Boost Enrollment Fast: Expert Marketing Strategies for Arts Program

So I have been with todayspring for four years now, and I am the arts division director. So I manage all of our arts programming and our season of events. We have nine major productions that we do every year. Some of those are rehearsed within class, some of those outside. Some of them are summer camps and intensives. Lots of arts programming is what I do.

Yeah.

That's great.

And so do you have an arts background yourself?

I do, yeah. If you can't tell from behind me, I majored in dance in college, and so I danced when I was growing up.

Okay, wonderful. Okay. So do we have everybody now? We do, yes. Okay, great. So this is just a kind of a strategy call, and I did read through the document you sent, so thanks for taking some time to do that. And I did know a lot of this from when you came and presented at our Mastermind, which thank you again for doing that. That was absolutely wonderful. So I guess I want to learn how you guys would like to utilize our time together for the maximum benefit to you. I've put some things together that I'm going to send to you when we're done, but while we're in person, we're going to talk. How can I help you? Most in the next question, 45 minutes or so.

So I know one of the things that we've been talking about is we have roughly a month, from month to a month and a half before classes start in the fall. And so what are the maximum impact things that we can do right now to boost enrollment in the fall?

Okay.

Both in the academy and in the arts.

So what's your enrollment deadline then, Caitlin.

You want to take that?

Yeah.

For arts, it is open. It's rolling. Depending on the class. I would say that most of our classes, it's best to be enrolled by the end of October, but we have a general arts, like fine arts or a visual arts class that kind of has more open enrollment throughout the year. Whereas a musical theater class, once they start working on their show or have auditions, then they're moving on from there, similar to a music class, once they've gone, you know, so far into their curriculum, there is. It keeps building on itself, so it can't. So I would say the end of October is like a good deadline for them.

Okay. And Arianne, then you said you have a month. So that's for the academy itself then. Is that what you're referencing?

Yeah, we start our parent workshops as well as our orientation and all of that about the middle of August. So it's really good to have our enrollment for the academy sets before we get to the end of August.

Okay. Okay. So the fact that you want to talk about maximum of impact in 30 days changes everything that I was going to share with you. Because if you got, if you've got 30 days, then ads is the way to go. I think ads as part of a long term strategy is a good, good thing. I do not typically recommend a lot of ads as like a heavy part of your budget normally because ideally what we really want to do is grow organically and we want to get the word out more often than you think. So I was looking at your cadence on like your newsletter, once a month, things like that. So just at a super high level, that should be a minimum of once a week. But you're communicating with your audience and your social media post cadence should be at least five days a week, if not seven, if not multiple times per day. So like building things like that with a strategy around growing your audience and then bringing in the different audiences that you have. And you do have several different audiences that you're trying to reach, including corporate sponsors, people for the academy, people for your programs that aren't part of the academy. There's like a whole diverse thing. But if you have a 30 day window to get people in the door for the academy and enrollment up, then my immediate recommendation is because it's so short, ads are the way to go. The thing is though, ads are only as effective as where you send them. With the power of the calls to action and the value and benefit that's there for them to see, and they need to see it quickly. That would include in my mind some work on your website. I'm not saying a redesign at all. I'm just saying some work on the messaging on the homepage. So let's just say ads in the first 30 days is going to be what you need. But if you don't mind, I'm just going to share my screen and just walk through a couple things on your website that I think will help the conversions. Is that okay with you guys?

Yes.

