Part III of the School Video Deep Dive Series
In part three of our school video deep dive series, we’re going to focus on the concept of “social proof” as a way to promote your school. Specifically, we’re going to explain how to showcase various success stories by highlighting student and parent experiences in a marketing video. These videos, which we’ll refer to as “student-parent experience videos,” focus on both the experience and transformation that families can expect if they choose to invest in their student’s education through enrollment.
How these videos take shape largely depends on the values and priorities of the school. For instance, parents may choose enrollment in hopes that their children become more adjusted, successful students. In that case, your school marketing videos should emphasize transformation through education. On the other hand, if your school focuses on offering a loving and nurturing environment, then your marketing should highlight the emotional experience of the school community. Regardless of exact messaging, these school videos ultimately fulfill a family’s need to hear from other families about their experiences before they commit.
What Is a Student-Parent Experience Video?
A student-parent experience video is simple yet open-ended. In 3 minutes or less, this video should highlight what it’s like to be a student and parent at your institution using testimonies and relevant footage. This asset within your school video marketing campaign should follow the lead of the flagship general admissions video by carrying out the already-established themes and values.
The student-parent experience videos should speak to both students and parents because the opinions of both work together to create a compelling narrative. Students understand the experience of your school firsthand, while parents invest their money and time into helping their children thrive. Typically, parents like hearing from other parents about their experiences, and students likewise appreciate hearing from their peers.
There is a lot of room to get creative and tailor the student-parent experience video towards your school’s priorities. It can be helpful to take stock of inspirational success stories in your community and identify any trends or common themes. Keep in mind that this video should target the specific type of family that your school focuses their marketing efforts on, so the success stories should be relatable to that audience.
Types of Student-Parent Experience Videos
The key to successful student-parent experience videos are powerful, sometimes emotional, interviews with students and parents. Beyond that, the video can follow a few different formats. Which format you choose will depend on the kind of success stories you have in your community and whether you have leftover footage from filming your general admissions video (evergreen video assets) that you can incorporate.
One way you can frame your student-parent experience video is to think about it through the lens of the arts, academics, or athletics. For example, if there are students that found refuge in your school’s art program or turned around their grades because of your exceptional academic offerings and excellent faculty, then the video can focus on the students’ experiences in those programs.
How many student-parent experience videos you choose to produce is entirely up to you. Some school marketing campaigns might be more effective with multiple videos that cover various stories, programs, or grade levels in-depth. On the other hand, you can choose to have one video in which you compile several testimonies into one overarching theme. Ideally, your video production company will have developed a video marketing plan with you prior to filming and helped you prepare the school for a video production.
If you have a very strong singular story you can focus on, you could make a video just about that one family. Ideally, this video would be a few minutes long and show the transformation of the family in a three-part structure (the family’s situation before, during, and after their experience at the school). This type of video is especially powerful if the family is representative of a target audience that would relate to the message.
Repurposing Student-Parent Stories for School Marketing
Once you have finished your student-parent experience video, you can maximize its value by sharing it across multiple channels. First, you should ensure that your video is properly featured on your school’s website. Then, you can distribute it through targeted Facebook advertisements, email marketing campaigns, and even at open houses.
Ready to begin creating student-parent experience videos for your school’s video marketing campaign? Contact Monzo Media Productions today to set up a consultation about your school video marketing campaign.
