The £10,000 Mistake Most Providers Make After Sending Their First Email

Now if today's episode has hit a nerve and you've realised your school or nursery outreach currently lives across notebooks, sticky notes, emails and your memory, I've put together something that can help.

It's called the Fully Booked In Schools Roadmap and it walks you through the process of building a predictable pipeline of school and nursery opportunities.

Get your copy here: 

https://ceryskeneally.kartra.com/page/free-roadmap

And once you've downloaded the roadmap, you'll also find a simple tool to help you track every conversation, follow-up and opportunity so nothing slips through the cracks.

Because schools and nurseries aren't ignoring you as much as you think.

The bigger question is: Are you keeping track of the opportunities already sitting in front of you

With thanks to our sponsors at LoveAdmin

If you run a children’s activity business, you’ll know this already.  The hard part isn’t the sessions.

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Transcript

hello, and welcome to the Approaching Schools podcast. I'm Caris Kennealy, and I help children's activity providers to build key business relationships with schools and nurseries without having to use cold calling or stalking.
I want to help you earn a more reliable and consistent income while building your social impact and enriching children's lives with ease. So join me as I take you on a journey and let's make a positive difference together.
If you run a children's activity business, you'll know this already. The hard part isn't the sessions, it's everything that sits around them, the bookings, the payments, the messages, the registers, the forms, all the moving parts that come with trying to run something properly, and that's where our partner Love Admin comes in. It's not about being the simplest system on the market, it's about having the right things in place, the kind of functionality that actually reflects how children's activity businesses are run, and gives you the visibility and control you need as you grow. So, instead of patching things together or outgrowing your setup every year, you have got one system that supports you to run more efficiently and build something sustainable. If admin is starting to feel like a blocker rather than a support, it's worth a look. Hello, and welcome back to Approaching Schools. Now today I want to talk about a mistake that costs children's activity providers, wellbeing professionals, sports coaches, performing arts teachers, and former teachers 1000s of pounds every single year, and the frustrating thing is most people don't even realize they are making this mistake. Now, before we dive in, I want you to think about this question: How many schools or nurseries have you contacted in the last 12 months. Be honest, because maybe it's 10, maybe it's 50, perhaps it's even 100
But here's the second question: Can you tell me exactly which ones replied, which ones didn't, which ones asked you to come back later, which ones wanted more information, which ones asked for prices, or which ones showed interest but never booked, because if your answer is not really Keris, or sort of, or well, I'd have to go and look back through my emails, then today's episode is definitely for you, because over the years I've worked with hundreds and hundreds of providers who tell me the exact same thing. Caris, schools aren't responding. Keris, I've tried nurseries before. Keris, I've sent loads of emails to schools and nurseries, and nothing happened. But when we start digging a little deeper, we usually discover something pretty interesting, because the issue isn't usually that schools aren't interested. It's usually that there was never actually a system in place. And what happens then was this: they sent some emails, they got busy, they delivered sessions, they ran classes, they dealt with customers, they lived life, and then six months later they couldn't remember who they'd actually contacted, and that right there is where opportunities actually start disappearing. Because schools and nurseries are not Amazon, they're not buying within 10 minutes, are they? They're not seeing your email and immediately pulling out a company card. Schools and nurseries buy very differently. Okay, education settings buy over time. They buy around budget cycles, they buy around staffing changes, they buy around school improvement priorities, they buy around timetable reviews, and often they buy when a problem becomes so urgent that they actually need a solution right there and then, and that's what I mean when I say that timing matters, because if you aren't tracking conversations, those opportunities will disappear. I was speaking to a provider recently who was convinced, convinced schools weren't interested, and she'd contacted what she describes as loads of schools, but when I asked how many, she wasn't actually sure, and when I asked which school she had contacted, she wasn't entirely sure about that either, and when I asked who she'd followed up with, she said she couldn't remember, and when I asked her which schools had replied, she had to go hunting through her inbox to check. Now, this isn't a criticism, because in fact I think this is incredibly normal. Most providers start their business because they're absolutely amazing at what they do, they're fantastic with children, they're brilliant at delivering outcomes, they're amazing at creating.
Impact, but nobody ever teaches them how to manage their pipeline.
Nobody ever teaches them how schools and nurseries actually buy,
and nobody ever teaches them how to manage multiple conversations at once either. So, instead, everything tends to live inside their heads, and that works for a while until it doesn't, because eventually you reach a point where you are juggling a school that's interested in September, a nursery that's asked you to call back next month, a head teacher who wanted a proposal, a PE lead who requested prices, a SendCo who loved your idea, but needed approval, and suddenly your brain becomes your filing cabinet, and the problem with that is that your brain is not a filing cabinet.
