Your website is among the first places a prospective family visits when researching your school. Your website—and especially the home page—is your first chance to make a good impression. It should immediately communicate your mission, your vision for your students, and your place in the community.
Consider your website as it stands today. Is it doing all it can to showcase your school and the quality of your graduates? If you’re not sure, these small tweaks may come in handy for future updates and revisions.
- Communicate your value proposition effectively. You offer a unique value to the families that choose to send their children to your school. Is that reflected across all website pages? Is it compelling enough to encourage visitors to stay and visit multiple pages throughout your site? If it’s on your home page, that’s a start. But it should also be included when discussing admission, academics, athletics, cocurriculars, and your faculty and staff.
- Include calls to action. What do you want your website visitors to do? Chances are, a primary goal is to get them to request information about enrolling a student. How do they do that? Fill out a form? Send an email? Call your office? Whatever your call to action (CTA) is, make it easy and clear for visitors to do it. And don’t include it in just one place—ensure your CTAs are placed appropriately throughout your website.
- Create a robust "About" page. After your home page, many visitors will click over to your "About" page. This is your chance to shine. Include attendee and graduation statistics, content that can be easily scanned for quick understanding, visuals, and anything else that can capture and keep attention.
- Keep your website lively. Once you’ve created your website, you’re finished, right? No. Keep things dynamic by changing the content often. Include photos from the latest sports game or newest theater production. Highlight improvements and updates, shine the spotlight on recent achievements, and point to upcoming events and deadlines. If your website information is outdated or static, you risk visitors losing interest in what you have to say.
- Include community voices. What better way to illustrate your mission in action than by showing it? Include your students, families, faculty, and staff in your website. Whether it’s through written testimonials, video interviews, or photos of your school in action, let their voices highlight what you offer to the community.
Parents and families visit many different school websites when deciding where to send their children. Make it easy for them to see how their child would fit into your community and be served by your school's mission.
Additional ISM Resources:
The Source for Advancement Vol. 16 No. 1 5 Ways to Spice Up Your School Newsletter
The Source for Advancement Vol. 14 No. 7 Purposeful Social Media Plans
Additional ISM resources for Gold Consortium members:
I&P Vol. 40 No. 9 Marketing Communications and the Parent
I&P Vol. 31 No. 6 Your Parent Education Plan: Predictability and Support
