Planning Purposeful & Productive School Events - Part Three
This article is the third in a series on planning purposeful and productive events. If you haven’t read the Part One and Part Two, I suggest starting there first!
In Part One, we worked together to form a small events committee, listed and categorized your school’s events for the year, estimated your team’s investment into these events, and then outlined the results of each event in past years.
In Part Two, we played “Keep, Axe, and Add” to create a purposeful ministry events calendar that aligned with your school’s yearly priority.
In this third and final installment, we’ll tackle the three biggest reasons that school events aren’t productive….or flop all together…so that your team can avoid these common pitfalls. It’s all about the BEFORE, DURING, and the AFTER.
It’s all about the BEFORE, DURING, and the AFTER.
Pitfall 1: Not Enough Marketing BEFORE the Event
School events take a TON of work to execute, so it’s incredibly frustrating when people don’t show up for them. The number one reason I see attendance lagging at events is because of a lack of marketing:
An overestimation of how much marketing you’re doing. To get people’s attention these days, schools MUST be consistent with their marketing because they are competing with every other event, message, email, and advertisement on social media, in the mail, online, or in people’s inboxes. Many schools do not advertise their events nearly enough, especially those to the community (a sign out front is usually not enough!).
Too late to the game. While planning and executing is critical for hosting an event, often the advertising of the event is overlooked or done too late. Most events should be advertised at least a month in advance. Summer events should be advertised even earlier, as parents often make summer plans in the spring.
Pitfall 2: Not Enough Intention DURING the Event
This pitfall is focused on outreach events, events where your ministry is hoping to build awareness and engagement with prospective families in your community. After an event like this, school’s often have no idea how many prospective families actually attended the events, if they enjoyed the event or have interest in your school, and if so, how to connect with them again.
No check-in process. A check-in process is the easiest way to make sure you connect with every family at an event, whether they are part of your school family or a prospect family. This can easily be solved by have a sign-in table to welcome families, have them sign waivers or register for the event, ask them how they heard about the event, and then give them a takeaway from the event (something branded or informational). Also, consider having your admissions personnel, pastor, and/or principal at this welcome table.
No invite to “the next thing.” Right at the registration table, have signage that invites families to the next event, Mommy & Me session, sermon series, or activity. It’s never too early to start marketing for the next thing and reinforces the idea that your school wants to engage with your community in an ongoing way.
Pitfall 3: Not Enough Evaluation AFTER the Event
Once the event is done, it’s clean-up, a sigh of relief, and on to the next thing, right? As tempting as this may be, the event isn’t over when it’s over! All too often, schools move on without evaluation and follow-up.
No follow-up. Remember those waivers and registration slips at the check-in table? Make sure to enter them into an email system! Utilize a CRM system that allows you to build an email list with the information you receive from prospects. Aim to send a follow-up email after every event that thanks them for attending, as well as invites them to the next event/to schedule a tour. Use this email list to invite prospects to the next event, program, church service/Bible study, or activity. Email the list once a month with a little info about the school and an invite to schedule a tour.
No evaluation. Don’t forget to sit down as a team and evaluate how the event went. What could you do better next time? What would make it easier? Was it worth the resources to have it again? Record your notes for planning next year’s event calendar!
Exercise 3: BEFORE, DURING, & AFTER
Now that you have your events calendar (see Part Two of the installment), sit down as an events team and make the following plans for each event on the list:
BEFORE - when do you need to start marketing the event? What will you do to ensure the event is advertised enough?
DURING - how will attendees be welcomed and how will your team gather information for follow-up?
AFTER - does your team have a system for follow-up? who will be in charge of ongoing follow-up? how can you ensure that evaluation happens and is recorded for future planning?
I hope you’ve enjoyed this series on planning purposeful and productive school events. If you’re looking for more helpful marketing articles, check out the Blueprint Schools Marketing Round-up.
Blueprint Schools loves helping schools reach more families in their communities. If you feel stuck or need advice about your marketing and admissions, we’ll listen to your unique situation, answer your questions, and share how we can help your school thrive.
Take the first step by scheduling a Zoom consultation with us.
