Friday, May 25, 2012

Marketing Tools

New Marketing Tools Available from First Children's Finance

By Tom Copeland. Published with permission.
6a0133f3fc5805970b0168e945c31d970c-200wiWhy should parents bring their child to your family child care program?
Your ability to answer this question will determine in large part how successful you will be. Maybe you run a high quality program, but unless parents know about you, you may struggle to succeed.
First Children's Finance, a non-profit agency in Minneapolis, Minnesota has posted a number of marketing tools on its website that you can download to help you promote your program. They include:
* Promoting the Benefits of Your Child Care Program: a worksheet to help you identify the benefits of your program.
* Marketing Assessment Checklist: a checklist that identifies over 30 marketing tactics to help direct your marketing efforts.
* Who Are My Toughest Competitors?: a worksheet to help you compare your program.
The First Children's Finance website also contains a number of additional marketing resources. Their Business Resource Center for Family Providers offers tools and resources on Recordkeeping and Taxes, Contracts & Policies, Legal & Insurance, Money Management, and How to Start. I wrote a number of these tools and resources.

FCF is a non-profit organization providing financial and business-development assistance to high-quality child care businesses (homes and centers) sering low-and moderate-income families. They offer low-interest child care loans and business consulting services in Minnesota, Iowa, Michigan, and North and South Dakota. For further information about their loan program, call 612-279-6515.
For many years I served on the board of FCF.
Image credit: www.firstchildrensfinance.org
Marketing GuideFor more information about marketing, see my book Family Child Care Marketing Guide.

www.tomcopelandblog.com