Proven Success Strategies for Child Care Centers

I want to pass along this video
called “Core Influence” from probably
THE coolest guy in internet marketing.

His name is Frank Kern. You gotta watch
his stuff, it’s very cool and funny. And
maybe even life-changing.

Here’s the link:

http://www.getcoreinfluence.com/?ref=J0M40PjjRjQZ06d6

(I get no compensation for sending this to you – it’s just cool stuff).

Enjoy!

All the best,
Kris

I am sitting here at my computer, just blown away.

I just found out that one of my child care center
clients has achieved a 34 PERCENT increase in
enrollment in the last 5 months!

They went from 59 kids back in September to 79 enrolled
kids today!

So how did they do it?

I’m going to reveal to you EXACTLY how they did it,
during my complimentary tele-class workshop tomorrow.

We’re going to spend an hour and half talking about
enrollment-building strategies that you can use
to make 2010 your best year EVER.

To learn more, please go here now:
Enrollment-Boosting Workshop

You won’t want to miss this call, it’s going to be
SIZZLING with great ideas!

To your success in 2010,

Kris

I just posted a brand new 4-minute video, and I think you’ll get a kick out of it.

Plus, you might learn a thing or two.

Go watch the video now:

Success in 2010

To your success in 2010,

Kris

You’re invited to join me and my friend
Julie Bartkus for the first ever, one-of-a-kind
holiday party for child care professionals!

This party will take place via a LIVE conference
call. No special equipment is required to join
us. All you need is a telephone.

During this call we will be featuring several guests
who will fill your notepads with ideas that you can
implement immediately to promote your child care
program and have a holiday season that really sizzles!

These ideas and strategies are guaranteed to propel
your child care program to the next level of success
in 2010!

*********************************

The party is today, December 10th!  Don’t delay!

Reserve your seat now:

Holiday Party RSVP

*********************************

WIN PRIZES!

Plus, we will be giving away prizes every 15

minutes on the call!

*********************************

For more details and to reserve your

seat visit:

Holiday Party RSVP

*********************************

Best yet, it’s FREE for you to attend.
I look forward to “seeing” you then!

Love and success,

Kris

P.S.  If you’re looking for ways to take your child
care business to the next level, or simply survive the
current challenging economy, you must not miss this call.

Plus, we’re going to have a lot of fun!

Experts reveal their top 10 secrets about writing grant proposals that demand attention and get funding.

Grant writing is seldom easy. Many schools are chasing after the same pot of gold, fiercely competing for technology dollars offered by corporations, foundations, and state and federal government. So there’s no room for mistakes. Yet, many pitfalls exist, especially for inexperienced grant writers. For example, some grant seekers apply for the wrong grant. Their goals and objectives don’t match those of the funding source. In the end, they waste everyone’s time and can jeopardize their chances of winning funding in the future from the same organizations. To discover the secrets of successful grant writing, Scholastic Administrator spoke to several experts who gave us their best advice on drafting grant proposals that work. Follow these 10 simple guidelines and your next grant proposal will stand a better chance of getting the funding you need.

1. Assess your needs. What are your instructional technology needs? Ask yourself this question before writing your grant proposal. Solicit information from teachers about the kind of technology or training they need, creative ways they could use it in their classroom, how it would enhance student learning or how the technology could streamline their administrative tasks. Then document your school’s most compelling needs in your grant application. If you’re asking for funds to purchase computers or integrate technology to improve teacher proficiency, reveal the percentage of teachers at your school who are at the beginning, intermediate and proficient stages.

2. Think locally at first. Form a technology advisory committee made up of teachers, administrators, business leaders and parents to develop or update your technology plan. Next, undertake your own pilot program. The same committee would write the grant and contact local employers to help support the program through matching funds, equipment donations, training or volunteers. Demonstrate the program’s initial success before asking for more help to expand or enhance the project. Find an impartial evaluator to analyze the pilot program, then cite the results in future grant applications. Establishing a baseline of success with technology will increase your odds of winning the grant.

3. Do your homework. Find out what kinds of school projects the prospective funder has awarded in the past. Contact those schools and ask for a copy of their winning proposals. Analyze their content and style. Use their proposal as your model, personalizing it to fit your school or district.

4. Make it personal. Successfully competing for a grant typically requires human interaction. Call the program officer and ask him or her to clarify anything in the request for proposals (RFPs) that may be unclear. You must follow their guidelines to the letter. Even something as minor as using the wrong font size can kill your chances. Also ask who will be reading the grant so you can tailor your proposal to their background or area of expertise. By speaking with the grant administrator, you can also get a much better understanding of the funder’s agenda and possibly an initial reaction to your project idea.

5. Show passion. Show some excitement about the project in your proposal. If appropriate, personalize it with one-sentence anecdotes, such as upbeat comments from students. Also study proposals written by past grant winners. Are they informal? Do they use words like “we” and “I”? Match the style. Finally, be concise and avoid jargon or overused buzzwords like paradigm and rubric.

6. Focus on learning, not the technology. Emphasize outcomes, objectives or goals. Focus on what you intend to accomplish with the technology, rather than on the hardware or equipment itself. For example, if you want five computers to help students improve their reading or writing skills, explain how the technology can help you accomplish that goal. Offer a realistic scenario describing how students and teachers will use the technology to improve in this area.

7. Think long-term. Develop a timeline that shows when you plan to achieve your goals and objectives. It should include plans to build on accomplishments after the grant runs out. Sustainability is crucial for a successful proposal because funders like to see that the activities they’re financing will continue beyond the life of the grant. For example, explain your plans to start replacing the equipment in the third year of a five-year grant, and how you’ll fund the upgrades.

8. Don’t forget professional development. At least 30 percent of the funds you’re asking for should be allocated for professional development. Funders won’t assume you’ll be able to meet your goals and objectives if you don’t train faculty, administrators or staff on how to use the technology.

9. Spread the technology around. Funders like to get the most bang for their buck. That’s why it’s important to explain how you plan to share the technology you’re requesting. As an example, you may partner with another school, enabling students from both schools to use the technology for joint projects. Likewise, your school may need equipment for its new computer center, which will also be accessible to the community. Students can teach local residents at the center how to use computers or other technology. Remember that funders like projects that can be replicated by other schools or districts.

10. Ask for constructive criticism. If you’re rejected, call the grant administrator and ask for a copy of the reviewers’ comments on your proposal. If that’s not possible, ask the administrator for constructive feedback. For instance, why was your application rejected? What were its strengths and weaknesses? How could it be improved? This information will enable you to write a better proposal the next time you apply. Once you develop a strong application, you can submit it to different funders with only minor changes to fit each one’s specifications.

(Published courtesy of Scholastic Administrator).

We all know that word of mouth is the most powerful form of advertising. So why do so many child care centers lack a customer referral program? Maybe we figure that if people love us, the referrals will come naturally, without us having to ask for them.

This might be the case, but there’s one problem: unless you reward existing customers for their hard-earned referrals, they’re unlikely to help you get new customers.

So what is the simplest, easiest way to create a customer referral program? Follow a simple three-step acronym: EAR. Earn-Ask-Reward.

Step 1: Earn . Do what you do so well that others can’t resist telling people about you. A great example is Disney. Ask yourself “how can we provide child care so well that people will be amazed at our service and how great we are…and they won’t be able to resist telling other parents about it”. In other words, provide a “WOW” experience.

Make a list of what’s special, unique, and different about your center. When prospects call and then visit for the first time, what “WOW” reactions will they have? Or will they have a ho-hum reaction? If they visit you along with two other competitors in the same day, what will make them remember YOU as opposed to the other two centers? If you want others to rave about you, you’ll need to refine your “WOW” experience.

Step 2: Ask . Create an easy-to-follow process for you and your staff to ask happy customers to refer you to friends and family. This could be a simple flyer that spells out the details of your program, including the reward for providing a referral. You can go further by communicating your Referral Program throughout your center materials, in your newsletter, via email to your customer list, on your website, and in flyers posted on the Parent Communication boards.

