“It’s been a pleasure to work with Pedroza Communications on this important project. They combine expertise in marketing and education, with a real passion for ensuring that EdTech can make a positive impact in schools.”

Nesta is the UK’s innovation foundation helping people and organisations to bring great ideas to life. As part of their work around education they launched a partnership with the Department for Education (DfE) to support more effective use of technology in education. Part of the DfE’s EdTech strategy, the EdTech Innovation Fund and EdTech R&D Programme involved 18 EdTech companies. It was designed to help them with product improvement, evaluation and testing, and scaling their businesses.

One of the barriers to success for the EdTech companies was limited expertise and experience in schools marketing. Nesta approached Pedroza Communications in 2021 to develop and deliver a programme of support which included:

• One to one support and guidance to help develop marketing plans
• Training about the schools market in England
• Resources and tools to support aspects of marketing

Research and planning

Our first focus was to understand more about the EdTech companies so that we could tailor support to meet their needs. Building on our existing expertise, we surveyed the companies identifying a range of needs including business wide issues, strategic marketing plans and more tactical advice and support.

We also felt that it would be really useful for EdTech companies to hear direct from school leaders so, using our networks, we recruited school and Trust leaders to provide advice to the companies on approaching schools.

One to one support

We worked with each EdTech company to agree a focus for our work together and provided one to one support including:

• Advice on marketing strategy
• Review of marketing messaging and guidance
•  Advice on marketing mix and tactics
• Help with a specific issues

The English schools market

To help the EdTech companies understand more about the schools market we designed and delivered a training webinar about the schools’ market covering:

• Messaging to schools
• Engaging and connecting with schools
• Common EdTech challenges
• The impact of the pandemic on the schools market

The training also included a Q&A with the chair of a multi-academy trust who also led an EdTech business, as well as practical case studies of EdTech marketing approaches.

Impact

All of the EdTech companies felt that that the support had a great deal of impact, with one saying: “External counsel is having a significant impact on our planning and operations” and another adding: “The advice and insights provided were incredibly useful and far exceeded our expectations.” In particular the evaluation found our support had helped to:

• Increase confidence in marketing
• Improve marketing strategy
• Inspire new ideas and thinking
• Support and enable positive internal conversations

Feedback from Nesta

“It’s been a pleasure to work with Pedroza Communications on this important project. They combine expertise in marketing and education, with a real passion for ensuring that EdTech can make a positive impact in schools. The EdTech companies have been really positive about the support they’ve received and how it has contributed to their ability to engage and promote themselves to schools.”

Sylvia Pau, Assistant Programme Manager, EdTech Programme, Nesta

 

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