Okay, so I have a very wide monitor. So that's why your website's going to look a little funny because you've got this screen all the way across and on most monitors this is going to look a little more normal. But besides that, everything up here is all about day spring. So it's DaySpring, arts and education. Welcome to DaySpring. Now, in the 30th year, that's all fine and dandy. You're featured on HCC TV. That's great. The thing is, is that nothing up here really calls me to action or speaks to me about an academy or after school programs or weekend programs or cancer productions or things like that. When I think about a website, it has to pass the caveman test. And up above the fold, which is where most people immediately make a judgment, is this for me or is this not for me? And they rarely go any further than that if it's not for them. If they make the judgment they, it could very well be for them. They just don't know it. And so they leave. Now, I'm speaking off the cuff without actually seeing your analytics. So if we work together, I would want to deep dive into your analytics. But based on my 25 years of doing this, this holds true in almost all cases. Above the fold, you really need to speak to what it is that you solve, the problem you solve for your audience and then what steps they need to take to get involved. And that is really it. All the rest of the stuff, the credibility, your longevity, everything goes below and then up here in your upper right, it's okay, you've got support dayspring, but at this point, I don't even really know what day spring is or why I'd want to support it. To me, the call to action up here should be a little bit different. And even this slide, I love the slide and I think the slide could be really effective paired with a change in messaging. And I, I'm going to send you this document when you're, when we're done. But I put together some things here. These, you guys could play with these because school better than I do at this point. But I hate the scrolling thing. Something like unlock your child's full potential through creative excellence. See, that's even a little bit unclear to me because creative excellent means a lot of different things. Empower your child with unique blend of arts and academics. That sounds very key to what you guys do. Nurture and passive. Transform your child's education with artistic and academic excellence. Do you see how that single statement ahead right here, that is what you guys do and then underneath it. So that's big and bold right up front. Yes, I need to do that with my child. And then underneath it, it's a sub thing. So at DaySpring, we blend rigorous academic programs with exceptional arts training, nurturing students to become confident, creative and compassionate leaders. So a combination of those two things right above the fold can make all the difference in the messaging on the website. And then just a big button, how to enroll your child or get your child involved, something like that. And then you take them to the page that has. In this instance, like if you're running ads, I would actually take them to the Academy page. And you can change that button even seasonally. So if you're doing something different for the summer and because you're going to get, generally speaking, as soon as they come to the page, however they get there, billboard radio ad, Internet ad, Facebook ad, Instagram ad, Google Ad, whatever, they're going to see that and then go to the Academy. And I would. Even in your 30 day window, I put enrollment closes if you've got 30 days. So I'm going to say the end of July, so there's no time to waste. Spots are limited, really strong sense of urgency. And then I take them to the Academy page. And from the Academy page I would make it super simple. There's a lot here people don't read. So I would. There's people who want to research and go into all of that detail, but first you want to give them the value and then push that stuff down. This is all good stuff. It's just not what needs to go above the fold. Like what are the promises of the Academy? So I like this, this language is good. But I think you need to say something like, enrolling in the Academy at dayspring transforms a child's life with more collaboration, creativity, critical thinking and communication than they get in any other public or private school setting. So you're comparing against. Because people are having to choose between you and another setting for the Academy. So you just make the clear difference. And then from there, here's what we do and you make it big and bold, not lost in a paragraph. So pull out the main drivers of what you guys do and then a call to action to enroll. And then there will be people like, this is exactly what I need. And they'll click through and you're not going to have them necessarily enroll online, but it's just a short form where then they can get on the phone or start engaging in an email conversation with whoever it is at your organization that is really good at closing the enrollments. And then the people who want to research beyond that, they will. All this stuff is fine to have on there, but people are busy and you want to make it easy, so you want to drive the value first, make it all around them. And the people who will research are going to research anyway. Just push it down a little bit. Does that make sense? I've got you guys all over here so you don't need to look away. Yes, it does. Yeah. So I would do that first. Do that first on your website before you start running any ads and make the form that you send them to, I even maybe put it on the same page. Don't make them click through again. When they click through an ad they come to the landing page, the homepage that has the language above the fold. Then they click to learn. Don't say learn more. That's passive. Use it. We'll use different call to action. Get into the Academy page and then have that super powerful statement above the fold and then a form, get more information about the Academy and again put that timeline in there. We close registration at the end of July. Limited spots available. Don't wait. Don't let your child miss out. And then that will drive leads. So that is the short term strategy. And then you, once you have that set on your website where it's super easy, super simple, have some people test it, you can send it to me, I'll be happy to test it. I'll be happy to help you make the changes because I'm not sure what level you want me to be involved but this is just advice for you guys to do. Then do your ads because if you run ads now and you send them to what you have, they're going to be a lot less effective. 30 days is still a really short time. You won't have much success in 30 days with what you have right now regardless of what ads you run. It's just too much. And you're talking about people's kids and having to make a decision about your kids and their future and their education. And so this is very different than a long term strategy that I would recommend. But since you said 30 days is how I can help you most on our call, this is what I Recommend for your 30 day window. So let's stop there and I'm going to stop sharing my screen for a second and let's just talk about that and what your thoughts are around that.

Hi Sandy. I was going to. Lisa, go ahead.

We were probably on the same wavelength because I was going to just mention to Sandy that Dan and I had talked earlier and we probably prioritize the website. We said we really need to get our website in order. So that way when we start marketing we're going to be sending our people to a really top notch website. It was really nice. It was validating to hear you say that.

