If your childcare centre has empty places, first identify where families are dropping out of the process. You may need more suitable enquiries, a clearer website, better tour follow-up or a closer match between available places and what families need.
These childcare marketing tips help you review the journey from finding your centre to enrolling. Marketing can support occupancy, but it cannot remove every constraint around availability, location or a family’s circumstances.
1. Match promotion to the places you can offer
Review available places by age group, days and starting dates. Share this information with the person managing your website and campaigns. Measure suitable enquiries separately from requests you cannot accommodate.
If you have plenty of enquiries but most are for a full room, increasing the same advertising may not solve the problem. Review what the campaign says and the audience it reaches.
2. Make your website useful before spending more on traffic
Check the centre page on a phone. Can a parent find your location, opening hours, programs, team and tour information? Does the page explain your centre’s approach with specific examples?
Use current photographs and clear enquiry buttons. Test the form with your team and confirm that the message arrives. A form that looks right is not proof that follow-up is happening.
If nearby families are not finding your centre, work through our childcare local SEO checklist before increasing promotion.
3. Give every enquiry a next action and an owner
Assign a person to respond, a backup for absences and a place to record the outcome. Agree a response target your team can maintain during operating hours. An automatic acknowledgement can confirm receipt, but it should not be mistaken for a conversation with the family.
Record what the family needs, when they hope to start and whether a tour is the appropriate next step. Make it easy to choose a tour time and send the practical details they need to attend.
4. Review tours booked and tours attended separately
A full tour calendar can hide a high number of cancellations or missed appointments. Confirm the address, parking information and contact details before the visit, and provide a simple way to reschedule.
After the tour, ask what the family still needs to know. Record any next action and who will complete it. Keep follow-up helpful and appropriate to the family’s preferences and your communication permissions.
5. Use social media and community events to answer real questions
Show prospective families what they can expect from your centre and its team. Our childcare social media guide explains how to create useful content with a clear next step.
An open day can help families meet your team, but decide how invitations, bookings and follow-up will work before promoting it. Attendance alone does not tell you whether the event generated suitable enquiries or enrolments.
6. Find the stage that needs attention
- Few suitable enquiries: review visibility, targeting and whether your offer matches available places.
- Enquiries but few tours: review response times, unanswered questions and the booking process.
- Bookings but low attendance: check confirmations, access details and rescheduling options.
- Tours but few enrolments: review the family’s feedback, availability, timing and unresolved concerns.
Track families from their original enquiry date so an enrolment several weeks later is not overlooked. Compare equivalent periods and keep notes about changes in available places or demand.
Turn the findings into a practical marketing plan
Use our childcare marketing essentials to choose activities and assign owners. Our Your ELC case study shows how website, creative and campaign work supported one childcare group’s approach.
For help connecting these activities, explore our childcare marketing services. Talk to our team about where families are dropping out of your current process.
