting relationships. Feeder schools will not just speak about your school as a feeder option for their families. Instead, they will have in depth stories and insight to share about your school.

This blog post originally appeared on the Target Marketing blog. Andrea Syverson is the founder and president of IER Partners and has worked with brands like Spanx, Ben & Jerry’s, Celestial Seasonings, CHEFS, and Boston Proper. We thank Andrea for allowing us to use it here.

In the April issue of Target Marketing, I wrote about 26 verbs that sometimes get in our way when we’re building brands that we want our customers to be passionate about. Now that I’ve transitioned my Brand Matters column from print to digital, I’ve decided to give you 26 more!

Use this checklist as a reminder to review your brand practices. No doubt, we all slip into some of these behaviors unintentionally. I encourage you to take some “Stop & Think” time with your brand team and have the necessary and fierce conversations about your latest offerings and evaluate them through these lenses:

Aggravate: What is niggling at you that might be perceived (big or small) as an annoyance to your customers?

Boggle: Are you giving your customers too many choices to consider?

Cannibalize: Might you be threatening your own market share in some way?

Doubt: What areas of your offering raise concern for your customers? Value perceptions? Price parity? Benefits? Competitive differentiation? What will you do about it?

Embarrass: What was your OOPS or DO OVER with this latest offering? Have you fixed it for next time? What is your post-mortem procedure for reviewing these things?

Forgot: Look over your offering carefully … what might you have overlooked by mistake?

Grovel: Are you asking your customers to do too much? Who is working for whom? How will you rectify that?

Inundate: Offering too much? How will you know what is “just right?”

Juggle: How many messages do you want your customers to absorb? How will you limit those or prioritize them strategically for maximum impact?

Know How: What special insider knowledge do your customers need to know to do business with you? Is that fair? How will you inform the newbies?

Loathe: A hard question for sure … but what don’t your customers like about you?

Mimic: What have you done that is totally UNLIKE your competitors these days?

Negate: What are you doing that detracts from your brand?

Obstacle: What hoops might your customers have to needlessly jump through to do business with you? How will you find out?

Pester: Are you asking your customers questions you intend to do nothing about? Why bother?

Quibble: What terms do you make your customers fight over In relation to your offering? Is that really necessary? How do your competitors handle the same issue?

Reverse: Is there any aspect of your offer that reverses your brand promise even in some small way?

Stagnate: In the last 12 months, what have you decided to do differently to stay relevant to your customers’ changing needs?

Taunt: How is your brand teasing your customers in negative ways?

Underestimate: Have you taken your customers loyalty for granted in some way?

Vex: What keeps you up at night about your customers’ behavior in relation to your brand? How will you solve this puzzle?

Water Down: Have you diluted your brand message in some way by too many stories? Too much information?  Too little focus?

[E]Xit: What was your parting message to your customer? Brand enhancing or brand detracting? (Brand neutral doesn’t count!)

Yank: Are you pulling your customers toward your brand or away? How?

Zipped: Great brand stories are meant to be shared. Have you zipped your customers’ lips by not creating a shareworthy experience?

Take a look at these “what not to do” verbs. Create your own list. Let me know what happens!

Jeff Escabar
Director of Admission, Marin Country Day School
Head of School Elect, Marin Preparatory School
AISAP Board Member

As the hustle and bustle of the school year draws to an end it is a perfect time to stop and reflect on how your admission season fared. It is easy to follow the same path year after year and sometimes the tried and true continue to work, but at other times you might decide if a change of course is warranted. Whether you are a one person office or have others that work with you, it is often useful to review your year and decide what if anything new you might just want to institute next admission season. Think outside the box. What might you try differently next season that might warrant a better yield? Who in your school might be an untapped resource for one of your admission events that you have not asked before? Now is the perfect time to recruit that special someone to assist in your efforts before you get into the actual frenzy of the season.

More is not always better and a little reflection on your admission events might just provide you an opportunity to cut back on some events and ramp up and improve other events. Parents applying to a variety of schools will favor attending meaningful events that showcase the unique features of your program, but do not require them to attend large numbers of less than useful events. It is better to do one or two events well that demonstrate your mission clearly to help families decide that the fit between school and family is a good one.

The end of the school year typically showcases events that are the perfect opportunity to take some new photographs either for your website or other social media venues. Spend time walking around the campus watching children and teachers and watch for those special photo opportunity moments that will serve to convey the unique qualities of your school. I always find the last few weeks of school invigorating because the admission season has concluded and I can remind myself of all of the wonderful reasons my school is a special place.