Yeah. And it's not that the Website isn't nice. I mean, there's a difference between a nice website, nice looking, full of information, and a website that actually converts and drives community and drives inquiries. They're two very different things. The websites that drive and convert, and it seems counterintuitive, are usually a little less attractive than the ones that highly convert that just look like yours right now. It's just that people don't take the time to read that much and especially now phones, and they're just. It's fast and if you don't draw them in fast, you lose them.

Sandy, I have just a question that I wanted to ask was with the. Our location and stuff like that, because we feel like that's another other kind of positive thing about our. Our school is that we're located. That's not something that you would put in. I don't know where you would put that on a website that, you know, hey, we're conveniently located. Or is that like a. That's not the first thing people are looking for, but it's something that would reassure them. Like not only are. Is do we have this to offer. We're very conveniently located. Is that something that we should put in there or not?

It is, but I wouldn't put it in that big statement above because that's really not the first thing they're thinking. Then what you do is once you get them in, then you start educating them around that stuff through a funnel, an email funnel essentially, and even a text message funnel. So you can bring that point in and you can even put it as a secondary point on your website, just down a little under the primary messaging. Oh, if this sounds interesting to you, you're going to love this. We're even centrally located. So it doesn't get much better than that because the centrally located thing isn't going to be the primary driver. It's going to be, I really want my kid involved in the arts. Really tired of public schools that don't prioritize the arts or actually don't even have the arts anymore to some places. And it's. And beyond that, then the other messaging is the tangible benefits of the having kids involved in the arts, which most of them won't go on to be professional performers, but all of them will walk out with more confidence, better communication skills, all the things that you need to succeed in life on a daily basis that you just don't get through other mediums.

No, that's good.

Yeah. And this is just coming from someone who was in the arts.

We're glad you're in the arts. We're in the arts. That's perfect for us.

Yeah.

There's the other small part. And Alicia, if you want to chime in, it's just the uniqueness of the academy and that our three day. It's three days. Is that something that we put also, like on the second secondary, below the fold kind of thing is that once they get. We've captured them, then you tell them, like you said, all the positives, one of location, one of them were three days a week and that kind of thing. Or because our audience might be more homeschool based, do we take the approach from what a homeschooler would say and look at it?

Yeah, that's part of the education too, because you have a lot of messages. So I. The biggest one is what you do and why it's important. The problem you solve essentially for these kids. And sometimes you have to agitate the problem too. So you. It's essentially called like a dominant message throughout the page. You pick something. Let me just show you an example. Totally different. I'm going to share my screen again and I'm just going to show you my website. So there is a very dominant message on my website. Leads. Your website should get you leads. Lots of them. How's your website doing? Leads. My actual inbox. How do you get more leads? If you. It is very clear when you come to this website that if you want more leads, I'm the person you need to talk to. There's no mixed messages. And then there's education down here for credibility. So all the credibility stuff is down here, but it's all leads, leads, leads, leads, leads. Books, book, book. Get a quote. So you want to have a very dominant message. And then the education piece comes after that. So they want to see themselves, if they want their child involved in a great arts and academic program that gives them confidence, better communication skills, much more socialization, positive environment, all that stuff. That's the what. And then there's the how, the where, the when. That's when you dive deeper. But they have to see the what first. And once they understand the what, they're like, yeah, I want that. Then you go into all the rest of it. That's just from a marketing perspective. But if you put too much in your initial, like the main predominant message, you lose them because they get confused. Their brain, it's just all over the place. So it's. You just have to drive that home. What you do, why it's important. And the people that resonate with that message. They're going to find the what or the when and the where go probably what how is next how you do it and then the where and the when.

So one of the things that we had a question about Sandy is that we've had an issue in the past kind of consolidating the what, why, where and how since we have the academy and also the arts division. And so finding one message that works for both divisions has been really difficult. Do you have any advice on how.

We can unify.

The messaging?

So I don't think the message is different on the what because it's the academy and it's the. The two divisions are the how, the what is the same. And then you have multiple hows. Maybe you don't want to go to the academy, maybe you just want to get in this program. But the message is the same for both audiences what you do. And it's just do you want to do it in a full time academic environment or do you want to stick with your current academic environment and add this in to your schedule? Those are really the two options, right?

Yeah.

And it's as simple as that. And you maybe even make it as simple as that. The language on your website. So this message resonates with you. There's two ways to go. One, do you want to immerse your child in academics and arts full time or do you want to add arts on to their current academic setting? It's just so you just make it super simple the way the parent will get. Because they don't really understand when you talk unless you've explained it. They don't understand academy versus you guys understand it. The academy's full time school at your place. And the other one is an add on to their current academic setting.