Step 3: Reward . Make sure you’ve identified a valued prize that will reward your customers for their hard work. Don’t appear “cheap” and don’t give a discount related to your child care business. One of the best gifts that parents can receive is a complimentary “date night” including dinner and a movie, or perhaps even free child care for the evening. Another idea is a $100 gift card to a popular retail outlet, or a generic $100 cash gift card.

Typically, the reward is given when the enrolling family names the referring family. For example, on the Enrollment Form you should have a field for “Please Let Us Know Who Referred You to Our Center So We May Thank Them”.

Using these three simple steps, you’ll soon find yourself with many prospective families interested in enrolling in your center, courtesy of your current customer base.

Why do you need a business plan? First and foremost, a business plan is a basic requirement to getting government grant and loans, as well as bank loans. It is also a great way to focus the complete picture of your daycare, get it out of your head and down on paper.

There is something about writing a plan down on paper that brings it into reality, and requires greater precision. This is what a business plan will do for you and your child care business. It does not matter if you’ve been open for years or just starting out – you will gain tremendous value from writing it down.

Preparing a business plan can be a long and daunting task, but I recommend using a daycare business plan template to give you a head-start and save you hours of time. If you’re not already convinced, here are 10 big reasons why should have a business plan:

1. Sets specific objectives for your daycare. Good owners set specific objective that can be measured. This allows you to keep track of how you are doing and make changes if needed.
2. Helps define your strengths. A major part of any plan is learning what your strengths are in a business both personal, professional and as a business. Knowing your strengths will allow you to play to them.
3. Helps uncover your weaknesses. Just like with your strengths, knowing your weaknesses can be a massive advantage for you. If you know where you are weak, you can focus more energy on this area, or find somebody else who can help you. Or best of all, delegate this area to someone else completely! An example is my friend Christine who runs her own daycare, and she is weak at keeping track of her business paperwork and finances. Luckily, her husband Robert is an accountant. He handles ALL the paperwork, receipt tracking, payments, and accounting for her. Sounds like a perfect marriage!
4. Helps you know and understand your competition. In developing your plan, you will get to know your competition, what their unique benefits are, and what their weaknesses are. From this you should be able to determine where you can compete with the greatest success.
5. Enables you to deal with professionals. Having a business plan will allow you to deal with other professionals, such as lawyers, accountants, insurance agents, and consultants, in a confident manner.
6. Understand who your customers are and what they want. To be successful in child care you need to give the customer what they want, not always what they need or what you are best at. The business plan process will help you to find out more about your customers.
7. Determine how much money you will make. Knowing your customers, your competition and your strengths, you will be much better able to make an accurate projection about how much money you will make, how much you may need to pay out in expenses and how much you get to keep!
8. Understand how much it will cost to start your daycare. If you haven’t yet started your daycare you will learn how much money you will need to get started. Depending on the size of your center this may be almost nothing to 6 figures for a new child care center. Knowing the costs will help you figure out where you can save some money too.
9. Help you sell your daycare. Right now you may not be thinking about selling the business you are just starting but down the road you may decide to. It is always good to get paid a large amount for all the hard work you put into your daycare. A good business plan that has made you successful goes a long way in receiving a good sales price.
10. You simply must have one to apply for grants and loans. To get any money from the government or banks you need to have a business plan. Not having a plan is one of the biggest reasons people don’t apply for government grants and loans and why that money goes unused. The money is out there for the asking, but you must have a business plan to get any of it.

Yes, preparing a business plan can be a daunting process. And if you take it on from the beginning alone it will be. But luckily you have several great options. There are several business software programs on the market you can use. These are good and they walk you through the process with examples for each section.

Another option is to have a business plan created for you by a professional. This is the easiest but also the most expensive route. Search the web and you should find several companies willing to do all the work for you and send you a professional plan.
A third option is a “done for you” child care business plan template. I’ve have a couple of these for you, (daycare center business plan, home daycare business plan), with just about everything already done. I’ve helped enough child cares to know what 90% of the business plan should be. I find from coast to coast the same information in just about every business plan.

