I’ve just found a new blog started by a home daycare provider called Mary (great name

Here’s what she wrote:

“Hi, I’m Mary and new to this site…. so bear with me while I test some things out.

I’m happily married for 8 yrs now and have 3 children. I’m a licensed in-home daycare provider.

Hopefully, I won’t bore you with my blogs!!

Mary”

You can see the blog here: I am Mary

Talk soon,
Mary Nightingale

P.S. Thousands of future or current home daycare providers just like you have already signed up to my ‘how to start a home daycare’ newsletter. It’s getting a bit overwhelming and I may cap signups soon, but for the time being you can still join. Don’t worry, it’s free. All you have to do is enter your name and e-mail below:

A lot of home daycare providers struggle to come up with a good name for their home daycare. I’ve just been reading a forum thread started by such a person and I thought you may find it useful.

Here’s the original post:

“Right now I’ve named my childcare

Cory Family Daycare

However, I want a fun name!! I felt like I needed to come up with something quick and that is what it was.

I’m thinking of

Cory Family’s Circle of Friends

What do you think???

Can you PLEASE help give me some more names???”

You can read the whole thing here: Childcare Names

Talk soon,
Mary Nightingale

P.S. Thousands of future or current home daycare providers just like you have already signed up to my ‘how to start a home daycare’ newsletter. It’s getting a bit overwhelming and I may cap signups soon, but for the time being you can still join. Don’t worry, it’s free. All you have to do is enter your name and e-mail below:

I’ve just found a great fact sheet about starting a home daycare business called “Growing Ideas: Caring For Young Children - Business Matters” produced by the University of Maine.

Here’s an excerpt:

“Caregivers or business owners?

Family childcare providers are both. Caring for and educating young children is important and rewarding work. Understanding how to operate a family childcare business helps provide the income and working environment needed for program success.
Why develop business skills?

When family childcare providers consider themselves professionals, it influences how they and others view and respect their role as educators. Being aware of and developing business skills is part of that professional role. Good business skills can save time and money, reduce stress, and support smooth functioning of a program. Creating a “business toolkit” can help.”

You can read the whole thing here: Growing Ideas: Caring For Young Children - Business Matters

Talk soon,
Mary Nightingale

P.S. Thousands of future or current home daycare providers just like you have already signed up to my ‘how to start a home daycare’ newsletter. It’s getting a bit overwhelming and I may cap signups soon, but for the time being you can still join. Don’t worry, it’s free. All you have to do is enter your name and e-mail below:

Raising fees can be a difficult thing for some providers, but sometimes it just has to be done.

I’ve just been reading an interesting forum thread with some great advice on this which I recommend you take a look at.

Here’s the original forum post:

“I am considering raising my fee at about $15 more per week. I used to get Tier II in the food program and now I get Tier I. I haven’t spoken to the parents yet but was wondering if this seems fair?

I used to get about $300 for Food Program and now to get $100 it’s hard to stretch it. what do you girls think? is $15 too much and do you guys think that the parents would understand?”

You can read the whole thing here: Raising my fee

Talk soon,
Mary Nightingale

P.S. Thousands of future or current home daycare providers just like you have already signed up to my ‘how to start a home daycare’ newsletter. It’s getting a bit overwhelming and I may cap signups soon, but for the time being you can still join. Don’t worry, it’s free. All you have to do is enter your name and e-mail below:

I’ve just found a forum post by a home daycare provider who’s furious that a child’s grandparent was angry at her for not going on holiday. Unfortunately this is something that many home daycare providers can resonate with. Fortunately it’s pretty easy to be in control of this situation if you have a rock solid contract like the one included with Home Daycare Secrets.

Here’s the original post:

“I am so MAD right now I just had to share. I took a vacation this week from December 24-Jan 2 and I reopen Jan 3. I actually had a grandmother, not not the mother, but a grandmother call me up complaining because no babysitter she knows takes a winter vacation. She also told me do you know how this messes up my life. Because your on vacation my daughter can’t find anyone to watch her child so I have to. I have family down and can’t take them anywhere bc the child has to eat and sleep. Which is funny bc I take her and 4 others places and have NO trouble. She goes on and on and then towards then end she starts trying to be nice saying she is going to bring clients my way because I am so good to her grandchild and daughter. It makes me so angry that there are people who believe providers don’t deserve the same amount of respect as everyone else. They believe we should just be here on call FOR them anytime THEY need us. Its crazy. I am so mad about this I can’t even see straight. Ahh sorry I just wanted to vent and also ask I am not the ONLY person that takes a winter and summer vacation am I? Other jobs get 2 weeks paid vacation as well am I correct? What makes me so less deserving?”

You can read the replies here: VENTING

Talk soon,
Mary Nightingale

P.S. Thousands of future or current home daycare providers just like you have already signed up to my ‘how to start a home daycare’ newsletter. It’s getting a bit overwhelming and I may cap signups soon, but for the time being you can still join. Don’t worry, it’s free. All you have to do is enter your name and e-mail below:

Sometimes attracting new parents and children can be hard work, especially when you’re just starting out.