It took us what we've been in existence 30 years. I've not heard that. That's pretty good.

That's really what it is. And so then what they'll do is so that at the top of the page it's that what then the two options, how don't call it your names, tell, you know, choose the path and then take them to the page on the path they choose. And then here's what that looks like.

So one other quick question with the website, then everything else, like our brochures and everything el should mimic the website and it should, if we did, if we do handout brochures, they should be almost the exact same thing, correct?

Yeah. The information is less like it's harder to chunk it and direct People. But I would say yes, let's just say you had a trifold brochure. The COVID should have that predominant message. And then we open it up, it should ask one of two questions, maybe on the inside. So when the trifold's wide open, maybe you go all the way across the trifold. Here's the full time academic setting, here's the other option. And then the huge call to action to go to the website or get a QR code in there so they can scan it and go to the website right on their phone and maybe even get two QR codes. One that takes them to the landing page for the Academy and one that takes them to the landing page for the other programs.

Yeah.

So they can just go right there and they don't have to navigate on their phone. And then one other thing that you might think about now, when you take them to those landing pages, make sure that those landing pages are set up like your homepage at the top. Big message about this. It's the same structure, just a different page so that they don't get lost in the minutia again. But always direct them. Don't feel like you have to take them to your homepage. And same with your ads, by the way, if you're doing your 30 day intensive on your ads, maybe even set up that Academy page so that, that's where directly where you send them so they don't even have to click through. And then there's the interest form right on the Academy page. And it doesn't require too much information. Name, email, phone, age of your kid and that's it makes sense.

I like this. Anybody else have any other questions for us?

I do.

So if, if.

I'm sorry, Caitlyn, did you want to chime in?

You can go ahead.

Wait.

If we had $5,000 that we could put toward marketing today, and this isn't even necessarily like a, in the next 30 days, but if we were to invest in our marketing and we had $5,000 to do that, where would you advise us to put that money to make the biggest, basically to get the biggest payoff for our investment.

So let's define payoff. What does payoff mean to you if it's not enrollment in your Academy in the next 30 days?

Right.

Honestly, it would be. That's what it would be.

Yeah. If it's, if the payoff is 30 days in enrollment in your Academy for this year, then I would say whatever your internal investment is in time, or to fix your website. And then I would put the remaining budget toward ads for 30 days. And I, trust me, it kills me to say that because I really hate ads. They are essential in times of crisis like 30 day windows. Though there's nothing you're going to do on your website in the next week that's alone that's going to help your enrollment in 30 days. Now that said, investing in your website now and changing your strategies now will help your enrollment for next year. The only thing that will help your enrollment for this year in 30 days is ads. Yeah, yeah.

So we should. So ads. When you say that ads, it's. Are you thinking radio ads or simple like radio ads based on the nature.

Of what you guys do? There are, I think radio stations. Don't they have have to dedicate some budget or airtime to not for profits?

Yes. Yeah.

If you can get that, do it.

Yeah, yeah.

Reach out to them, but fix your website first. Reach out to them because it'll take them time to produce the ad. But make sure that you're driving them to the website that's fixed and prepared. And then I would say Facebook, Instagram. I don't think that most people are going to be on Google searching for places to put their children at this point for this school year. I think they're going to have to be, it's going to be, have to be like interruption marketing. I think Google Ads are a decent way to go, but that would be over the long term because people, they're not going to make a decision like this now like searching for it. I don't think that I could be wrong, but I don't. I, I just doesn't seem like people would because they're already planning for the school year to start. So I would say interruption marketing which is display ads in your face on social channels. So I would just do that. I would target it. You mentioned 20 miles circumference or radius from your location. So I would definitely do that. And I don't know how skilled you are at targeting on those ads, but you can get it down pretty good. What most people do is they make the mistake of over targeting. Don't specify interest in the arts and things like that because what those pro. When they look when Facebook and Instagram is doing that matching, you're looking at the parent demographic that like their parent profile and what they're looking at which can mean a thousand different things. And then you are closing the door on other parents who aren't necessarily looking at that stuff but actually have interest in their children being in the arts. When you target it, just do the radius and do parents because you want them to have kids and that's about it. Maybe income level because of the investment required, but don't target interests.

What is your feeling about mailers? Is that something you did was that they're great? Really?

