Leveraging the Enthusiasm of Your Community
Slide One
The goal of our promotion is to introduce the connection that may exist between families, children, and our center. Though many people can say that this connection is evident still weak, we have to understand that the role of parents in early childhood development is impressive. Everything begins with trust. Children are ready to trust their parents only without any reasons or additional explanations. Our center aims at establishing good and trustful relationships with both parents and children (Freeman, Decker, & Decker, 2013; Hearron & Hildebrand, 2010). Communication with parents is a key to our new program, and we hire only the best and the most experienced licensed caregivers and employees so that they can explain how to provide children with effective emotional and social support. Education is what we offer to our clients, and this program is available to everyone.
Slide Two
Why is our problem worth people’s attention? The answer is simple. We focus on the development of different areas that may be interesting to children. We do not find it necessary to have as many children as possible. Our goal is quality, but not quantity. First, our program is important for child physical development and growth. Not all parents know what methods and techniques are appropriate for children, and this program is a good chance to learn for both children and parents about physical and brain development (Bales, 2005). Sometimes, it is not possible to influence the physical development of a child. Still, we never get upset and find out new areas for improvement. Emotional development and social interactions are what we offer to our children (Chien et al., 2013). To support parents and give guarantees, we also start working with several insurance companies to promote healthcare insurance and recognize children’s personal needs and family welfare (Children’s Bureau, Administration for Children and Families, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, n.d.). Finally, our early childhood education programs help to promote success and love for learning. We never impose, just invite and support.
Developing Marketing Materials
Brochure Step One
Brochure Step Two
In Step One, a brochure about our early childhood center is developed. It contains information about our board members, services, plans, and benefits that are available to all families and children who choose our organization. Each paragraph is a unique opportunity for all customers to learn more about this center and make their final decision. We do not give the promises that cannot follow. Therefore, each point is definite with no unnecessary adjectives and explanations.
This brochure is an effective tool in our marketing strategy. First, it includes several colorful images that can be interesting for children and a logo of our company that can be recognized by parents. Second, in this brochures, real names and contact information are given to provide parents and other caregivers with guarantees. It is easy to trust our center because we have nothing to hide from people. Finally, the goal of the brochure is to inform all regular and potential clients. We explain what families can ask for as our clients. We identify our main benefits to underline that our price has its explanation. We demonstrate that we have hopes and plans for the future. All these facts and statements may attract new families to our center.
A rationale for creating a new brochure is the idea that people like changes and want to observe them from different perspectives. Instead of advertising in a magazine where many ads and information are usually given, this brochure is a separate piece of work that can be offered to different people at different places for free. People should spend their money to buy a new magazine and be very attentive to observe our ads. Brochures are focused on one particular center with its goals, statements, or other important information. A thirty-second radio ad is also not appropriate for our marketing strategy. People may hear but not listen. A brochure is a visual advertisement that never disappears “on-air”. Even television commercials maybe not as effective as this brochure. Not many people have enough time to watch TV. Some people just do like TV. Instead of hoping that a person can find our commercial on TV and remember all the necessary information, a brochure can be offered on the streets, and people can certainly get the necessary information.
To supplement the advertisement as a part of our marketing strategy, two additional tools can be offered. First, our center may organize several open-air meetings for all people. During such meetings, children may try their skills and be involved in different short-term learning activities. Such opportunities can help parents make their choice and understand if their children are ready to be our clients. Second, an interesting video presentation can be offered on our Facebook page. In the brochures, people can find our Facebook address. They visit the page and watch a video where our regular activities are described, the opinions of parents are gathered, and the emotions of children are recorded. The task of our strategy is to inform people and demonstrate our true intentions to cooperate with children and promote early childhood development. Learning is not an easy activity for many children, and our task is not only to make children learn but to be in love with this process. Though parents make decisions and pay for their children’s education, a child is a key goal for our center, and all these brochures, meetings, and videos are created for children to open them a door to a new world of education full of interesting and helpful activities and entertainment.
