Marketing tip for teacherpreneurs #3: join and post in online parent groups.

To promote your microschool effectively, I recommend you post at least 1–2 times a month in yahoo, meetup, facebook and other online parenting groups

I’ve known several schools that have filled entirely just by posting once a week to online parent groups.

This tip takes a bit more time than the others (you’ll probably want to set aside 3–6 hours to get it all set up and 5 mins a week to post) but it’s well worth the effort.

Before you join any group, please be sure to check the rules of the group. Some groups do not allow commercial posts, so it is important you do not post to those groups. Many others are happy to receive information about local learning opportunities like yours, so those are the best to join!

You’ll be able to

• Reach thousands of families near you
• Post regularly about your microschool
• Respond to inquiries from prospective parents
• Engage in meaningful discussions about education in your community
• When you list your microschool on CottageClass, we provide you with a customized list of of all yahoo and meetup parenting groups in your area and give you tips on how to best utilize them.
• It might take 1–3 hours to join all these groups and up to two weeks to get approved.
• and it’s super boring (trust me from experience)
• so set yourself up with a good podcast before you start, but trust me
• it is well worth the effort.

I’ve connected with an enormous numbers of exceptionally wonderful families from these groups.

WHAT TO POST

It will probably take approximately 2 weeks to get accepted to most of the yahoo and meetup groups you’ve requested to join. (In some cases it may take up to 2 weeks, so just double-check to be sure)

When you finish your listing on CottageClass, we’ll send you customized wording for your posts that will maximize your impact in these groups.

Here are some tips for creating a successful group posts

• Make it an event or an announcement “we’re excited to announce that”
  Include some FOMO (fear of missing out) “2 spots left in” or sign up by “January 8th for our early bird discount.
• Start with a testimonial from a parent (actually, even better is if you can get a parent to post for you recommending your program)
• Share your story. I’ve always dreamed of starting my own school. Ever since I was in kindergarten at Montessori Elementary in Ithaca, I always played the teacher in role playing games.

Here is an example of a great post for Yahoo

Subject: New bilingual playgroup in Brooklyn

Body: Hi mamas, we’re excited to announce that we’re starting a new bilingual playgroup in Brooklyn.

Tambor is a full-immersion, home based, Spanish Pre-School in East Flatbush. At Tambor we will learn and practice language and culture skills through singing, dancing, gardening, arts, crafts; as well as though games and free play. Our house is full of light, open spaces, age appropriate toys and materials, and a backyard with a garden.

To learn more or apply, please visit https://cottageclass.com/listings/tambor-spanish-pre-school-spring-2018

Here is an example of a great post for Facebook or instagram

Hi mamas, we’re excited to announce that we’re starting a new bilingual playgroup in Brooklyn. Tambor is a full-immersion, home based, Spanish Pre-School in East Flatbush. At Tambor we will learn and practice language and culture skills through singing, dancing, gardening, arts, crafts; as well as though games and free play. Our house is full of light, open spaces, age appropriate toys and materials, and a backyard with a garden.

To learn more or apply, please visit https://cottageclass.com/listings/tambor-spanish-pre-school-spring-2018 #cottageclass #homeschooling #edtech #kids #preschool

More tips:

• Always include the link to enroll in your program.
• Include a picture If a picture doesn’t pop up automatically when you input the link, make sure to include one. On CottageClass, we’ll make a customized link for you where the photo will pop up automatically. Photos are so so so important.
• On Facebook, include the hashtag #CottageClass so other members of our community will be signaled to like your post (and make sure to follow #cottageclass and like them back!)

How to post efficiently to list-serves

To save you time, I’m going to show you a tip that will allow you to post to all the parent groups at once and even schedule a year of posts in advance.

While you might fear that people will get tired of hearing about your program 1x/week in 15+ parent groups, the reality is that for most people, it won’t even register that you have a program until they’ve seen it 16 times (that’s a statistic)

Redirect all yahoo group emails to a gmail address.

• First, you will need to redirect your emails from yahoo to gmail.
• Sign into groups.yahoo.com using the yahoo account you created.
• Add a gmail address to your yahoo account (any domain name that was created with googleworks too)
• Click the gear icon
• Click account security
• Click email addresses
• Click “add recovery email address”
• Click “send verification mail”
• Sign into your gmail and confirm
• Use the manage my groups on feature on yahoo to change the email address you receive and send from.
• Return to https://groups.yahoo.com/neo
• Use “manage my groups” to select the email you wish to send from.
• Select the gmail address you wish to use for each group.

Create a draft of the email you want to send to the parent groups in gmail
The text you use is important. It should be similar to the text you used in your press release.

When you create your listing on CottageClass, we will send you customized text we recommend you use.

Subject: New <<category>> in <<city>>

Body: Hi mamas, we’re excited to announce that we’re starting a new <<category>> in <<city>>
<<description>>
To learn more or apply, please visit <<link>>

When your parent ambassadors post, they can start with a testimonial about how much their child has loved your microschool. You can also use this tool to announce your events.

Save time by using YAMM to send personalized emails

• Open a google spreadsheet and title it yahoo/meetup groups
• Create one column for the list of email addresses to post to the group (Every yahoo account has a specific email address that people use to post)
• Not every meetup has a group meetup email, but some have an email you can use to email the group directly. Put that in the same column.
• Here is an example of what your spreadsheet should look like
• Use the YAMM google sheets add-on to schedule posts
• Go to the spreadsheet you created earlier.
• Click add-ons in the title bar
• Click “get add-ons”
• Search for YAMM (yet another mail merge)
• Install this add-on
• Select the draft you wrote earlier
• Start mail merge
• Choose receive a test email (I generally mess up the first time, so it’s good to take this step)
• Review the test email in your account (it will send to the first email on your list.
• Push send!
• Schedule subsequent emails once a week by selecting “delay delivery” or at least once a month) for as long as you wish. Rules may vary from group to group.
• Enjoy all the incredible responses you get from parents!

As you might imagine, the joys of YAMM are endless for sending customized, personalized emails to parent groups, the press and to potential local partners. There are a number of custom fields you can enter including the person’s name and any other custom information you want, so I highly recommend you explore it for all your growth hacking adventures!

Posting in online parent groups is really effective, so I am very very excited to see all your new students start pouring in!

Step 4: Build trust: Get more reviews
We’ve found that if teachers are doing a lot to promote their program and still aren’t getting students, it’s generally because they don’t have enough references. Here’s how to get more reviews and why they’re so important. Learn about reviews in our article on Building Trust.