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Revolutionizing Recruitment: Retention Is the New Recruitment
Schools spend a tremendous amount of time and resources trying to recruit the next family.
We invest in websites, digital marketing, social media, open houses, campus visits, inquiry follow-up, admissions events, and other strategies designed to generate more enrollment.
Those efforts matter.
But what if one of your most powerful recruitment strategies is already sitting in your car line?
Your current families already know your school. They have experienced your teachers, communication, culture, leadership, programs, and community. They know whether the promises you make to prospective families are actually true.
And when those families are confident in your school, something important happens. They stay. Their loyalty grows. They tell stories about their experience, and they recommend your school to people they know and trust.
The most valuable family may be the one already in your school.
That leads to Rule #5 in my Revolutionizing Recruitment framework:
Retention Is the New Recruitment
Retention has always mattered. There is nothing new about wanting families to remain enrolled from one year to the next.
The new lens is recognizing that retention and recruitment are not two separate enrollment strategies. They are deeply connected.
Your current families shape your reputation. Their experiences become stories. Those stories are shared with friends, neighbors, coworkers, church members, teammates, and other parents. Those conversations generate interest, and that interest can eventually become an inquiry.
We spend a great deal of time asking, “How can we attract more families?”
Rule #5 asks us to consider another question:
What are we doing with the families who have already chosen us?
Disney Doesn’t Build Repeat Visitors by Accident
My family has certainly done its part to support Disney’s retention efforts with over 400 visits to Disney World as an annul pass holder.
I have shared throughout this series how Disney became part of the memories I created with my sons, Benjamin and Caleb, when they were younger. Several years later, Janine came into my life. We met through eHarmony and quickly discovered that we had quite a bit in common: family, the beach, Starbucks, eating out and, as an added bonus, Disney.
After we were married, we became annual passholders. Living in Florida made it easy to visit the parks, sometimes for only a few hours.
And then there are Janine’s Mickey ears.
She has quite a collection on the top shelf of her closet. Before one of our trips to Orlando, I asked whether she wanted to bring a pair with her. She said no. I knew exactly why. There was a pretty good chance I would buy her another pair when we got there.
But compared with some Disney fans, we are amateurs.
During my keynote, I shared the example of Gail and Scott, a couple I have followed through a Disney annual passholder Facebook group. They spend part of the year in Kentucky and part of the year in Orlando. When they are in Florida, they visit Disney about three times every week: Magic Kingdom Mondays, EPCOT Wednesdays, Hollywood Studios Fridays, with an occasional visit to Animal Kingdom.
They even dress the part. I told the audience that you are not going to catch me wearing some of Scott’s colorful Disney pants.
Gail and Scott are not simply repeat visitors. They are diehard fans.
Disney did not create that kind of loyalty by accident, and I don’t think schools should either.
The relationship does not end after someone makes the first decision. The experience has to continue giving them reasons to come back.
For schools, that means recruitment cannot end when the enrollment contract is signed.
Re-Enrollment Begins on Day One
One of the most important statements I made during the keynote was this:
Re-enrollment begins on day one.
Schools often begin thinking seriously about retention when it is time to launch re-enrollment. We prepare the communication, establish deadlines, encourage parents to secure their child’s place, and begin watching the numbers.
But by the time that message arrives, parents have already spent months deciding.
From the beginning of the school year, they are evaluating their experience. Is my child happy? Is she learning? Does his teacher know him? Are we connected to the community? Is communication clear? When something goes wrong, how does the school respond? Is this experience worth the investment we are making?
Parents are constantly collecting evidence about whether they made the right choice.
That is why re-enrollment is not really an event on the calendar. It is the result of everything the family has experienced throughout the year.
And underneath much of that decision is something I believe is especially important: confidence.
Confidence Is the Key to Retention
Through my work with schools over the years, I have come to believe that the more confident parents are in a school, the more likely they are to remain enrolled.
Parents want confidence that their child is receiving a strong education. They want confidence that teachers know and care about their child. They want confidence in leadership, communication, school culture, safety, and the direction of the institution. For families making a significant financial investment in tuition, they also want confidence that the experience is worth it.
That confidence is not created by one great moment. It develops over time through a series of experiences.
A teacher who notices that a student is struggling can strengthen confidence. A thoughtful response to a parent’s concern can strengthen confidence. Clear communication during a difficult situation can strengthen confidence. Seeing a child grow academically, socially, spiritually, or personally can strengthen confidence.
The opposite is true as well. When parents repeatedly experience uncertainty, confusion, inconsistency, or disconnection, confidence can begin to erode.
No school will create a perfect experience. Parents understand that. Challenges will occur, difficult decisions will have to be made, and children will sometimes struggle.
What often matters most is how the school responds.
Does the response give the parent more confidence in the school or less?
That is why confidence needs to be built throughout the year, long before the parent sees a re-enrollment contract.
The Recruitment Promise Has to Become the Enrollment Experience
This is where the first five rules in this series begin to connect.
During recruitment, we build relationships that create trust. We design experiences that help our schools stand out. We tell stories that allow parents to imagine what could be possible for their child. We personalize the experience so families feel known.
Then they enroll.
Everything we promised is now being tested.
If parents felt deeply known during admissions but begin to feel anonymous once school starts, they notice. If we talked about community throughout the campus visit but the family struggles to find connection after enrolling, they notice that too.
If your website says every child is known, parents will look for evidence that their child is known.
The recruitment promise has to become the enrollment experience.
When it does, parents gain confidence that they made the right decision. The more frequently their experience reinforces that belief, the more natural the decision to remain enrolled becomes.
And that is where retention begins creating something more than stability.
It begins creating advocates.