I’ve just been reading a forum thread about a couple having trouble attracting business for their preschool and most of the advice they’re given applies just as well to home daycare.

Here’s the orginal post:

“My wife started a home preschool 3 months ago. We have only two full time (Same family) and 1 part time so far. Rate is $155/hour which according to our local daycare association is average for our area. Spent $15,000 Remodeling and equipping the classroom with full Montessori setup. My wife is a Montessori teacher with 4 years teaching experience in public and private schools. She has a masters in education and is certified by the American Montessori Society. We’ve put fliers up all over town, Started a webpage, advertised on every listing we can find, and spent about $600 on classifieds. No one that’s toured has put their kids into a different daycare yet so the parents seem to like the setup once they see it. Anyone have any ideas why we’re having such a hard time getting prospects in the door, and if there might be something we’re missing in our marketing plan?”

You can read the whole thing here: New Startup. No Clients

Talk soon,
Mary

P.S. Thousands of future or current home daycare providers just like you have already signed up to my ‘how to start a home daycare’ newsletter. It’s getting a bit overwhelming and I may cap signups soon, but for the time being you can still join. Don’t worry, it’s free. All you have to do is enter your name and e-mail below:

I’ve just been reading a worrying article about daycare providers being scammed out of money.

As long as you follow a few simple steps, it should be OK though. Just make sure your foreign checks are legitimate with your bank.

Here’s an excerpt:

“Their has been a series of fraudulent checks being mailed to day care providers from over seas.

This is what happened to me and has happened to others according to the local sheriff and Postal Inspection Service.

I was contacted by e-mail from someone who got my info. from another day care web site. They said they needed child care for 1 month and would prepay me to save their child’s spot. They said their wife and child would be arriving from Spain. They were to mail my fees for 1 month and include extra funds for their wife and child’s fare, and they instructed me to cash the check and money gram the excess funds to a travel agent in Spain. I didn’t feel comfortable with this so I asked them how much excess funds and to send me a family photo.”

You can read the whole thing here: Beware of new Day Care Check Scam

Talk soon,
Mary

P.S. Thousands of future or current home daycare providers just like you have already signed up to my ‘how to start a home daycare’ newsletter. It’s getting a bit overwhelming and I may cap signups soon, but for the time being you can still join. Don’t worry, it’s free. All you have to do is enter your name and e-mail below:

I just found a website where you can list your home daycare for free. People looking for providers can search to find suitable daycares in their area.

Here’s the blurb from the site:

“Any U.S. childcare provider (preschools, daycare centers, family / home daycares, babysitters…) can register with Daycare Bear in order to promote their services and advertise their openings on the Internet.

Once registered, you will be able to describe in detail your business or services, and come back as often as you like to modify your listing (current openings, general description, opening hours…).

By registering and creating a listing you will not only benefit from an Internet presence but you will also be part of the most advanced search engine dedicated to daycare providers and childcare services which is used by numerous american parents every day.

Go ahead, registration is FREE!”

Here’s the site: Daycare Bear

This looks like a great service. It’s free, so you might as well register if your home day care is set up.

Talk soon,
Mary

P.S. Thousands of future or current home daycare providers just like you have already signed up to my ‘how to start a home daycare’ newsletter. It’s getting a bit overwhelming and I may cap signups soon, but for the time being you can still join. Don’t worry, it’s free. All you have to do is enter your name and e-mail below:

I just found this great article. I thought you might like it:

8 Lessons in Strategic Marketing A La ‘Daddy Daycare’

I bet you thought the movie “Daddy Daycare” was a kiddie comedy, right? Wrong…It’s a marketing strategy film! When Charlie and his friend Phil are fired as Product Development/Brand Managers for a cereal company, they decide to fill a need in their community.

Along the way to success they demonstrate several solid marketing strategies — equally applicable to online, offline, and integrated companies. Take these lessons to heart when developing plans for your business.

Lesson 1: Research the competition

The future entrepreneurs visited each daycare in the area. While doing so, they got a feel for their daycare competitors. By knowing your own competitors you will be better able to effectively find a way to compete.

Competitor research does not have to be thought of as “guerrilla warfare.” In many industries, competitors work together by partnering, cross promoting, sending business to each other, or even manufacturing each other’s products.

Lesson 2: Know your customers’ values

Charlie and Phil understood that price is not the only important factor for their target market. Based on their own experience and customer research (talking to other parents), they recognized that other concerns besides price played a part when parents choose a daycare provider.

While price is almost certainly a consideration for your customers, don’t get caught in the mentality that customers will buy from you only if you have the lowest cost. If you think of your own service/product as a bundle of attributes having a unique value for your customers, you will be more successful.

Lesson 3: Identify opportunities

Charlie and Phil uncovered an unmet need in the market by combining their competitor research and knowledge of customer values. You can do the same when looking to develop new products/services or improve existing ones.

Lesson 4: Develop a positioning based on opportunity

Using knowledge from the first three lessons, they positioned themselves as the quality alternative and focused on providing different benefits than their nearest competitor. In the movie, Daddy Daycare stole all the competitor’s customers and drove her out of business.

