15+ years in the sector. 500+ Australian centres helped. I find the leaks before you spend a dollar on demand, then we turn the tap on.
Most owners pour money into childcare advertising while families quietly walk out the back door. Paid ads are only as good as the system beneath them. Before you spend a dollar on childcare marketing, you fix the leaks, or every ad dollar burns faster than the last.
We walk it backwards, because the cheapest enrolment you'll ever win is the family you already have.
Every family that leaves is a place you now refill from scratch, and refilling costs ten times what keeping costs. Most owners genuinely don't know why families leave because they never ask. We start by mapping churn: educator turnover, communication gaps, the polite "we changed days" that was really dissatisfaction. Fix this first, or every dollar spent on ads burns faster.
Two levers that cost zero in marketing. Days per child: a family doing two days who could do three is occupancy already sitting in your book. And sibling enrolments: the warmest lead you'll ever have for child number two is the family who already trusts you with child number one. Most centres never capture this systematically. These two alone can move occupancy several points.
Most centres are already getting enough enquiries. They're just losing them. Speed: a family hears back two days later and has already toured three other services. The tour: a waitlist form is not a tour, and a tour is not an enrolment. Follow-up: families who didn't enrol on the spot aren't a no, they're a not yet. I'd rather double your enquiry-to-enrolment rate than double your enquiry volume. The first is nearly free.
Once the bucket holds water, turn on the tap. Meta to put your service in front of local families who don't know they're shopping yet. Google for the ones already searching "early learning centre near me." Both feeding into a conversion system that actually works. Ads are the last thing you build, not the first.
Martin's path into childcare marketing started with hands-on operational experience across multiple Australian providers, working directly with the teams that drove occupancy at scale. That early run gave him the fluency most generic marketing agencies never get.
From there he founded his own agency, Enrolment Boost, and went on to work with 500+ Australian businesses, a huge chunk of them in childcare. The pattern was unmistakable: tailored, sector-specific strategy delivered results generic agencies couldn't touch.
Today he provides childcare marketing and advertising strategy for Oxanda Education, Scholars Group, Mayfield, and a long list of single-site and small-group operators. What sets Martin apart isn't a generic advertising playbook. It's a decade-plus of direct involvement with the sector. He speaks the language of families and the language of owners and managers.
Based on the Mornington Peninsula with his wife, two kids, and a labradoodle called Daisy.
Before you spend another dollar on childcare advertising, get a clear picture of where your occupancy is actually being lost, and which lever moves the dial first.
One form. One reply within a business day. No agency sales call, no generic deck.