Employing Public Relations Strategies
Step One
Nowadays, it is so easy to choose an organization and develop a strong critique focusing on its weaknesses and shortages. At the same time, it does not take much time to introduce a service and prove that it is one of the best options available to people. However, our organization believes that many people are in need of true and fair posts with the help of which it is possible to read helpful and essential information and make clear conclusions. In the article by Richards (2014), the Green Hills Early Childhood Center was introduced as a failed project basing on the complaints of one family. As a representative of Green Hills, I find it necessary to respond to this critique, not in order to protect our early childhood center and prove the correctness of the chosen position, but to explain why our center is worth people’s choice and visits and what may cause such misunderstandings and negative attitudes.
Green Hills Early Childhood Center opened its doors to the citizens of Stoneriver City four years ago. Every year, new families bring their children aged from 2 to 6 years to our center and enjoy the results they observe. The peculiar feature of our center is the creation of the environment where the unique needs of every child have to be nurtured and used for the promotion of a life-long love of learning (“Green Hills Early Childhood Center: About us”, 2014). Our organization was blamed for much unstructured time for children during classes. However, can anyone imagine a child at the age of 2 or 5 constantly reading or writing something? Such a picture is hard to imagine, and even more, it is unnecessary to imagine such things. We hire certified caregivers and assistants to take of every child. We believe that play is one of the best forms for young children to get familiarized with the world around them.
The age of our clients is the period when children should enjoy their free time and admire the opportunities they have. It is necessary to remember that brain development is a formation of connections from the simplest areas to the most complicated items (Bales, 2005). At the age of 2, children have to be educated about the simplest things. As a rule, they spend about 6-8 hours at our center daily. Is it fair to provide children with two hours of free play during this period? Our experts answer “Yes”. Parents, as well as those people who want to critique the work of our center, should come along with one truth that in the business world full of competition and unexplainable boundaries and frames, many organizations forget about the worth of childhood and the importance for children to be children but not the robots who have to be properly programmed and educated for a new stage in their development.
Finally, the development and progress of one child may not provide the required picture of the whole organization. Though our goal is to focus on every child and identify their strengths and weaknesses in order to turn them into new opportunities, sometimes, personal characteristics and parental involvement can interfere with the development and lead to unpredictable outcomes. Our task is to make sure that every child is happy and has enough knowledge to join a new kindergarten program. Our results have been positive during the last four years, and the choice of people is the best evidence of our progress.
Step Two
I would like to underline that our center is the place where 60 children can enjoy the benefits of life-long learning and entertaining annually. We do not divide families and children according to their personal issues, financial aspects, race, or ethnicity. What we need is several strategies for proactive strategies in order to promote a positive image and invite new people. Child Care Aware (2016) offers information and trust as the main concepts for marketing strategies. In the modern world, the role of the Internet is crucial. Millions of people use their Facebook pages daily and visit different sites to find new interesting information. Social media influences the way how people communicate and interact (Mahoney, 2010). It does not cost a lot for our center to create an official Facebook page and invite all our clients to communicate. We can create questionnaires to gather the opinions of different people. We may receive messages with questions and give answers. We can share photos from our programs and courses to provide parents with guarantees that their children receive the required portion of attention and training.
Many organizations and centers have already got certain benefits focusing their strategies on information and clients’ support. Trust and loyalty of parents is what we should strive for in our marketing campaigns (Kluskiewicz, 2010). We have nothing to hide from our parents, and we are ready to offer photos online as the best evidence. Another strategy includes the creation of new brochures. The only requirement that should be followed is not to leave our zones of comfort where we know what to do (Kalifeh, 2011). If parents do not have time to visit the web or read a paper, they are welcome to use our brochures and read quickly what they and their children can get with our center. Bright images, brief facts, and interesting details attract the attention of many people.
Enlarging a Network
As soon as the decision to open the Green Hills Early Childhood Center in Jacksonville, Florida is made, it is necessary to investigate what local, state, or national agencies can be helpful for the center in its intentions to cooperate with parents and contribute to the healthy development and learning of children. To begin with, it is better to focus on the local organizations that are available for cooperation and may lead to certain improvements in the work of our center. Despite the nature of the company chosen and the level of its involvement in the work of the center, every partnership has to be respected and appreciated. In addition, to become better, local partnerships may be used to improve the quality of care offered to children and offer new services and options for different families.