They're great because back in the day, we used to get junk mail. Remember, like, our mailboxes were flooded. Now people don't do that anymore. So you really stand out when you send it.

Yeah.

So there are companies that do that, and they can target demographically pretty easily. And it's not that expensive to do. I would reach out to a local printing company. There's a company at the lake, Lake Printing that does it, and they do it pretty quickly. Then it's not. They're not targeting the lake. They can target any zip codes you want. But I'm sure there's some near you as well that might even give you a discount if they know who you are and the mission that you have and all of that. But yeah, those are great.

Yeah. That's the first time I've heard that mail is actually not bad anymore. So that's really interesting to hear.

No, it's not. It's not bad. And in fact, it's very good. And it's highly effective. And I would even. The only reason I say it's not more effective than online, I think doing them both is good. Online, people are bombarded with ads. You see so many ads. When you do an ad online these days, you really have to get. Design the ad in such a way that people, number one, will stop their scroll and see themselves in the ad. Like, they have to see it and say, that's me. And that's very hard to do because you guys know fast. You scroll through stuff when it comes in the mail, in the mailbox, you're there with a couple bills and you have a very nicely designed piece. And they look at it like they. They stop. You don't have to stop them. They stop.

And then it would be like a. It would be like a postcard style, very simple. Not a trifold or anything like that. And then probably use a. Should we use a QR code on that one? And then just. That's when they want to. If they want to find more, they would just click it and then go to our website.

Yeah. You want to reduce all friction points. And having to type in a URL is a friction point.

Okay.

Yeah. The QR code. Absolutely. On everything. Even when you go to, like, fairs and places where you set up booths and stuff always have a sign with the QR code.

That was another thing, because we go to. We do go to these fairs, and I see people stop at our banner, but they still don't know what we are.

Yeah.

And that's interesting. Okay.

Yeah, go.

This is great.

Yeah. And on your. Since you said that, they see your banner. I haven't seen your banner, but I assume it just says Day Spring.

Yeah. And it's a lot of really colorful. Very. It stops people as they're walking by, and they look at the color and they look at us, and then they go through it all, and then that's when we stand up and tell them who we are. So we have to interject it. And I was like, how do we get them to just come by? And if they don't want to talk to us, they still would be interested. So we could put a QR code on the banner.

QR code. And I would. Even those stand up. Retractable.

Yeah, that's what we use.

Okay, so good. Get one that goes on the outside of your booth, not behind the people. So if there's people at the table and somebody's walking by, they don't want to interrupt whatever conversation is going on. They're curious. But most people will just keep walking at that point, have it on the outside so they can just scan it and keep going.

Yep. Yeah, that's great. Because that. We do put it on the outside. We do have that. I just was noticing that. That they would go by, and then I'd be talking, and out of the corner of my eye, I could see somebody looking at the banner, and then they'd walk on, and I couldn't get them because I was talking to somebody else.

Just another. It's. It's a small tip, but it does make a difference. Put the QR code at eye level on the banner. Don't put it at the bottom. A lot of times when people design those banners, they'll put it at the bottom, the eye level.

Okay, that makes sense. Because how many people have to then drop their phone down to pick up the QR code? So that makes a lot of sense.

Yeah. Okay.

Should we put QR codes all throughout our building, too? Just put it everywhere we go.

You know what? I would. If you have a lot of visitors to your building for whatever reason.

Yeah.

Yes. Put it where they can see it in multiple places.

That's great. I like that.

I have a few questions about social media.

Okay.

So going back to the ad campaigns that you're suggesting is it more effective to do one ad that runs long term or targeting like a different ad each week where you're changing the graphic.

What I would do is split test. You don't want to run one ad long term for a lot of reasons. The biggest one is ad fatigue, people. It's like a billboard on a road. When a new one goes up, you notice it and then you drive by it 30 more times and you don't see it anymore, even though it's still there. So you want to make sure that you're changing up your ads but don't just change them up willy nilly. So what I would do is I would run at least three up to five different variations of the same ad at the same time with the same budget. And then don't test too many things at one time because then the split test doesn't really give you good data. So maybe run for a week with a very specific demographic, make the demographic all the same, make the visual different and the call to action, change it up a little bit and then see which one outperforms, turn off the other ones and then take the one and then add some more in. And then if you're gonna, if you're gonna test the demographics, use all the same graphic, change the demographic. So only change one variable in your split test. Run it for a week, highly targeted, and then make your changes based on the data that you see.

Okay.