Finally, spend a little time with your graduating students. Most of us were very involved in getting them into our schools, but if you are like most Admission Directors over the years your interactions are few and far between. We post the graduating student’s 8th grade portraits on one side of the auditorium and their kindergarten portrait on the other side.  It serves to remind me just how special they were when they entered the school and how much they have benefited and contributed to our community. Talk to them and realize that this is why we do the work that we do. Enjoy your summer!

This blog post is written by Deborah S. Ashe, the Director of School and Child Care Search Service in the Office of Work/Life at Columbia University and originally appeared on their News and Noteworthy section of their website. We thank Deborah for allowing us to re-post it here.

Deborah S. Ashe
Director, School and Child Care Search Service
Office of Work/Life
Columbia University

Having just finished reading Columbia University School of Journalism Professor Marguerite Holloway’s book The Measure of Manhattan about John Randel, Jr., the man who plotted Manhattan’s grid, I am feeling inspired to superimpose order across the overgrown and confusing landscape of independent school websites.  So, whether you are the parent of a child born in 2008 who finds yourself willing to explore independent school options anew or the parent of a child born in 2009 approaching the task with trepidation, you need more than a school’s url to find your way through the thicket of information.  We are moving from the hokey pokey to hocus pocus.

The schools are well-meaning, eager to share their mission, vision and values.  Photos abound, college lists are alluring.  But the schools don’t seem to realize that you are on a scouting expedition, reconnoitering, gathering intelligence:

–How much does it cost to apply?
–Will the school waive or reduce the application fee if you apply for financial aid?
–When is the school’s application deadline?  Financial aid application deadline?
–What company does the school use to collect financial aid information (there are three major ones used these days)?
–When must your child turn five in order to be considered an applicant (the “birthday cutoff”)?
–Does the school require an admissions test?
–If you are applying for financial aid, can you request a fee reduction for that admissions test?
–How much is tuition and how much does tuition tend to increase from year to year?
–What is included in tuition and what extra fees do families pay?
–What percentage of your students receive financial aid and what is your average financial aid award?

If a school provides the answers to these questions, and they don’t all do so on their websites (in fact, some schools require you to call to find out what their tuition is), finding those answers requires a high level of frustration tolerance as one clicks from page to page to page ad nauseam.  Or, perhaps the message the schools are inadvertently sending is that if you have to ask, you don’t belong here?

So this is a call for schools, especially those that belong to organizations like the Independent Schools Admissions Association of Greater New York (ISAAGNY) or the Association of Independent School Admission Professionals (AISAP) or the New York Association of Independent Schools (NYSAIS) or the National Association of Independent Schools (NAIS) to provide this type of information on each school’s website in one place on one designated page.

Until that happens, I offer our version of a grid, an excel spreadsheet with information we gathered last summer on each of these schools.  This means that the tuition information is already outdated, and between now and September the application fee might change (read “increase”), but it does at least provide a compass reading.  Look for an updated version on our website by end of summer.

Once you move from exploring the digital terrain to visiting the schools themselves, you’ll undoubtedly find a warm welcome from students, parents, admissions staff and heads of schools.  They will be eager to hear your questions and to introduce you to their school community.  If the virtual world lacks the virtues of clarity and transparency, we hope you’ll find your way to our office for some guidance.

Deborah Ashe, the Director of the School and Child Care Search Service at Columbia University, assists Columbia families who are searching for schools in the New York metropolitan area.  Before taking on this position, Debbie was the Director of Admissions and Financial Aid at Trevor Day School (Nursery through Grade 5) for 11 years. During that time, she also served a term as Co-Chair of the Independent Schools Admissions Association of Greater New York (ISAAGNY).

This blog post is written by Caroline Fisk, Director of Admissions, at Warren-Walker School. We thank Caroline for allowing us to use it here.

Caroline Fisk
Director of Admissions
Warren-Walker School

If you ask my headmaster “How many kids are in your 4th grade?”, he can quickly tell you there are 19 in Mrs. Jones class, 16 in Mrs. Doe’s class and 20 in Mrs. Smith’s class.   He is a “numbers guy” and can spew out numbers from financial figures to students in classroom with amazing ease – and accuracy!  Numbers are in his head and come quickly to him.

Meanwhile, I am the people person who is great with all things marketing and everything that we do to make a family feel welcomed in our school community.   So of course the question I dread most is “How many….?”   The numbers swirling in my head at this time of the year are sometimes exhausting.  How many applicants today?  How many inquiries?  Spots left to fill? How many more applicants this year than last?   Retention rate the last 5 years?  Whew!

But even more of a challenge is how best to report all these numbers.  I am still looking for that Holy Grail of Reports, the all-encompassing report that captures what my headmaster wants, my business office needs, my teachers needs and mine, as well.  I’d love a report driven from my database that shows static and dynamic information, all-school, counts, and the detailed class list breakdown all on one easy-to-read  page.  Impossible!  Especially impossible when I have two lower schools, which are at separate locations, and one middle school.

Every year I review the shared reports that float across the list serves and every year I try to make one work but at the end of the day, I still find myself manually transferring numbers from one report to the next to accurately account for applicants, tours, visits, etc.  My “admissions reports” file folder is like a graveyard of dead reports. Each year a report gets discarded for a newer and better one.  The latest and greatest… promising to make my life easier, linking all the numbers together to tell the story of admissions throughout the years.  And yet none really do.  So for now I will continue.

Of course, if you have any suggestions….

This blog originally appeared on David Willows’ blog, “Fragments: A Storytelling Approach to Life and Work.” We thank David for allowing us to use it here.

Some ideas are worth playing with, just to see what floats to the surface.

For some years now, I’ve been fascinated by the question of how we come to know the Truth.  What are the conditions, in other words, in which people suddenly see meaning amidst all of the white noise and find that everything makes perfect sense?

Plato was one of the first to kick this conversation off.  For him, the pursuit of Truth involved looking inwards and simply remembering what was innately present within the human soul.

Most of us will recall his allegory of the cave, illustrated below.  You’ll notice the captives.  They are the poor, helpless unenlightened ones (the majority) who think they are seeing things clearly.  In fact, though, they are faced the wrong way and only watching the projected images of the cave-dweller higher up the cave.

Coming to know the Truth, says Plato, is a journey in which the captive rids herself of her ties and begins the long and lonely ascent up out of the cave into the sunlight.

So what has any of this got to do with school admissions?

Here’s my thinking.  What if we replaced the word ‘captives’ with ‘prospects’?

Doesn’t this somehow capture the desperate and unenlightened state of so many families as they seek the truth of what school is best for their children?  Oftentimes, these families are led to believe that the images they see are ‘real’.  We know, however, that these websites, brochures and social media platforms are only the projected images of the marketing team who hide behind a wall a little higher up the cave.

And yet, despite the darkness and the flickering reflections, a family will often make that choice and begin the lonely ascent towards the first day of school.

So does it end there?  Absolutely not!  The route, these days, is treacherous and fraught with danger along the way.  Even the more resolute will become exhausted by the number of forms we ask to be completed.  Not to mention the ever-present peril of life of a waiting list.

Of course, none of this is true.  I’m just kidding.  Playing with an idea that was never intended for this purpose.

It does make you think, though, doesn’t it?

Jeff Escabar
Director of Admission
Marin Country Day School, CA

AISAP Board of Director

Relationships: Head of School, Board and Director of Admission

As the Admission season begins to wind down for many of us it seems like a good time to reflect on the process each of us go through as we manage the often times delicate balance between Admissions, the Head of School and the Board of Trustees. In speaking with many colleagues over the past few hectic weeks, this theme has surfaced as an area for us to be aware of and explore. What are or are there, best practices as we navigate this territory? There are certain themes that seem to prevail from successful schools and can guide our work. Admissions, like other important departments of our schools works from a base of professionals who possess core standards and competencies and as such work to create mission appropriate classes each Admission cycle.

Heads of School who truly understand Admissions, know that for the process to be most successful, they need to rely on the expertise of the Admission Director who if they are doing their job appropriately, has developed a strong sense of each candidate and family, having reviewed the file and having had several touch points with the family during the process. They create a class based on knowing the full picture. Newer Heads of School or those who do not understand Admissions often times come in at the last moments and try to manipulate the outcomes without having done the back ground work. A strong Head of School listens to the Admission professional and Admission team and will rely on their thorough assessment of each family to form the class. Obviously, the Head will insert some useful information; perhaps a development consideration or Board recommendation to further complete the picture and allow for minor adjustments.

Likewise, the savviest Board members will interact directly with the Director of Admission about prospective families. I always appreciate their perspective and certainly use it when forming the class. Board members, who go directly to the Head of School, run the risk of putting both themselves and the Head of School in an awkward position, if ultimately the candidate cannot be accepted, or if the Head fails to share the information with the Admission professional.

When decision letters are sent out, schools that have the Director of Admission sign the letters rather than the Head create a solid front from the initial interactions between families and the Admission professional through the final decisions. When phone calls come in they should be directed to the Admission Director and not the Head of School. At our school, the Head signs the “Accept” letters and I sign all other letters. “Accept” families rarely yell!

As we conclude the Admission season it is the perfect time for Admission professionals to review A.I.S.A.P.’s Standards & Competencies for Admission & Enrollment Management Professionals with our Heads of Schools and likewise remind our Heads of Schools and Board members of appropriate conduct for the Admission cycle. As part of Board presentations about admission statistics, a review of best practices may be a welcome addition.