One of the possible companies to cooperate with may become some social service office where people come to solve their personal and professional problems and organize their lives. In Jacksonville, there are many social services with a number of social workers who are eager to help. The choice of our company is Social Care Services that is located right in Jacksonville. Enough important information about this organization may be found on its official website. This organization aims at helping people understand their strengths and opportunities and build their lives in a proper way.
Sometimes, people are not able to reach their full potential because of a lack of motivation or knowledge. This social service helps to overcome all personal challenges and doubts and inspire people despite their age, race, gender, or the level of income. Cooperation with Social Care Services is a unique opportunity for the Green Hills Early Childhood Center to learn more about the local community and the needs of the population. Family problems have a considerable impact on children. Therefore, our center should be aware of what local people may be afraid of, how they cope with challenges, and what expectations they are ready to develop. The healthy development of children depends on the social wellbeing and readiness of parents to cooperate with outside sources in order to solve their concerns and get the answers to all their questions.
Another organization that may be used as a partner for the Green Hills Early Childhood Center is Jacksonville Kids Coalition. It was founded in 2001. Spontaneous intentions of its leaders to create a helpful non-profit organization for children resulted in one of the best campaigns that may be offered to local children and their families. Many interesting facts and history of the company may be read on its site. Though people can never say that they neglect children’s needs or stay indifferent to their needs, not all of them are ready to take the steps and offer effective help. Jacksonville Kids Coalition is one of the most successful examples of how local agents should work with children and provide them with the best services and opportunities. Our partnership with such an organization is a chance that should be used to understand what local children may be in need of, what funds and financial sources can be found to contribute children’s health and physical development, and what are the places where local children may be supported anytime.
The best rationale that can be given to support the partnership between the Green Hills Early Childhood Center and Jacksonville Kids Coalition or Social Care Services, as the representatives of the local agencies, is based on the development of communication with families and the promotion of learning and knowledge. Our goal is the establishment of trustful relationships with families and their children. We can achieve this goal only in case we have enough information about the population and can demonstrate our background knowledge and awareness of their needs, expectations, and demands. These two local organizations are chosen due to their tight connection to families of Jacksonville. They may share their knowledge and the results of their cooperation with different families. Our center can use this information and think about new improvements and options that can be available to children.
Our team of professional caregivers and teachers has a solid background in learning activities and techniques. They know how to help children and develop their skills in math, thinking, and evaluating the world around. We also know how to promote love for learning and never confuse professional qualities with personal demands. Our partnership should help us learn what families and children may allow and cannot reach. Their social support and financial needs can hardly be recognized by an ordinary childcare center. Therefore, we have to address the organizations that know more about people and know how to cooperate and support. Out professional learning and the chosen organizations’ publicity create a number of opportunities and options for the improvements in early childhood education. We have to respect our partners and learn from them how to work with local people. Effective marketing campaigns, the establishment of goals and missions, and excellent communication skills are the first steps in our growth in Jacksonville.
References
Bales, D.W. (2005). Sharing the message about early brain development: Georgia’s better brains for babies collaboration. The Forum for Family and Consumer Issues, 10(2). Web.
Chien, N., Blasberg, A., Daneri, P., Halle, T., King, C., Zaslow, M., … Dwyer, K. (2013). Conceptualizing and measuring collaboration in the context of early childhood care and education. Web.
Child Care Aware. (2015). Marketing your program: Preparing a marketing plan. Web.
Children’s Bureau, Administration for Children and Families, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. (n.d.). Child welfare information gateway. Web.
Freeman, N. K., Decker, C. A., & Decker, J. R. (2013). Planning and administering early childhood programs (10th ed.). Boston, MA: Prentice Hall.
Green Hills Early Childhood Center: About us.(2014). Web.
Hearron, P. F., & Hildebrand, V. (2010). Management of child development centers (7th ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson.
Kalifeh, P. (2011). Marketing: No longer an afterthought. Exchange. Web.
Kluskiewicz, D. (2010). Marketing an early childhood program to urban families. Web.
Mahoney, M. (2010). Harnessing the power of social media to build your business.Exchange. Web.
Richards, L. (2014). Green hills: Stoneriver’s most expensive babysitting service? The Stoneriver Gazette, 22(4), 1.