And then in terms of more organic growth, you mentioned posting maybe more than one time a day, up to seven days a week. I think right now we're about six days a week usually, but still once a day. And we, because of all different divisions, all the arts things that we have going on, plus the academy, we do just have a lot of content. And so what is the best frequency for that and what is going to.

Get the best organic as much as you can. I mean really you should be posting, I'd say three to five times a day and with all your different divisions and all your different programs. Because when you think about it organically, people are going to see your audience, 2% of them are going to see your stuff at any particular time. And the more you post throughout the day, the more organic growth you're going to start to see. So if you have the bandwidth of someone internal to do that, you should be doing that. And the posts are all going to be different because you're right, you have all different kinds of content, so the more the better. And then what I would do is with Like Facebook, Instagram, that obviously you're going to be educating people, you're going to be showcasing your program, showcasing the students, showcasing testimonials, all the stuff on LinkedIn. Are you guys posting on LinkedIn?

Somewhat. I think Julie previously did it a little bit more. So there's been a little bit of a gap. But yes.

So on LinkedIn I would change your messaging for that platform and make your messaging all about businesses who want to support the arts. And then that's where you're going to find your sponsors.

Thank you.

While we're on the social media topic, do you see value in using hashtags on Instagram and having a targeted draw with that?

Yes. Don't make up your hashtags. You can have branded hashtags to hashtag dayspring. But what you want to do is just do some quick research around hashtags that are being searched. Hashtags that are all about search. When people are searching on these social media channels, which they are, it's all around hashtags. So you want to use hashtags that you know are being searched around the topics that you're seeing thing about.

And that's maybe Lewis Private School, St. Louis Arts, things like that.

Yes.

Okay.

Yes. And piggyback on those. If you have some of the major art centers and, and they're using hashtags that you know that their audience, their wealthy audience, their engaged audience is using payback on it and absolutely use them.

Yeah. Okay.

Thank you.

Yeah, you're welcome. Any other questions around that? I know it's 30 days is a very tight window, but I'll send you the strategy document. It's a very high level document, but it'll give you some other ideas. But from a priority standpoint, make those changes to your website and then get those ads running and if you have time to get those mailers out, that's what I would do in 30 days with your $5,000.

Yeah, you also. I'm sorry, I was a little bit late getting in. You were talking about, they mentioned the 30 day window. Is there, is what you're sending us is that more of the longer term. Is there something that we should build at the same time? So that's what you're going to send us?

Yeah.

So longer term then I would re. So I talked about just a few pages on your website, but longer term I would reface the website as like on all the pages so that all the pages follow that structure. I would have calls to action throughout to build. Start building your list Building your. How big is your list right now?

Your email, what is it?

I think it's like over 3,000.

Yeah, I mean, you want to get that list a lot higher and your money is always going to be found in your list. So the bigger strategy beyond the social media that we talked about, because that is a long term strategy too, the consistency and the frequency is a very big deal. Then everything on your website should be driving people to either enroll during enrollment time or get on your list. One of those two things. So. And that's just a matter of revamping pages. It's not a website redesign. It's just facilitating the flow and getting people. It's not signing up for newsletter. Some people will do that, but there are a lot of other ways to get people on your list and lead magnets would be one of the big ones. And then from a strategy perspective, how are you guys leveraging YouTube right now, if at all?

We do a couple videos or kind of comical videos, but I don't think we've really done anything with YouTube, have we?

Yeah, we use YouTube more internally. So all of our shows and that's how we share it with our community, is by uploading like unlisted links, unlisted videos to you.

Do you have any process internally? Because I understand sensitivity with kids. Is there any process where parents are able to opt into being featured and shown?

Okay, yeah, we do have that. I'm just. It is, yeah. It's always felt more internal on our YouTube, but it's been. We use it, I guess we. We haven't thought about it on that sense. And using it as we go out or putting it as a feature in YouTube.

Yeah. So I would start working on the nuss's long term play. Working on building out a YouTube strategy because it is the second largest search engine. It is the platform that people go to search when they're trying to figure out how to. If they're trying to figure out the credibility of people behind the scenes. Even though there's sensitivity with kids, you have so many people on your staff that could become YouTube personalities, for lack of a better term. Even though I know people are going to be resistant to the idea, it will help you grow the brand of the academy massively.

Sandy, not in our office. We have plenty of YouTube stars already. I love to be in front of the camera. So I don't thank you for that idea because now they're all going to get excited and we're going to have all kinds of YouTube videos going.

I get that's something we could look at maybe on another call is building out that YouTube strategy. Because you start building that out and get subscribers on the channel and that helps drive people to the website, that helps drive people to the list. There's so many ways now to leverage technology to grow your audience and you want as big of audience as possible. And the cool thing about what you guys do, yeah, you want to drive enrollment. It seems like you have a very small audience with the kids, but you have a huge audience with donors and people interested in the arts and people who will go to the performances and people who will bring their kids and bring like class trips to performances. And so you have a much bigger audience and a ton of ways that you could be getting the word out. And we talked about this a little with the group who came to our mastermind and presented and then start building an alumni program. Because 30 years you guys have some alumni and you're going to continue to have alumni. And these are the people who are in the arts, put their children in arts generally. So you want to start building on a long term program to really engage your alumni too. Not only from a sponsorship perspective, but from an enrollment and helping get the word out and building, you know, referral incentives and things like that.

So we could use our alumni as part of the YouTube videos too and have them guest star and kind of talk about. Because we've been toying also we had this thing that we're switching up a little bit right now is during our performances in the beginning we have an ask and we have a student that comes in and talks about their experience and then gets up and says this is what dayspring does for me and I'll please give. And then it's an ask or pass the hat at the beginning of the performance. And then now we're going to shift it to the intermission. And I guess that we could just create a video of that or something along that line.

Yeah, that's one type of content I would suggest that you do a 10 to 1. So the one being the ask 10 being actual valuable content. Let's say you have someone on staff who teaches viola. Maybe that person can do a weekly YouTube video that's 15 minutes on some kind of viola technique. People can subscribe to your channel and they can see Ms. Smith weekly viola tip or piano tip or voice tip or acting stage presence, whatever it is. So you start building these tips. So then you start getting not only an audience, but nationally and internationally in your area too, which is what you really want. So people subscribe to that and they're like, man, I could be with this coach or this teacher all the time. So it's free. But what it does is it draws them in. So you're really just demonstrating what you do. You're demonstrating it publicly on a consistent basis.

Alicia, you could see that in this even in. Because we're hands on. The school's more hands on. I was just. So we can subtly say what we are doing, which is we're more of a hands on school. So the teachers could even do a little bit of this is what we teach. And so we could have teachers in the academy kind of talk. Is that what you're thinking? Showing even our. Some of our Lego robotics and things like that. I'm just offhand. We could show like how this is what we do in the classroom or this is the kind of stuff rather.

Than this is what we do. I would do. This is how to do it.

Okay.

So you're actually teaching in the YouTube video. So you're. That's the value. And then you're like, you want to learn how to do more of this and do it better.

Yeah.

On today spring.

Okay.

It's what we do.

And then with dance and we could have. This is how to do. This is our tap. This is how you do tap. These are the steps. I get it.

Yeah. Yeah.

Okay. Caitlin, are you excited now?

Here's a little video on how to do the time step.

And then, you know, Sandy, this has been very helpful. I don't want to. I don't know how much time we have left or I don't know the.

Yeah, we've got just a few minutes. I do these for an hour. But like I said, I've got a document. And so the document is very high level. We've talked in a lot more detail on this which is why I wanted to let you guys guide on what would help you. What would serve you best in 60 minutes. And then you can talk about. We can help you with any parts or all of it. And just let me know I'm. I'm here to serve.

Wow, we appreciate it. Do you guys have anything else that you have. We had. We. I appreciate the idea that we could answer the questions up front and it formulated where we were going. And you've been very helpful in the sense that you were. We didn't have to explain too much of who we are, which helps. But is it.

Do you.

Do we seem unique to you? Just our school and the way we. The way we are, absolutely.

Yeah. I think it's fantastic. I love your mission. I love the options. I don't know how much you know about my background. I taught at high school at the Las Vegas Academy of International Studies and Performing Arts and was also a full ride music major in college. And so I get the. I get what you're doing and I love the mission. And yeah, it's incredible.

That's great. It's always nice to have somebody that understands the arts when you're working with them because it's not like you have to explain it all. And I think that. I appreciate it. I think we hooked up with somebody that really can help us. That's great.

I had one other question and it's a very low tech question, but it's an idea that we've thrown around for a number of years. I just wanted to get your take on it. There's a billboard at the exit of Dorset and 270, which we're less than a mile from. And we have thrown around the idea of buying time. It's one of those electronic billboards buying time on that. Is there any value to that? And the only reason that I ask is that many people who do not find out about us through word of mouth are like, I've never heard of DaySpring Arts and Education. So just. We started with car magnets, I want to say, in the last seven years, just to get our name out. We started with T shirts and things like that in the last eight years just to have the DaySpring brand out in the world. Other than just in the families that.

