A Website That Reflects A School's Mission: Rose Hill Montessori School
Key Insights
- Website Re-design
- Website Content
- Montessori CRM & Automations
- Marketing Support and Guidance
A great school website has the ability to showcase a school's vision and mission. Your website is often the first point of contact for prospective families seeking information about your school. A well-designed website with engaging content and captivating imagery creates a positive first impression, capturing the attention of visitors and instilling confidence in the quality of your educational offerings. Each Montessori school is special and unique, and as Montessori marketers, when we partner with schools we like to showcase their unique approach and story through a powerful website.
About Rose Hill Montessori School
Rose Hill Montessori School opened on Monday, June 3, 1996. It was started in order to provide a quality Montessori Elementary Program in Boise, Idaho.
Their mission is to provide a comprehensive Montessori education with experienced staff that guide students toward becoming confident, creative, empathetic, culturally aware, and responsible children who are nurtured toward having a lifelong love of learning. They currently offer Primary (3-6 years) and Elementary (6-12 years) programs. Rose Hill is also an AMS Pathway Verified school, providing their community with high-quality and authentic Montessori programs. Throughout the nearly 30 years the school has been open, they have also had the ability to improve their building, grow their programs, and expand with the help of their incredible staff and parent community. It is evident that Rose Hill values and nurtures the community around them as part of their core mission.
Nido Marketing partnered with Rose Hill Montessori School in November of 2023 in the hopes that a new website would help them attract more prospective families and showcase what their programs had to offer. They wanted to work with marketers who understood the Montessori space and target audience. Our team was excited to be a part of sharing their stories with prospective families.
Consultation & Planning
When we begin working with a new website client, we usually start by offering an audit of their existing website. This allows us to assess the content, navigation, and overall experience of a school's website. During this process, our team of Montessori marketing experts and web developers can work together to identify some re-design and engagement opportunities. We then discussed our assessment with the Rose Hill team and offered them ideas and strategies that would help them improve their website. This ensures that Rose Hill is involved in the process. We want each of our clients to receive consistent communication before, during, and after the build-out of their school website so that their vision can come to light.
Here are some of the areas of improvement we noted for the Rose Hill website when they began working with us:
Homepage
The old homepage of the Rose Hill Montessori website did not have a lot of content or information. Ultimately, it left visitors wondering a lot. Here's what we wanted to change:
- There was no school logo: at the top left-hand corner, the name of the school was there, but it seemed minimal and did not offer an identity to the school.
- There were no effective and clear CTA's: calls to action are crucial when building a school website. Towards the top of the homepage, there are areas where website visitors can "learn more" or "find out more"... but that doesn't invite them to take the next step in the admission process. We wanted to create some clear and obvious CTA's that would encourage families to fill out a form or schedule a tour.
- There was a lack of content: a homepage should direct families to explore more of the school's offerings. With this homepage, parents can see where they can learn more about the admissions process, learn more about the school, watch a clip, or see the school event calendar (which is more applicable to current families). We felt it was important to include some information about the unique benefits of Montessori, what families could do to take the next step in the admissions process, and some more detailed information about their programs. A homepage should summarize everything you have to offer at a glance!
- Hidden navigation bar: A parent should be able to see what's included on your navigation bar at a glance. In this website design, the navigation bar is hidden in the upper right-hand corner and a visitor must click on the three lines to see what else the website has to offer.
Program Page
The program information page on the old Rose Hill website needed more imagery and strategic content. Here are our notes:
- Montessori Langauge: while it's great to talk about the Montessori philosophy, we noted that the content on this page was using language that a parent new to Montessori might not understand. Terms like "sensorial" or "practical life" are a bit complex to include as the leading points of a program. Instead, we suggested leading with benefits like how Montessori is child-centered, offers a personalized approach, and has scientifically researched hands-on materials. Being purposeful with program content can make a huge difference in how families form an impression, it's important to make the information approachable.
- Staff: All staff information should be included in an "about our team" or "faculty" section. focus the content on your program page to answer important information about the program and its benefits.
- Testimonials: The Rose Hill website lacked testimonials and social proof throughout their website. This is valuable to include because prospective families want to gauge how successful and trustworthy your programs are.
Admissions
The admissions page on the old Rose Hill website was simple and to the point. There were still some areas of opportunity:
- Application Forms: A visitor could fill out an online application form and hear back about a school tour. This adds extra steps, it's even more effective when a visitor can fill out a form and automatically schedule a tour.
- Un-gated Tuition: on this version of the Rose Hill website, visitors could click to gain access to the tuition information. We recommended gating this tuition and creating a unique page about tuition and fees. The reason why is because this is usually the information that families want to know most. By gating your tuition, you can collect contact information and follow up with families. Because Rose Hill was freely giving out their tuition information, many visitors would click that and not bother to schedule a tour. Lead with your values and benefits, not cost!
The Rose Hill Website was ultimately missing content, automations, and some strategic design and CTA's. This was something we could remedy through a new website powered by our Montessori CRM.
