10 Ways to Market Your School Online - Part 1 of 5

Rule #1 for a reason.  If you don't have one, get one.  Budget for it.  If you have a parent that dabbles in Web site design, those days are over.  WordPress sites today are better looking than most sites made five years ago.  More importantly, your Web site must be able to be viewed and be functional from mobile devices - Blackberries, Androids, iPads, etc.  If those words are things you'd rather not worry about, then it's time to either get up to speed, find someone who can assist in these efforts, or, dare I say it, move out of the way.  That sounds harsh, but here are three compelling reasons why these things are important:

1. The Millennials are starting to become targetable parents.  The good news is that they are more aware of the importance of community than Generation X parents are.  The bad news is that the Web is how they communicate.  If you have a Web site because you "have to" but really don't put a whole lot of work into it, they will not be attracted to your school.
2. The Kindergarteners entering your school this coming year (11-12) are the iGeneration (or Digitals).  Not only have they not known a time when there was not a computer in the house, but "dial-up" means nothing to them - it's highspeed or nothing.  As you plan for the coming years, know that the computer needs to be an integral part of their learning.  Putting a book in front of them may freak them out.  Educational publishing companies are now releasing their textbooks in digital form.   "Kindles for Kindergartens?"  You heard it here first.  (OK, Joe Bennet said it a year ago (https://joebennett.wordpress.com/2010/03/), but not in this context).
3. The Web site itself.  The days of sending out information packets to parents are OVER! (Did I say that loud enough?)  ALL promotional information and forms for your school that used to be in those Duo-Tang folders should be part of your Web presence.  Today, if a parent wants more information about your school, that's your cue to get them into the school for a tour or for an interview.  Enrollment is sales.  When you want more information about your new car, you research it on the internet, but no one calls a dealership and says, "Please send me an owner's manual, all the paperwork I'd have to sign, and information about your service department."  Your Web site presents a branded image of your school, its mission, vision and case.  Your other marketing activities should bring users to it.  That said, your Web site needs to be three things:
• Interactive & Dynamic - Tasteful pictures (of smiling and engaged students - not empty buildings), not a lot of text (since pictures say a thousand words), and interactive (with forms families can complete).  The public presence of your Web site is for marketing.  It needs to have a password-protected area for materials for current parents.  Many schools have teacher pages on the public presence.  Teachers actually need to have two places - one for the public presence where parents can see a sample of what's going on in the classroom, and the password-protected portion where the day-to-day activities are posted.
• Easily-updatable - YOU need to be able to update it.  If you have to call your Web master to make changes to your site, your Content Management System (CMS) is too complicated.  Many Web creators will want this in order to keep you as a customer.  The point is that if they insist on this is the way they do business, your school may no longer be their client if it closes.  Web presences today need to be updated DAILY if you want people to keep coming back to them.
• Mobile-ready - If you have a mobile device that can access the Internet, check out your school's Web site on it.  For many parents, THIS is the first exposure they have to your school - not the home computer.  If they're not impressed by what they see on their mobile phone, you may have lost the battle already.

One last point before moving on.  This is 2011.  "What about those people that don't have access to the Internet?"  This is the equivalent of 1971's comment, "What about those people that don't have access to an encyclopedia?"  This is equivalent to 1991's comment, "What about those people that don't have access to in-depth research material?"  What did you do?  Did schools offer access to those resources?  YES!  Did public libraries offer access to those resources?  YES!  Should we open our schools to parents in the evenings if we have a computer lab that's connected to the Internet?  YES!  If you have a parent that says, "But my child doesn't have access to the Internet," they're telling a non-truth.  That said, if your school has a policy against the utilization of technology, or parents refuse to utilize any technology of any type due to the particular belief system they espouse, then you must respect that.  However, since you are a private and/or faith-based school, there is no reason that you have to accept that child if technology is an integral part of your curriculum, and such policies must be outlined in your official policy handbook.  If you do not have a curriculum policy and overview or an official policy handbook, you now know your summer homework assignment.  Remember that if you accept a student, you must provide accommodation.

2) Share what your school is doing offline on the Web site and through social media

Your school changes lives every day!  The projects that your students undertake to help make their community a better place to live, to offer aid to people of a country half-way around the world, or to bring a smile to the faces of the elderly, the sick, the lonely or the hungry are the fruits of your efforts in the classroom.  Faith-based schools need to be schools with excellent academics and activities infused with faith-based values, and need to run like businesses, but everything done in those two systems needs to focus on creating students to be SIGNS for the world.  Just as DREAM stands for the elements of Advancement and FACTS (Faith Identity, Activities, Curriculum, Technology, and Surroundings) stands for the instructional program of your school, SIGNS stands for Serve, Inspire, Grow, Nurture, and Succeed - the purpose of your school.  If your school teaches your students to do those things, prospective parents that see these SIGNS will be emotionally attracted to your school.  Share these projects through your Web site as well as social media like Facebook, Twitter, Flickr and YouTube so that parents in your school and alumni can share with friends, family and co-workers.

For every event that you're involved with, see if you can partner with a local non-profit that has the same mission.  Doing so increases your exposure, and those other organizations will be more likely to share your work in the future.

Some faith-based schools seem to have difficulty with this concept because they believe that their work should be done as service and not publicized, adhering to the Scriptural reference that good deeds should be done in secret, so that the left-hand doesn't know what the right-hand is doing.  Three things:

1. That reference is made in respect to giving alms.  Excellent practice...although I'm sure there a many folks that want their charitable deduction.
2. The Pharisees of Jesus' time that demonstrated their charity in public were hypocrites.  Our service needs to be authentic.
3. In Jesus' time, movable-type printing and the Internet did not exist.  Word of Mouth was the (and still is the best) way good news spread (which is why next week's Marketing Matters include the use of testimonials).  St. Francis of Assisi reminds us to always spread the Good News, and, if necessary, use words.