In real life, customers choose a product/service that best fits their needs. Consequently, competitors can co-exist when each are valuable in different ways to industry customers.

Lesson 5: Create a catchy tag line

The tag line “Who’s your Daddy?” helped advertise the new business. Often, a concise, catchy tag line can go a long way in building brand equity, communicating benefits and features, and/or conveying a feeling/mentality your target customers can relate to.

Some examples:

“Just do it.” (Nike)
“Life Unscripted” (TLC)
“Naturally sweetened whole grain oat cereal with real berries.” (Berry Burst Cheerios)
“Makes anything possible.” (Craftsman)
Lesson 6: Spread the Word
Phil and Charlie put their tag line on t-shirts along with their business name. They also printed and distributed flyers that explained their new company’s positioning.

A few more ideas you can use to spread the word about your business:

Word of mouth — give customers an incentive to tell people about your business. Advertising — use both online and offline methods. Online options include pay-per-click search engines and ezine advertisements. Offline methods include radio spots and newspaper advertisements. Philanthropy — donate money, services, and/or time to non-profit organizations or conduct your own event.

Lesson 7: Be ethical and above-board

The new business owners cooperated fully with the daycare inspector. They treated him as a source of information rather than “Big Brother”. This resulted in not only a better business, but also a valuable ally. In the long run, your own company will be more likely to thrive if you concentrate on improving the business rather than dodging regulations.

Lesson 7A: Subterfuge is a poor long-term strategy

Besides being unethical, subterfuge soils your reputation. In the movie, the competing daycare crashed and ruined a fundraiser event…spilling bugs, freeing animals, and drenching visitors. Short-term, it worked. Phil and Charlie were broke, seemingly with no way to continue with their venture.

In the long run, Ms. Subterfuge had such a poor reputation (from this and other business tactics), her business failed.

Lesson 8: Implement until you’re blue in the face

In the beginning, the new Daddy Daycare was a complete disaster. Charlie and Phil did their “homework” and knew they had a good idea. When reality hit theory, however, a few not-so-minor details got in the way. Like all successful marketers, they worked out the kinks (okay…disasters) and kept trying (and trying, and trying) until they got it right.

Keep the Daddy Daycare lessons in mind when developing and implementing your own marketing plan. Don’t give up, strive to continually improve, and you’re business is sure to be a success.

About the Author Bobette Kyle draws upon 12+ years of Marketing/Executive experience, Marketing MBA, and online marketing research in her writing. Bobette is proprietor of the Web Site Marketing Plan Network, http://www.WebsiteMarketingPlan.com, and author of the marketing plan and Web promotion book “How Much For Just the Spider? Strategic Website Marketing For Small Budget Business.” (HowMuchForSpider.com/TOC.htm ) Copyright 2004, Bobette Kyle. All rights reserved. | Article Source: http://www.EzineArticles.com

Talk soon,
Mary

P.S. If you want to learn more about starting or improving your own home daycare, why not join my e-mail newsletter by typing in your name and e-mail address below?:

I’ve just found a good article about writing a business plan for your home day care.

Here it is:

Developing An Effective Daycare Business Plan

In order for any business including a daycare business to be successful it is advised to do a business plan. By completing a daycare business plan you will be better prepared and know if your business idea is one that you can succeed at. Below are a few steps that you can take when developing a business plan. You can use the information below as well as go to the 2005 Small Business Resource Guide and develop and write your own business plan. If this is more than you think you can handle you can hire an accountant to do this for you, but realize that it can be expensive. Or another way is to go the middle road and utilize a Business Plan Template that will cover all the basics, you will only have to update the information that pertains to your individual business.

Daycare Business Plan Outline A business plan should consist of six (6) things.

1. Cover sheet

2. Statement of purpose 3. Table of contents

4. The Business - Covers Description, Marketing, Competition, Operating procedures, Personnel, Business insurance and Financial data

5. Financial Data - Loan applications, Capital equipment and supply list, Balance sheet, Breakeven analysis, Pro-Forma income projections (profit & loss statements) and Pro-forma cash flow.

6. Supporting Documentation - Tax returns, Personal financial statements, Lease or purchase agreements, Copy of Licenses and other legal documentation and Copy of resumes of all principals

Other things to consider

While developing your daycare business plan their are some things that you will want to make sure that you focus on and decide on in the process. A business plan should be a well thought out process and should not be rushed. Focus on these areas below and it will help ensure that you have a well thought out business plan.

Define Your Business & Vision.

Write Down Your Goals.

Know Your Customers.

Learn From Your Competition.

Count The Cost

By following this information, you should have a good start at creating a successful business plan. Remember in order to have a successful Daycare Business a Daycare Business Plan is a must. This is a start but you will need more indepth informations.

About the author:

To help with this J. Wayne Norris the owner of www.start-a-home-day-care-business.com has compiled his site with information on the subject. Go to his site for information on starting a daycare and information about developing a daycare business plan.

Talk soon,
Mary

P.S. If you want to learn more about starting or improving your own home daycare, why not join my e-mail newsletter by typing in your name and e-mail address below?: