Support
‘Effective marketing lets you take control, manage your agenda, and broadcast your positive messages to key stakeholders’
values. Are these values displayed in prominent places, such as the reception area, corridors and sports hall? Are the values woven into your materials and clear on your website?
Materials If you’re approaching business sponsors and donors for support, they will expect to see professional materials that clearly represent your school’s values. Assemble all your literature (such as newsletters, prospectuses and open-day materials) together and evaluate the consistency of branding. Introducing brand guidelines – a set of essential elements including colour palettes, type style and logos – ensures your materials are reproduced consistently, time after time. Include displays and signage in
your marketing review. Visitors to school, whether they be parents or potential sponsors, will form an opinion very quickly, so it’s critical you project your positive brand messages. Check whether your signage is clear and welcoming, and review the ‘customer journey’. In other words, how does a visitor feel when they first make contact with the school? Are they made to feel welcome and can they find the answers they are looking for? Consider introducing a ‘key facts’
sheet – a simple, downloadable, promotional sheet that highlights why staff and students should choose your school. Include essential features such as academic data and outcomes, quotes from Ofsted reports, extra-curricular activities and pastoral care provision.
TOP TIP Walk around your school with a trusted friend or colleague (someone who doesn’t know the school well). They may well see things that you don’t. One of the schools I worked in placed a large Biffa waste bin outside the reception area three days a week. My fresh pair of eyes noticed that eyesore immediately – and it was swiftly relocated!
School website First and foremost, your website needs to be up to date and reflect current protocols, policies and practices in school. Carry out a regular web audit to remove old stories and newsletters. Check that links between tabs work correctly, and that all statutory information is up to date and accessible. Over half of all web activity takes place on mobile devices, so make sure your website is tablet-friendly. Make it easy for people to find out
about your fundraising activities. Add a new tab to your website, such as ‘Support Us’. Use this to link to all your projects, with photos, details on why you need support, and the impact the new facility or programme will have. Make sure that it is easy for people to donate, by using downloadable Gift Aid forms, for example. Digital media is extremely
effective at engaging with audiences – video marketing increases the number of visits to school websites and the amount of time visitors spend on the site. Research shows that 64% of people say they are more likely to use a service after viewing a video
(Insivia Statistics, 2016). Parents are far more likely to engage with a short video clip than read
paragraphs of text, so think about introducing short, student-led video clips. Two-to-three-minute clips are really effective in attracting the interest of prospective parents. They’re also far more interesting than a static image of the headteacher or a stock school photo. Google is biased towards fresh digital content, so use this to push your website further up the search rankings.
TOP TIP Your fundraising efforts
can be boosted with a video of your project. If the film is led by the children then it’s more likely to make an emotional impact.
Social media Social media is an effective and inexpensive way to promote good news stories and broadcast key messages about your school. More than 60% of schools use Facebook, and it remains a favoured communication channel among parents. Twitter is also a great platform for engaging with businesses and developing relationships with local groups and organisations.
TOP TIP Ensure someone in school has responsibility for managing social media communications and give them the time to do it effectively. They can coordinate the news story templates from other staff and ensure materials are proofread and suitable before release.
26 SUMMER 2019 FundEd
IMAGES: VLADIMIR OBRADOVIC; MARYLIFLOWER/
ISTOCKPHOTO.COM
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