Desert Sage School was a fun challenge. When we started, there was no school location, no students, and no school history to pull from. We had the opportunity to start from scratch.
We were also working within a small time frame. Desert Sage High School planned to open its doors in August, which meant we had just 4 months to attract enough students for the school to welcome its founding 9th-grade class.
We started by crafting the branding that we felt would resonate with and attract prospective students, created posts that celebrated the surrounding community, and developed a hashtag strategy to attract local families. After the first two months, we went from 0 to 70 followers.
David Wagner, the Administrative Director, was ready to pour some fuel on the fire, so he opted to try our Rapid Growth à la Carte Services. Over the next month, using our outreach strategy, we gained 100 more followers and attracted over 100 leads through a targeted Facebook and Instagram Ads. With these strategies, combined with the in-person efforts of the Faculty and the Board, Desert Sage School attracted 30 new students, signed the contract for their location, and opened its doors in August!
The tricky part with creating the Desert Sage Schol branding was meeting the goal of developing trust in the surrounding community. Because it was a brand new school, we could not use testimonials, current photos of students, or share exciting experiences that simply hadn’t happened yet.
To create trust, we shared photos of Waldorf high school alumni that had gone on to do amazing things, posted photos of new hires to create a buzz of excitement, and educational posts that supported our school’s mission and charter.
We posted consistently and responded swiftly to prospective parents’ comments and questions to demonstrate that we were a reliable source they could depend on.
We took the opportunity to share Information Sessions, leaked our location when we signed a contract, and shared employment opportunities to demonstrate that we meant business about opening our doors.
The brand visuals mirrored the Tucson landscape, and we used on-trend formatting to walk the line of speaking directly to our teen prospective students and their parents.
As a new neighbor, we needed to bring metaphorical baked goods to our surrounding community.
With the tagging feature on Instagram and Facebook, it made it easy to draw attention to our profile by creating posts that celebrated local artists, nature conservationists, and local events happening that may both interest our families and celebrate our local community.
The tagging feature helped us because it notified those we tagged that we had created a post featuring them and got them more involved with our cause.
You attract more 
s with 
than vinegar, as my Grandma always used to say!
When highlighting local heroes aligned with our mission, we also celebrated Tucson at large. These posts were relevant and exciting to them, they followed along on our journey, and they got our foot in the door.
Once they became part of our audience, we had the opportunity to pitch our school through thoughtful and compelling posts.
After we were rounding the bend of month two, David Wagner, the Administrative Director, was ready to pour some fuel on the fire, so he opted to try our Rapid Growth à la Carte Services. We wasted no time and got started with targeted outreach. What does targeted outreach look like? We spend time engaging (liking, commenting, and following accounts that we feel might make an excellent fit for your school). Many of the accounts we chose to engage with were local schools that went up to 8th grade and those that followed those accounts.
When you take an interest in others, oftentimes, they will take an interest in you. 
We were able to boost our following by 100 people that were primed to be candidates for the founding families at Desert Sage School.
At the beginning of the ad campaign, we tested two images to see which performed best, eventually picking the highest performing ad for the remainder of our advertising budget.
Due to the powerful nature of Facebook Ads, our advertisement got in front of 11,541 parents of children of 13-17-year-olds of those living in Tucson, Arizona, or 28 miles outside of Tucson.
We got 341 link clicks from the ad to the home page, and 106 people clicked on our ‘Information Session’ page, ‘Enrollment Page,’ or ‘Apply Now’ page from the buttons on the homepage.
We saw an increase in direct messages and Information Session attendance numbers.
With these social media strategies, combined with the in-person efforts of the Faculty and the Board, Desert Sage School attracted 30 new students, signed the contract for their location, and opened its doors in August!
My team and I wear so many hats, having someone dedicated to keeping our social media running is essential. Whenever I see our school’s posts on my Facebook feed, I think, Wow! That looks cool, and then I realized it was one of our posts, which made it all better. I am so impressed by the work that K12 Social Media is doing for our school!
Administrative Director
We would love to learn more about your school and your social media goals and share ways we think we can help!
We'll send over a proposal that meets your school's needs. Once you pick one of our packages, we kick things off!
This is the fun part! After gathering a bit more information, we will begin creating your custom social media strategy and start posting in two weeks!
Helping schools shine, one stellar social media post at a time! Some of the most inspiring stories come from within the four walls of your classrooms.
Our mission is to help schools safely, efficiently, and confidently share their stories on social media, attract prospective families, and boost school spirit.