Healthy, Happy Families Don’t Just Stay
During the FACTS keynote, I described the goal as creating healthy, happy families who remain continually enrolled and eventually become some of the school’s best recruiters.
That distinction matters.
We do not simply want families who remain because moving to another school would be inconvenient. We want families who are confident in their decision, satisfied with their experience, connected to the community, and enthusiastic about what the school is doing in the life of their child.
Those families do more than re-enroll.
They talk.
They tell someone about the teacher who went out of the way to help their daughter. They share how much confidence their son has developed. They describe the friendships their child has made or the way a coach invested in them.
They are usually not repeating your marketing language or reciting your list of differentiators.
They are telling their own story.
That is where retention becomes recruitment.
Loyal Families Tell the Best Stories
Earlier in this series, I wrote about Rule #3: Story Is the New Sales Pitch.
Schools certainly need to become better storytellers, but some of the most credible stories prospective families will ever hear are not going to come from your admissions or marketing office.
They will come from other parents.
A current parent can say something you cannot say with the same credibility: “Let me tell you what this school has done for my child.”
That story may be shared at church, at work, in a neighborhood conversation, or on the sidelines of a soccer game. Someone may simply ask, “Where do your kids go to school?” and the conversation begins.
In my FACTS keynote, I said that loyal families become the ones who can tell the best stories.
Those stories matter because they come from actual experience. The family has trusted the school with their child, lived through the highs and lows of school life, and made the decision to continue.
When a parent like that recommends your school, another family listens.
Long before someone completes an inquiry form, visits your website, or schedules a tour, recruitment may have already started.
It started with a family you retained.
The Retention Flywheel
In the expanded version of my Revolutionizing Recruitment presentation, I illustrate this connection through what I call the Retention Flywheel.
It begins when families stay and thrive. Their positive experiences build satisfaction and confidence. Satisfied families become advocates and share their stories. Those stories create referrals and inquiries, and some of those inquiries ultimately become new mission-fit families.
The progression looks like this:
Retention → Satisfaction → Advocacy → Inquiries → Mission-Fit Enrollment
Then the process begins again.
This is why retention should not be viewed simply as a defensive strategy designed to prevent students from leaving.
Retention can create enrollment momentum.
A retained family protects enrollment. A loyal family can help grow it.
That is the essential idea behind Rule #5.
Your Current Families Are Shaping Your Reputation
Whenever I work with a school, one of the questions I want to answer is, “How did families first hear about you?”
The answer is remarkably consistent.
Word of mouth.
A friend told them. A neighbor recommended the school. Someone they know from church has children there. A coworker shared an experience. Another parent said, “You should really take a look at our school.”
That should change how we think about retention.
Your current parents are shaping your reputation every day, whether you have an intentional strategy for it or not. Their experience influences what they say about your school, and what they say influences whether another family ever considers you.
In the expanded keynote, I described the same progression: satisfied families become advocates, those advocates drive inquiries, and healthy word of mouth helps attract mission-fit families.
So one of the most important recruitment questions a school can ask is actually a retention question:
Are our current families confident enough in us to recommend our school to someone they care about?
That is a much higher standard than simply asking whether they plan to re-enroll.
Keep Earning Their Confidence
One mistake schools can make is assuming that once a family enrolls, the hardest work is finished.
I believe enrollment is the beginning of another responsibility.
The family has made an initial decision to trust you. Now the school has the opportunity to reinforce that decision throughout the year.
That does not mean continually marketing to current parents. It means continually providing evidence that their trust is well placed.
Help parents see how their children are growing. Communicate with clarity. Make it easy for them to understand important decisions. Create opportunities for connection. Respond well when concerns arise. Continue telling stories that help parents see your mission coming to life.
Sometimes schools devote enormous energy to helping prospective families understand their value while assuming current families already know it.
They should not make that assumption.
Current parents need to continue seeing, experiencing, and understanding the value of the school too.
The goal is to help parents repeatedly arrive at the same conclusion:
“We made the right decision.”
When that confidence is reinforced throughout the year, re-enrollment becomes less about persuading a family to stay and more about continuing a relationship they already value.
Questions for School Leaders
As you think about Rule #5, I would encourage you to look beyond your re-enrollment percentage.
A percentage tells you how many families stayed. It does not necessarily tell you why.
Are parents becoming more confident in your school as the year progresses? Does their experience after enrollment match what you promised during recruitment? Do families continue to feel known, valued, and connected? When concerns arise, does your response build or erode confidence?
And then consider what those parents are saying outside the school.
Are your current families simply staying, or are they becoming advocates? Are they telling stories that make other parents curious about your school? Would they enthusiastically recommend the school to someone they know and care about?
Perhaps the most important question is this:
What are you doing throughout the year to help parents repeatedly say, “We made the right decision”?
Because when parents truly believe that, something powerful happens. They are more likely to stay, and they are much more likely to tell someone else why.
Your Next Family May Come From a Family You Already Have
Schools spend significant time, money, and energy trying to reach people who do not yet know them.
Again, that work is important.
But sometimes one of your most powerful recruitment opportunities is already sitting in your car line, cheering at a basketball game, attending a school program, or talking with another parent in the community.
Your current families know whether the experience you promise is real.
When they have confidence in your school, they are more likely to stay. When positive experiences compound over time, loyalty grows. Loyal families tell stories, and those stories create word of mouth.
Eventually, someone hears one of those stories and decides to learn more.
That person may become your next inquiry.
Your next applicant.
Your next enrolled family.
And the recruitment process may have begun because you took care of a family who was already there.
That is why Retention Is the New Recruitment.
Disney doesn’t build repeat visitors by accident. Schools should not build loyal families by accident either.
Retention begins on day one. Build confidence throughout the year, and the families who choose to stay may become the families who help others choose you.
