There are many childcare centres out there, and it can be difficult to know what to do to ensure that yours stands head and shoulders above the rest.
The main thing that parents are seeking in a childcare centre is a place they feel confident leaving their little ones, so making sure to foster a safe and clean environment should always be your number one priority.
But beyond that, how do you truly differentiate your business? Read on for 6 tips to make your childcare centre stand out.
1. Offer Extracurricular Activities
Extracurricular activities such as sports or foreign language lessons are important to a child’s development in terms of mental stimulation, social interaction, and/or physical activity.
While most parents will be looking to enrol their children in activities of this sort, it can be a challenge to fit them into everyone’s busy schedule and sometimes limited budget. Offering various extracurricular activities will therefore be a huge bonus for parents considering your centre.
2. Invest in Staff Engagement
A high staff turnover at daycare centres can make parents nervous, which means you should do your best to hang onto your staff for as long as possible. This means driving up staff engagement — and there are myriad ways to achieve this.
For example, invest in training and personal development plans. Create a social budget for team bonding activities. Give honest feedback, and give praise where it is deserved. Ultimately, do whatever it takes to ensure that your childcare centre is a pleasant place to work.
3. Develop a Consistent Code of Conduct
When it comes to working with children, consistency and fairness is key. Parents need to know what to expect from you, and they need to know that each child is being treated the same way.
Develop a code of conduct and share it with all parents before their child starts at the childcare centre, while emphasising that both the childcare centre and the parents must stick to the agreed rules. This should cover everything from hours of operation and discipline to feeding, vaccines, and what happens in case of emergency.
4. Hold Events
Host events to make parents feel like they’re part of the community at the childcare centre. This could mean small events at pick-up time, where parents are invited to relax for a while and see what their kids have been up to over the past few weeks.
It could also mean bigger community events like barbecues, fairs, or an open house, where prospective parents are invited to get to know you and your staff. If you opt for this route, ensure that you have plenty of business materials prepared to hand out.
5. Over-Communicate
While people would usually prefer not to be bombarded with communication, parents would generally rather receive too much information rather than too little when it comes to the safety and happiness of their little ones,
With this in mind, make sure they know that they can reach your team at any point while their child is at the centre, and send regular email updates that don’t require a response from busy parents.
6. Implement Childcare Software
Software can be a huge asset when it comes to running your childcare business as it can help streamline and improve your overall operations.
In particular, implementing software with a dedicated parent portal will be a major draw for parents — anything you can do to make their lives a little easier is a huge plus. A parent portal will allow parents to complete tasks such as bookings and payments right on their mobile phones, saving everyone precious time.
For more information on the benefits of implementing childcare software, please contact our team.
