How many times have you sent a child or their parent/guardian home with a letter containing important news or information only for it to be forgotten about or lost in the bottom of their bag? Using social media is a quick and convenient way to communicate directly with parents and reduce the risk of them not being properly notified about key information.
Many parents are already active on social media, particularly Facebook, in their personal life so using these platforms is a great way to get your updates seen by them. When delivering information it is a good idea to go where your audience already is as this means they don’t have to go out of their way to find information relevant to them, saving them time and making their lives easier. Here are some ways you can use social platforms, Facebook and Twitter, to communicate with parents:
There are two main ways you can use Facebook to communicate with your audience. The first is to have a company page for your nursery; this is ideal for general promotion of your nursery, to the public and prospective parents as well as the parents of children already in your care. Content that you are willing to share with the general public should be posted on your Facebook page as any Facebook user can see it. This is a good way to make more people aware of your nursery and convince new parents to bring their children to you.
The other way is to create a private group for the parents of the children at your nursery, and perhaps other nursery staff if this is relevant. The content posted in this group can only be seen by group members, and anyone wishing to join must be approved by an administrator, so you’re in control of who becomes a member. This is the ideal platform for posting more private and confidential information and updates which is specifically relevant to the children in your care. Another benefit of this is that Facebook tells you when a post has been read by group members and who, specifically, has read it. This lets you know if important information has been delivered or not and whether you might need to seek an alternative route of communication for certain parents.
Make sure to give parents links to relevant social media channels you are using, invite them to private groups when necessary, and let them know what you will be using these platforms for so they know why they should be a part of it and what they should expect to see there.
Like Facebook, Twitter allows you to control who sees the content you share through the option of having a private profile. So if you are planning on sharing content with the general public, to promote your nursery and attract people to it, for example, then a public profile is right for you because you want as many people as possible to see what you are posting. If you just want to share information with parents, on the other hand, then you have the option to set your profile to private. This way you have to approve who is allowed to follow you, and only your followers can see the content you have posted. You can then use a private profile in a similar way to how you would use a private group on Facebook, to communicate more personalised or confidential information to parents.
You can also use the list function on Twitter to divide your followers into categories. For example, if children are separated by age groups then you can split parents into lists equivalent to these groups so that you can ensure that they are receiving information that is appropriate to their child.
Parents aren’t likely to check your website everyday for news and updates so social media is a good alternative for delivering your messages as it is probably already part of many parents routine to check their social profiles on a regular basis. Plus, if they do use social media then they are already familiar with it so will be more comfortable using this platform to stay updated on their child’s nursery.
If you would like any more help on using social media to communicate with parents then please get in touch by email info@192.168.1.71:8888/shake or call us on 0115 901 7357.
By Madeleine Helme
Madeleine is a marketing manager and creative writer. She loves to write blogs!
Kate Tyler is the founder of Shake Social and our long time social media expert. A regular speaker at events, Kate offers consultancy and training on a range of digital marketing topics, in particular safeguarding and using social media in an educational setting.