About the business
Child’s Play ELC is a family-owned childcare facility that offers nurturing care and playful learning spaces for children aged 6 weeks to 6 years old. The business stands out because it focuses on the unique needs of each child within a safe and welcoming environment. Its motto, ‘Every Child Matters,’ emphasises its commitment to supporting and caring for all children.
The challenge
- Owners Sam and Ian Johnson had a vision of expanding their business into additional locations. They needed to achieve enrolment growth, staff growth, and the ability to streamline their marketing and sales processes so that they could focus on caring for children. To achieve this, we needed to create a cohesive and aggressive marketing strategy to ensure that the centres were filled within three months of opening.
- We also needed to create a way to ensure their staff were focused on caring for children without being bogged down by administrative tasks, like managing increased inquiries and applications, overseeing waitlists, booking tours, and managing enrollments.
- Ian and Sam knew that smoothly transitioning families to the Child’s Play community was imperative. So, Child’s Play needed an effective way to attract potential families to its childcare services, build relationships, and address the concerns of young families.
- The team also decided to rebrand Child’s Play ELC to better resonate with their audience and reflect the brand’s playful, nurturing, and inclusive personality. They sought additional design elements versatile enough for signage, email marketing, social media, website design, printed brochures, business cards, welcome packs, uniforms and banners.
Pixeld’s solution
Digital Marketing Strategy and Plan
To achieve the ambitious growth goals (we love an aggressive growth target), we developed and implemented a comprehensive inbound marketing strategy. The strategy prioritises a deep understanding of the Child’s Play target audiences’ needs and concerns throughout their search for a childcare centre. First, we developed targeted content tailored for each stage of the customer’s journey so that we could guide families with insightful and helpful content.
Next, we identified the most relevant digital channels to share this content. This process involved understanding where the target audience spends their time online, what information they seek at each stage, and their preferred content formats. By setting clear KPIs, we ensure a cohesive and measurable approach. Ultimately, this strategic content plan empowers us to efficiently attract and engage potential families, driving enrollment and supporting our overall growth objectives.
The implementation
- The implementation process began with us creating Child’s Play a user-friendly website that showcased each centre’s unique features and benefits. We then implemented search engine optimisation (SEO) to improve the website’s visibility for relevant search queries.
- We established engaging Facebook and Instagram pages that feature daily activities, staff profiles, and testimonials from satisfied parents.
- We conducted a Google Business Profile Audit and optimised each centre’s profile. We regularly post on each profile and encourage and respond to client reviews.
- To amplify the content strategy and reach a wider audience, we leveraged targeted online paid advertising across key platforms. Google Ads was used to capture parents actively searching for childcare services. By utilising relevant keywords, we ensured their ads appeared when parents were actively looking for information. Facebook Ads, on the other hand, allowed us to target a broader audience based on demographics, interests, and even potential needs gleaned from user behaviour. This enabled us to reach parents who might not be actively searching, but who may be receptive to our message based on their online activity and interests.
- As part of the content marketing strategy, blog posts, brochures, and videos addressing common childcare concerns and highlighting Child’s Play’s unique approach to play-based learning were developed to attract the right audience.
Sales and onboarding process
- As a Hubspot partner, Pixeld was able to provide an automated solution for managing and nurturing leads and achieving aggressive growth targets.
- Lead capture was streamlined by implementing a user-friendly online form on the website for potential families to easily start their journey with Child’s Play.
- Nurturing email sequences for potential families were developed using workflows in HubSpot. These campaigns were created to engage with leads after initial contact, allowing them to progress through the enrolment process in their own time.
- We were then tasked to simplify and streamline the application and enrollment processes to minimise barriers and ensure a positive experience for families seeking to enrol. We ensured that families could easily book a tour via Hubspot’s online meeting tool. Each potential family is guided along the steps of the enrolment process and receives friendly reminders at each point.
- Staff are automatically notified of any new leads, upcoming tours, tour cancellations, bookings, and enrollments, ensuring everyone is up to speed on their tasks for the day.
- Using HubSpot, relevant information is collected via web forms and application forms, giving staff easy access to contact details throughout the enquiry and enrollment process. This facilitated personalised interactions with potential families.
- New staff are trained on how to use HubSpot to monitor enrolments. The Pixeld team have created personalised training videos and conducted regular HubSpot workshops for the Child’s Play Staff.
Child’s Play then embarked on the Pixeld Branding process. We started with a brand discovery session, where we uncovered Child’s Play’s brand DNA and archetype. From there, we were able to create a tone of voice and a set of supporting design elements. The final step was rolling out branded assets including business cards, uniforms, digital creatives, website content, brochures, newsletter templates, centre signage, and banners for events and fences.
Branding Assessment – Child’s Play’s primary archetype is ‘The Caregiver’, followed by their secondary archetype ‘The Citizen’. This insight empowered us to tailor Child’s Play’s branding strategy, ensuring it aligned seamlessly with their identity and appealed to their target audience.
Results
- Increased brand awareness – Pixeld’s targeted marketing efforts led to a significant increase in website traffic and social media engagement.
- Lead generation growth – The well-placed online presence and lead capture forms substantially increased potential families expressing interest. The leads were easy for Child’s Play to handle as it was an automated process using workflows in Hubspot.
- Improved lead nurturing – Engaging email campaigns developed deeper connections with leads and addressed their concerns in a staged approach, leading to warmer interactions with the Child’s Play staff.
- Enhanced enrollment conversion – By streamlining the process and training staff, the enrollment rate at Child’s Play improved significantly. Through a targeted approach, we were able to fully book the centres and automate a waiting list process for those who didn’t get a place.
Conclusion
Through Pixeld’s comprehensive digital marketing and strategy implementation, Child’s Play was able to successfully navigate their rapid growth, and is still growing steadily today. Coupled with our Marketing expertise, their team’s strong vision, drive for growth, and dedication to caring for children in a personalised way is a winning formula. As a team, we have effectively generated leads, nurtured their relationships, and converted them into enrollments, leading to the expansion of their childcare centres and a positive impact on the local community. In fact, when Child’s Play started with us they had 2 centres – we’re proud to note that they now have 5. All of these efforts have empowered them to live and breathe their philosophy of ‘every child matters’ across the entirety of their business.