By: Carolyn Amborn
The robust fall colors have me feeling nostalgic today. The sky is bursting forth with a sunny hue of yellow, shining down on trees ablaze in shades of red, orange, green, and brown. The main reason for this nostalgia is not the season itself, but rather the back-to-school excitement that coincides with the changing of the leaves.
You see, I was an elementary educator for 21 years, and as the saying goes, you can take the teacher out of the classroom, but you can never take the classroom out of the teacher. With that background, I’d like to share with you three ways to market to educators and instructional leaders, or to entice one of them to consider a certain product or way of managing their kingdom—for indeed, an educator’s classroom is their personal kingdom.
- Be quick and concise in delivering your message.
Educators have, on average, five to six subjects a day to deliver to 25–35 students who require individualized instruction in many of those subjects. Specialist educators have many more students with many more styles of instruction. I think you’re getting the point. As a vendor, you may get 10–15 minutes of that educator’s attention. Make that interaction clear, timely, and courteous. Also, realize that they may not give you an answer immediately because their mind has already categorized your information in a “get back to” folder.
- Leave the educator with a classroom take away and a personal take away.
Most of the materials that educators use to do their jobs are consumable. Oftentimes, teachers end up supplying those materials themselves due to budget restrictions. How much better is it to leave educators with samples of your product or some useful and tangible resource to save them money and time? Let me tell you, products and resources are much better than a business card!
Of course, a personal take away works like a charm as well. A little chocolate goodie bag for that needed end-of-day pick-me-up or a bottle of hand lotion for those dry hands will definitely be appreciated and remembered. Notice that those things are also consumables. A teacher can never have too much chocolate!
- Remember that a teacher’s classroom is his or her professional kingdom.
This is true both in an elementary classroom—where the day’s subjects can be moved around according to how the teacher views the day’s events—or in the middle school or secondary school, where there is more of a block schedule but the teacher can change the lesson plan after reflecting on the day’s schedule. Teachers take great pride in their classroom’s culture and organization. Think of them as the ones who make the decisions as to what comes into that kingdom and what does not.
And remember, while they may not be able to make all of the final decisions, teachers are a strong voice of persuasion when it comes to what will be purchased and what purchases will not be renewed in the following school year.
Thanks for sharing!
