All Blog Jun, 26 2020 2 min read
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One super important strategy to grow your enrolment long-term is to hire the ideal person for conducting tours of your facility.

The child care centre director or assistant director usually takes on the role of persuading new parents to enrol, but what if the strengths of these two top administrators do not lie in that arena?

How can you still have amazing tours that create the rates of enrolment that you need to grow your program?

There is a simple and strategically crucial answer: Identify who in your program is the best person to conduct tours and enrol new prospects into your program.

Many directors and assistant directors are nervous, dreading the end of the tour because they hate selling and the possibility of rejection. They have neither the innate DNA nor the skill set to perform this valuable routine. Sometimes you can provide incentives for them to build those skill sets. However, rather than forcing the issue, there maybe someone else on your team who already has the skill set – the innate DNA – that is ideal to SELL your program. And that is the key. Enrolment is sales. Sooner you learn this better your occupancy would be.

Take a step back and try to discover who the ‘enrolment building’ machine is within your team. Do you already have someone on staff that would excel in this role?

Who is head-over-heels about your school and just can’t say enough about how awesome your program is?

Who can demonstrate your centre’s mission on a daily basis and shows pride in working for your centre?

Who do you confidently believe would be able to:
  • Identify the parents’ unique needs and hot button issues
  • Emotionally identify with the families touring your centre
  • Win over and charm that person, injecting personality and making the winning connections with the touring parents
  • Charm the child and making a ‘felt’ connection
  • Show the parent engagement app like Xap which truly makes a difference about their child’s learning.
  • Better app which documents their child’s learning journey.
  • Demonstrate that your facility truly cares above and beyond all other programs they might be considering
  • Ask for the enrolment business at the end of the tour by giving reasons to take action with you

These naturally persuasive talents often go untapped because they are not identified.

I’d like to suggest a surefire way you can select the ideal tour guide from your team.

Learn to identify your employees’ strengths and find the best person to be your tour guide and ‘new prospect enrolment specialist’. Invest your time in finding this person.

Think: Who is really great at promoting their room?

It’s likely that you already have educators who are talented at selling your program. Give some assessment to any whom you think may have this skill set.

According to the outcome of the assessment, the great salesperson you seek should have the innate DNA of an ‘influencer’, one whose skill set combines certain themes, such as:

  • Winning others over (WOO)
  • Self-assurance
  • Being a ‘maximizer ‘, a person who looks for individual and unique strengths in others

Your ideal tour conductor can uniquely identify with the mom or dad on the tour, take them to the next level of success and sell them on your program.

The strength finder 2.0 book shows how to identify unique strength in a person. The book then shows you how to lead most effectively with your team’s strengths in mind. Once you know which team member shines at the tour and enrolment process – the one who loves sales – use the title of Enrolment Specialist, Director of First Impressions, Director of Parent Communication and Enrolment, or any other creative title, while he or she conducts tours. This ideal person will naturally and joyfully enrol more and more children into your program.

Identify your ideal salespersons and give them some responsibility for your enrolments– the opportunity to do what they do best – and you will both reap the benefits of your soaring enrolment.

If you would like to get a better childcare app for your centre, please book a personalised demo with one of our consultants.

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About The Author

Emily Chin - Marketing Executive Xap at Technologies Pty Ltd- With a linguistic and graphic design background, Emily has worked extensively with children. Emily focuses on bringing customer driven solutions to KidsXap’s clients.