Hi I’m Charmaine Campo, Owner & Founder of Do Good Communications LLC. I want to welcome you to today’s blog where we’re going to talk about How To Get More Students Online.
Over the summer, I received a note from an educator. They wrote in:
“Hey Charmaine, I worry about having a stable income stream that I can count on for month to month. In order to have that I need to figure out how to gain more clients at a higher rate. My services sound expensive at first but many parents don’t realize how much their students will get for the cost. I worry about how to grow the business and how I will get more students.”
A WORRIED EDUCATOR WHO JUST WANTS TO MAKE A DIFFERENCE
Well the first thing I’ll say is if you’re a worried educator who just wants to make a difference, you’re not alone. There are a lot of educators who write in to me saying…
It’s very difficult to increase the number of calls per week…
and it’s difficult to reach more students, especially with the high competition concentrated in a small area…
Sometimes you feel overwhelmed like you can’t do anything or or rise above the noise which can lead to stress, frustration, exhaustion. So you’re not alone in this, and there is a way to reach more students that doesn’t involve paying for ads, doesn’t involve spending a lot of money or sort of putting tasks on your communications staff that are pointless.
You know you don’t want to be putting out posts that no one shares or cares about because that’s counterproductive to your goal to gain more students at a higher rate.
So what can you do?
First, consider who your audience is so you know where to reach them in the digital landscape. Are you trying to reach parents? School leaders? Students? Who is the decision-maker you need to connect with?
Whether you spend your time on your website, growing your social media presence, writing emails, blogging, creating TikTok videos — will depend on who you want to reach and how they spend their time online.
The latest social media report from HootSuite and WeAre Social says that folks spend half of their time online (of course due to the 2020 Coronavirus COVID-19 pandemic and a transition to online work environment that time will increase).
What are folks doing online?
Well, half they time they’re on social media and the other half they’re in their email looking for information they can share with their immediate network.
So if you’re a frustrated educator, and you want to build relationships with parents and students so you can increase you enrollment, then you might consider going where they are. That could be sending campaigns via email or social media platforms. And there are many of them out there with new ones being created all the time.
Let’s look at some social media platforms as an example.
You have Twitter, you have LinkedIn, you have Facebook, Instagram, SnapChat, TikTok, Discord, Twitch, YouTube… and more.
Some of these platforms are very easy to look at and understand immediately what they are for. Everyone knows LinkedIn is for professional networking and business-to-business relationships. That’s what it’s for.
When evaluating social media platforms as part of your strategy to get more students, here are some questions you can consider to guide you…
What’s Facebook for?
What is Twitter for?
What is Instagram for?
Who are the people that are on those platforms… and are those the folks you are trying to reach?
Start there, and if you have any questions, you can always reach out to me, Charmaine Campo, Owner & Founder, Do Good Communications, LLC. Visit our website at www.dogoodcoms.com. All my contact information is there.
As a bonus, you can Download your Free Social Media Guide For Educators Now.