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Marketing Your Day Care Online

I'm a huge advocate of having a website and blog to support your day care business. I have connected with a lot of clients that otherwise might not have found me or might have overlooked my service in favor of one of the above. They might have overlooked my service in favor of a bigger, better, faster, shinier, more centrally located day care.

People were impressed with my website; with the pictures, information and 'glimpse inside' that it offered. The Montessori curriculum, the beautiful, country setting and the fact that we are a family run business appealed to them. They felt like they knew us already thanks to the 'personal touch' effect of the website.

Having an online presence has many advantages in terms of marketing and simply communicating with current and potential clients. A professional website is worth considering and is not difficult to create or maintain. A vibrant, regularly updated site and blog can sell your business better than anything else. Make sure it is easily navigable and well stocked with information about you and your business.

Granted it took a few months of work submitting my site to online business directories and ensuring I had all my meta tags and keywords up to speed but ultimately it was worth it. My day care almost always shows up in the first few listings for any search for child care in my area (oftentimes for nationwide searches).

Pictures of your day care should abound, both interior and exterior - nice bright shots of your playrooms and playgrounds. Parents love to see concise details of essential policies, fees and curriculum - so they know what to expect. You can include downloads of your day care contract and parent handbook - the more information you provide the less questions they're going to have.

Keep your existing and future clients up to speed and interested in your day care by adding a blog to your website. I am getting lots of positive comments and responses having recently begun my own blog - Wordpress makes it easy for even the most technically challenged to to this. Put pictures of you and your employees on a staff page and include a few details about each person. This way, you won't be such a stranger to your potential clients and they'll be much more inclined to consider your service.

Find out about childcare from Fiona Lohrenz who has run her own day care for the past 10 years. She incorporates all that knowledge into her website and her 'Start a Day Care Business' DVD guide: Start A Day Care Business DVD Find her at: ChildCareOnly.com