New Rose Hill Website
Our web team worked closely with the Rose Hill Montessori team to build and develop a new school website with content, automations, and purposeful design and imagery. Let's take a look at the new homepage:
At first glance, this homepage has much more content and CTA's than the original homepage. Let's break it down:
- CTA Front and Center: The first thing families see is an introduction to "A Montessori school serving children ages 3 to 12 years since 1996" and then a CTA to schedule a tour automatically directly on the school website. This CTA is included throughout the school website as a means to invite visitors to take the next important step in the admissions process. This has been crucial when it comes to generating more leads through the website and increasing enrollment.
- Mission and Why Montessori: We like to include the school mission on the homepage. This is a storytelling element that is important to have. It's also valuable to include some information about why families should choose Montessori. We include a "why choose us" section that breaks it down and leads with the benefits.
- Programs at a Glance: Scrolling down, families will be able to see what programs are available at Rose Hill.
- Admissions Breakdown: Showing a step-by-step application process can help families understand how it works and encourage them to take the first step.
- Testimonials: Social proof is crucial to include on any school website. Sharing success stories adds to a school's credibility. We make sure to display testimonials on the homepage and throughout the school website.
- Blog & Montessori Content: Parents can check out Montessori blogs at a glance. It's important to have blog content as a way to improve SEO, provide resources, and allow families to learn more about Montessori directly through the Rose Hill school website.
- Navigation & Device Compatibility: The overall design of the school website is more modern. The navigation bar is fully visible and this website is compatible with smartphones, tablets, and desktops.
- Imagery & Graphics: There is now a school logo for Rose Hill on the top left-hand corner. We also used consistent fonts, colors, and layout throughout the new website.
Admissions & Tuition Pages
The new admissions page has a cleaner and more visually appealing layout. We use subheadings to break down the text step by step. There is also the option to schedule a tour automatically directly on the school website. This is powered by the Montessori CRM and works to schedule tours around the clock 24/7 based on the availability of the school. We completely removed tuition information from the admissions page and instead built a unique page to address tuition and fees:
The new tuition page includes information about the value of a Montessori education. It's great to remind visitors of all the benefits they will be receiving when they choose Rose Hill Montessori School. We then created a form that families could fill out in order to automatically receive tuition information via email. This is now a new way that Rose Hill can receive valuable lead information so that they can send follow-up emails to the prospective families that request tuition information. This has helped them intake and nurture families towards enrollment.
Program Pages
The new program information page has more purposeful and strategic content. We worked closely with the Rose Hill Team to curate the content in a way that would educate prospective families on the benefits of their Montessori programs. We also made sure to include supporting testimonials so families could see how the programs have been beneficial to others.
Montessori CRM & Automations
A Montessori CRM (client relationship manager) is software that is used to manage interaction with current families and prospective parents. Our CRM has been a huge help in keeping communications organized and maintaining relationships with interested prospective families for Rose Hill when we launched their new school website.
We worked with Rose Hill to decide what forms would work best for their community. Here's what they can now do through their new school website powered by the CRM:
- Intake new leads directly from their website through inquiry forms and automated tour scheduling
- Respond automatically via email or text thanking the visitor for their interest and letting them know that they'll be in touch soon.
- Organize the visitor’s contact information and any other information captured on the form for future reference
- Tag them as a “lead” or a “prospect” and track their journey throughout the admissions process
- Send reminders automatically to follow up by a specific date.
Client Support
We make sure to offer one-on-one guidance and a smooth onboarding process to all of our CRM clients. We will answer all your questions and offer support when needed. The Rose Hill team worked closely with one of our talented Client Success Managers to learn how to use and integrate the software. We offer support before, during, and after the launch of a school website.
It became much easier for Rose Hill Montessori to track their admissions! They were able to customize their admissions pipeline to fit their process so they could track all their leads on their way to enrollment.
CMS can even send SMS messages and emails automatically through the CRM to confirm tours and follow up with prospective families who showed interest in their programs and filled out a form. This means less manual entry for their admissions team, which will be a huge time saver! Here are all the features that CMS can now utilize with the Montessori CRM:
Results and Impact
The revamped website received overwhelmingly positive feedback from both current and prospective families. Users appreciated the intuitive design, informative content, and the ease with which they could navigate through various sections. Here's what the team at Rose Hill had to say:
"We have received so much positive feedback from our families and prospective families about how easy it is to navigate and how visually appealing our new website is. Thank you, Nido Marketing, for your hard work and dedication to making our Montessori school shine in our community. We are grateful for your expertise and support throughout the entire process."
- Julie Douglas, Head of School at Rose Hill Montessori School
We really feel that the new school website for Rose Hill Montessori School connects beautifully with their mission and vision of providing high-quality Montessori programs and building a strong and uplifting community for families.
A Lasting Partnership
We are thrilled that Rose Hill has a website that reflects the amazing quality of their Montessori programs. We feel confident that with their new website, Rose Hill Montessori School will be able to grow its admissions and create a stronger community. We hope to continue partnering with Rose Hill as they grow and expand their school programs and look forward to the possibility of offering more of our digital marketing services to their community.
Thank you to Rose Hill Montessori School for all that you do for your community and future generations!
0 comments
Leave a comment