Now, let's take a quick break, because one thing I hear a lot from clubs is this: we know we're making a difference in our community, but how do we show it? Impacts is often much bigger than registrations or attendance numbers alone. It's the confidence built, the connections created, and the role your club plays in the community around it. Inside Thrive Hub, Love Admins Practical Learning and Resource Hub, there's a course called Understanding Your Community: Measuring Impact with Confidence. It explores simple ways to gather feedback, understand who you're reaching, and turn everyday insight into evidence you can actually use, whether that's for funding applications, partner conversations, or helping families better understand your impact, and once you've finished, you'll also get the Community Impact Action Pack with templates and tools to help you start measuring and sharing your impact with more confidence. If you'd like to explore the course, you can follow the link in the show notes to access the free Thrive Hub course that Love Admin are offering for my listeners this month
it's not a CRM, and it's not a project management system either. It certainly wasn't designed to remember dozens of separate conversations happening across multiple schools and nurseries, and this is especially true if you are a busy business owner, or a parent, or someone who's still out delivering sessions, or if, like me, you've actually discovered later in life that your brain works a little bit differently, and at some point you stop being able to rely on memory, you need a process. Now, here's the part that most people miss with this, okay, because the providers who secure annual contracts, they're not necessarily sending better emails all the time, and they probably haven't got more qualifications than you, and they may not even have a bigger business than you, but they do know exactly where every opportunity sits. They know who they've contacted, they know who needs following up, they know who wants a demo, they know who's requested information, they know who's asked them to come back next term, they know who is likely to convert in the future, and because they know these things, they can take consistent action, not emotional action, consistent action, and that's important, right, because emotions are terrible business advisors, aren't they? When you don't know where opportunities are sitting, you just start assuming the worst. You start spiraling like nobody wants this. Schools aren't interested. I failed. Maybe my offer isn't good enough. Perhaps I'm going to have to go back to teaching. But when you can see your pipeline clearly, something shifts, because what I can tell from working with hundreds of providers at this level is when you see your pipeline you realize actually I have 12 schools waiting for a follow up, I have three nurseries that requested information, I have two schools that wanted prices, and I've got four that asked me to come back in September. So, you haven't failed there at all, have you? That's your pipeline, and having a pipeline sitting there like that is actually very different to rejection, because it's not a no yet, is it? One of the biggest mindset shifts I teach inside the Approaching Schools Academy is that school outreach is not a one-off event. It is a process, but a lot of providers out there are treating it like an event. They're sending one email, they wait, they hope, they panic, and then they give up. But successful providers treat it like a process. Okay, so are you treating it like a process, they contact, they track, they follow up, they build a relationship, they create opportunity, they secure a booking, they expand the partnership, which is what I'm doing in my vibe mastermind of my members right now, helping them expand their partnerships, and they are all in the process of renewing.
At contracts, by the way, and it gets to be completely different, and once you understand that, you start viewing every conversation differently. You stop asking things like, did this email work, and you start asking things like, Where is this relationship currently sitting? Because that is how decision makers in schools and nurseries are thinking. They think in terms of relationships, trust, consistency, reliability, not random one-offs. So, if you've been telling yourself that approaching schools and nurseries doesn't work, I want you to challenge that assumption. Is it really that approaching them doesn't work, or is it that opportunities are falling through the cracks, is it really that nobody is interested, or is it actually that conversations aren't being trapped? Is it really a lead generation problem, or actually, have you not been following up, because very often the money isn't actually in finding new schools. Okay, so that's very often
not the problem at all, because you want to be thinking about your existing schools as much as you do think about getting new schools, because it's very often not the problem. The money is in managing the schools that you've already found, and that brings me to today's challenge. Because I want you to take 10 minutes today, open your laptop, create a list, write down every school and nursery you've contacted recently, then answer these questions: What stage are they at? When did you last speak to them, what happens next, and if you can't answer those questions, you've just discovered the biggest opportunity in your business right now, not more marketing, not more content, definitely not another qualification, but actually a system, because when you can see your opportunities clearly. You stop operating on hope, and you start actually effectively operating on strategy. Now, if today's episode has hit enough, and you've realized your school or nursery outreach currently lives across things like notebooks, sticky notes, emails, and probably your memory, I've put together something that can help. It's called the Fully Booked in Schools Roadmap, and it walks you through the process of building a predictable pipeline of school and nursery opportunities. You will find the link in today's show notes, and once you've worked through that roadmap, you'll also find a simple tool to help you track every conversation, follow up, and opportunities, so nothing slips through the cracks, because schools and nurseries are not ignoring you as much as you probably think they are. The bigger question is, are you keeping track of the opportunities that are sitting right in front of your face? So, thank you for listening, and I will see you in the next episode.
Thank you for listening to the Approaching Schools podcast. If you've enjoyed this episode, do come and let me know in my free group for children's activity providers approaching schools, so that I can make more content like this that you'll love. You can find me on my socials at Carers Keneally, and my inbox is always open. I would love for you to leave a review on iTunes and hit subscribe on your favorite platform, so you can be the first to know when a new episode is ready. Until then, chat soon,