I’m very passionate about improving the educational experience for students and staff. Oftentimes startups and established businesses have great products and services that could potentially help meet a need but their message gets lost in a massive sea of email. From personal experience as a school district superintendent, I can give you a few pointers to help in your email marketing campaign.
Here are a few examples of a typical inbox of a school district superintendent.
Since the superintendent’s email address is public knowledge, it ends up on practically every list and sold over and over again. It’s almost impossible to stay on top of real email from staff members, vendors, contractors, etc… with this much unsolicited spam email making its way into the inbox. Some of this ends up in the junk folder, but a lot of it does make it through to the actual inbox. The problem is that after years of serving as a superintendent and wading through unsolicited spam, it takes something special to get the attention of your target audience.
Stop Spamming and Get Personal: Consider sending an unpolished personalized email.
Be casual – Write like a friend or neighbor – No “Superintendent Peete” – etc…
Scan through public documents to find the goals of the district and how we plan to achieve them.
Do a small amount of research to find the focus of the superintendent or district. If targeting California, go on any district website and click on the Local Control Accountability Plan (LCAP). There you will see how the school plans to meet the state’s 8 priorities. Also, you will see special call-outs for deficient areas. My district, for example, needs to work on our chronic absenteeism rates. Lastly, schools in California enter what is called CSI or Comprehensive Support and Improvement when they are very deficient in a goal. It could be academics, suspension rate, chronic absenteeism, etc… Attempt to tie your product or service to the actual need of the district.
See where this is going? Switch your mindset from blanketed mass email to administrators to taking the steps to become a partner.
Quick tip: Superintendents typically know the superintendents in the neighboring districts. If you can use this in an informal way, it may help. Adding a reputational resource to the email in a casual way has the possibility of improving your conversion rate.
Here’s a short sample after looking at the LCAP, finding neighboring district superintendent names, and getting contact information. Your call to action should be getting a phone call – Do not expect much else… Once on the phone, the rest is up to you.
Hi Josh,
I’m working on a project to help districts in XYZ county fix their chronic absenteeism rates. Though your chronic absenteeism rate was 39%, some of the neighboring districts had double digit rates as well. I know you are addressing this in your LCAP this year. Hoping to ping a few ideas off you that could help. I’ve reached out to Joe and Jerry to see if a few of your neighboring districts are interested in collaborating. Call me when you have a moment – 916.555.1212
Your name
Use a generic email address – like gmail or other service. If not, then a .org email address sounds more service oriented. If your company or service name has a .com, we will likely make a snap judgment that you are just trying to make money and your email is less likely to convert.
A few notes about the sample above:
Notice how it sounds like a regular email with someone trying to help. It doesn’t seem super professionally polished, like you could send this out 1,000s of times with the click of a button like the images above show. Also, it comes across as wanting to help meet a need with a partner-seeking feel.
There are only about 1,000 school district superintendents in California. Less in other states… If administration is your target then target slowly, personally, and thoughtfully – mass just smells of spam and will be ignored even if it makes it into the inbox.
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