It’s up to you how you go about writing your business plan, but you should strongly consider getting started today writing one. Success is just so much easier with a good business plan for your daycare.

A recent report by independent research firm eMarketer.com (September 2009) provided some great insights into how people are searching online for local products & services. Here are some of the major findings of the study:

• 37% of people who conducted an online local search ended up visiting the store in person.
• People were 46% more likely to go to the store after finding them in a local online search, when compared to other ways of finding a business.
• Even more local searchers contacted the business by phone after finding them online.
• The top 2 business categories for local searches were child care and hotels.

All in all, the days of the phone book are gone. People now search online (primarily Google) for a business when they need them, and child care is one of the TOP business categories that people are searching for online.

When you search for anything, who do you contact first? The top few results, maybe the top five. If you are like most people, you start with the top two results and only if they don’t work out do you continue down the page. Moreover, page two might as well be the moon – only the few diehard searchers get that far.

Based on these findings, your child care center needs to be high up in search results for your area (preferably in the Top 5), in order to increase the number of prospects contacting your about future enrollment. Now you don’t need to be number one, although you should be trying, but you should be “above the fold” so nobody needs to scroll down to find you.

The first thing you need to do is some keyword research. What terms are people typing into Google and Yahoo search to find child care in your area? For my area, here are the keywords I came up with. Feel free to adapt this list to your local town or region:

• Child care, Hudson, OH
• Childcare Hudson Ohio
• Child care centers in Hudson OH
• Best child care centers, Northeast ohio
• Daycare in Hudson Ohio

When choosing keywords, do not forget about the areas and towns surrounding you. Far too often child care centers focus only on the city they’re in, but you likely have customers from other towns. Would you fit with a surrounding town, or neighborhood? How about big employers nearby? Target all of these too, not with as much effort as your main term, but still with some effort.

(By the way, the techniques that I’m going to teach you in this article are not being used by many centers, so by taking action on these tips, you’ll come out ahead of your competition!)

After you take action on these tips, it won’t take much time at all to see some results. Here’s an example I did the other day just for illustration purposes. These results took less than 5 hours to achieve.

I targeted Aurora, Ohio, the town next to ours for this example. Here you can see the results for “child care” and “daycare” in Aurora.

You can do this with any location. Now I did my example quickly and I would get even better results if I had let this run for more than 5 hours. However, I followed the techniques I will teach you and here are the results.

Yep, there I am number 5 for child care, and number 2 for daycare!

Do you think I would get some calls and customers off being that high up? Yes, I would. In addition, if I gave it more time I would be higher, and on the map section. It can take a couple of days to get there, which is still a relatively short amount of time to get a huge amount of online traffic.

I took the whole thing down after 5 hours, because I didn’t want to confuse parents actually trying to find child care. I just didn’t think that was right to do to them. Try this for yourself and you will be amazed at the results you get, and how little time it takes.

Here are the 7 steps to getting your child care web site to rank high in local search results. To get the most out of your work I suggest you do things in this order, but I would rather see you get as many items done as possible rather than delay while earlier stuff was completed.

• On-page keywords. I know this should sound obvious but I see it missed repeatedly. Make sure the exact words people are using to search for you (also known as keywords) are on your home page. i.e. “Aurora Ohio child care” or “child care centers Aurora, OH”. You also want the name of your business and the full address and telephone number on every page, so people don’t have to search for the phone number on your site.

• Behind-the-scene coding. This is all the stuff that goes on behind the scenes in the programming the actually makes up your web site. There’s a lot of information passed between your site and the search engine, which is vital to the search engine finding your site. Things like what your site is about, and what items are important. You can do most of this yourself or have your webmaster person do it for you. But you want to:

• • Make sure your “title tag” has the terms you want to rank for in it. This is what shows up at the top of a page in blue on search results. i.e. “Aurora, OH child care – Daycare Aurora, Ohio – child care centers”. I usually recommend 3 or 4 keyword phrases in the title tag, separated by hyphens.
  • Make sure the “description tag” contains the words you want and encourages people to click on your site. This is the text you see about your site. I.e. “take a look inside our child care and daycare center in Aurora, OH.”
  • Have your “keywords tag” include your main words and other areas. This helps tell the search engines what words you think are important and is a great place to add other area to your site. I.e. child care aurora Ohio, child care Hudson Ohio, Murray’s daycare…
  • Make sure your address is included inside an “address tag”. You don’t see this on you page but this tells the search engines this is your address and should be used.
  • Try to have your keywords include in an “H1 tag”. This generally shows larger and in bold but also tells the engines this is the most important set of word on this page. I.e. Murray’s child care and daycare in aurora Ohio offers award winning care.

• Get in the local and main directories. Directories are the new phonebooks. They contain lists of sites organized by topic. Google, Yahoo!, and Bing all have an option that allows you to submit to their directories for free and indicate you are a local business. Also, look for local or regional directories. Care.com is a big one but Aurora, Ohio also has a small local only directory. Get in as many of these as you can. Most are free but even if they cost a couple of bucks, it is well worth it.

You will find these directories very helpful because Google and Yahoo will list local results first in searches if it appears people are looking for local information like child care. Search engines gain this information from you telling them, and from looking in the local directories.

• Make a video or two of your child care center. A simple 2-4 minute video showing people your daycare, just as you would new parents is an amazingly powerful tool. Take these videos and put them up in YouTube, Viddler, Yahoo! Video, Metacare, Tube Mogul, and other video sharing sites. You will be amazed at the number of people who find you through these videos.

• Create a Facebook Fan Page for your Center. This is a great place for people to talk about how much they like your daycare, and form a community. This will take 5 minutes and the search engines do notice. Go to Facebook.com, and click on the small link at the bottom that says “Advertising”. Then click on “Pages”, then “Create a Page”. Add a main photo of your staff or the outside of your center, and start adding content. Be sure to communicate your new Fan Page to your currently enrolled parents and staff, and ask them to become a “fan”. Also, if you’re planning on adding photos of the kids in your care, make sure you get a signed release from parents authorizing you to do so.

• Make sure if you are paying for advertising online, it includes a link back to you. If you are paying to be in the online Yellow Pages or BBB, make sure they have a link back to your site and it is correct. Also, try to get your keywords into the link. I.e. “Murray’s child care and daycare in Aurora Ohio.” This will help with people clicking on your link and help you show up higher in search results.

• Get into the social scene. Social bookmarking is big right now so use it to your advantage. Encourage parents, friends and coworkers to reference your site on social networks. Have people join your Facebook fan page, Digg your videos and any informational articles you put out, have people bookmark you site, have people comment about your site and your business online. To show you the importance of this look at this:

I know this all may appear to be a lot of work, and somewhat overwhelming, but really, it isn’t. Most of this you can do in a couple of hours and what you can’t do a webmaster should be able to do for you. If you would like some help, contact us and we will see what we can do to get you up to the top of your search results.

As you can see, it is very important to be at the top of the search results and it doesn’t take much time at all. I’ve shown you how to get it all done and be near the top in less than 5 hours. Now it’s your turn to give it a go.

I came across a great article in the paper this week. The article is about which volunteer jobs are the most helpful to kids. Here’s the article: http://online.wsj.com/article

I like the information of where to volunteer and think parents may like it (i.e. something for your newsletter:-)). I found this section to be very relevant to those of us in child care as well as parents:

“Throughout school, the most important parental role of all is to shape your child’s attitude toward learning and school, communicate high expectations, and help him or her set goals and solve learning problems.

And setting expectations doesn’t mean telling kids, “We are bound and determined that you are going to get into Harvard,” Dr. Hoover-Dempsey says; it means sending a message that “doing the best you can is important for all the things you’re going to be able to do in life.” In elementary school, such coaching has roughly twice as big an impact on children’s grades and test scores as volunteering.”

As caregivers we have a massive impact on the kids in our care. We owe it to them and ourselves to do the best we can for them. Teach them to love learning, have fun with it, to do their best in everything they do, and to set meaningful goals in life.