Are there right now.

Is there any value to doing a billboard either short term or long term?

Yeah, I. Yes. So how far away are you from the billboard?

Less than a mile.

Okay, so where the billboard sits, are you like below it or to the.

Right or in the area? So it's like it's off the major highway. We're a mile off the major highway or less than a mile off the major highway.

So like you could do an arrow that says, that's what I'm gonna.

Yeah.

Go 2/3 of a mile. That or half a mile that way and we're there.

So don't. What I wouldn't do. Don't put day spring really big on the billboard. I. I know that sounds strange, but I would say something like, this is probably a little too long. I mean, think about it. But did you know there's an arts academy one mile that way? And then.

I see what you're saying, you know, What? I mean it's tempting them. What then they explore from there.

Did you know it's less than one mile that way? And then day Spring. Make sure you can read day Spring. But the message is did you know? And they'll be like, actually no, I didn't. Let me look that up.

I like that. That's good. I don't know how much that ad costs on that billboard but that might blow through most of our money because.

I think those electron not for profit though probably will get a discount too.

I want to say when we looked into it it was a couple hundred dollars but I don't remember how long that lasted for. I don't know if that was like per week or per month or whatever. It was less money than we thought it was going to be.

Some is more than what you have right now. You're looking for attention and awareness right now and that will do it. That will definitely help do it.

Yeah, I like that. So my idea about putting a 700 foot high spire in the sky isn't going to do it. It's just that's we struggle with that is our name recognition and that's. I know a lot of people, people see dayspring and they still don't quite know. It doesn't in the name doesn't tell you anything.

Yeah, can I. I'm going to add one more thing and I really. On these calls, I don't like to pitch things but I think this could be really beneficial to you guys. So we do offer something called retargeting. And retargeting is the ads that follow you around the Internet. So if you're going to run ads over the next 30 days or you're going to put a billboard up or whatever you're going to do to drive traffic to the website, before you do that, think about setting up retargeting. And I can do that for you. And I'm just going to show you. I'll show you retargeting that I do for my own company. Let me just bring it up really quick. So when someone comes to your website, what it does is it writes a cookie to their machine and then your ads follow them around the Internet forever and ever. It's like the creepy. You were looking at a tractor or a lawnmower at Lowe's and you didn't buy it and then all of a sudden you start seeing ads for it. Yep, that's what this is. So let me just.

I was wondering how that happens and.

I'll show you this is how. And what it does is it leverages everything that you are doing. It leverages all the money that you're already investing in your ads. So I'm just going to share my screen. So this is msw, my. My company. So I'm just going to show you the campaign. So this is from the beginning of January to the end of June. I haven't spent that much fifteen hundred dollars. And I'm just going to show you the ads. So for fifteen hundred dollars and ignore this because I haven't set up conversions for it to track, so it's guessing on those. But this is what I want you to see. So I had 252 people click back to my website that had been there once, saw our ads. So the ads look like this. So this is 252 people who had been to the website once and came back as a result of seeing an ad, which is great because those are 252 people that I had already invested in getting to the website. They didn't take action. They left. Doesn't mean that they didn't want to work with us. Just meant that they got distracted. They were thinking about it, they went on with life. And then all of a sudden I show up again and they're like, oh, yeah, I need to go do that. What it does is it just takes your ad spend whatever it is that you're driving people to your site with, and just leverages and amplifies it. So those 252 people had already expressed interest and now they're coming back. So that's the best kind of people to bring back to them. If you're interested in doing that, shoot me an email. We can install the code on your website or send you the code to install on your website. And I think on my ads I run 75 or 100amonth. I don't spend a lot on it. It's not expensive.

Okay. Okay, that sounds great.

With an email, I'll send you the detail on that. But if you're going to invest money to run ads of any kind, make sure you have this installed because it just really amplifies everything you're doing.

It does make sense. Yeah. Do we have any other questions?

Thank you so much. This has been amazing.

You're welcome. I'm glad I could help. And so follow up with an email and then let me know how I can assist in the future.

Oh, you already helped us a lot, so thank you so much.

Good. All right. A good weekend and a great holiday weekend. Okay.

Yeah. Thank you.

Thank you.

Bye. Bye. Bye.