Hi Selena,
There’s no doubt King’s Chester is impressive: award-nominated, academically strong, and proud of its pupils. And the ad touches all the right bases: a clear Open Day message, a warm invitation, and helpful detail.
But here’s the test…
Imagine a parent scrolling at speed — phone in one hand, school tabs open in the other, head full of deadlines, diaries, and dinner plans. Would they see this ad and know it was St John’s? Would they get a sense of what only you offer? Or would it blur into the same reassuring-but-generic noise we’ve seen from dozens of schools?
To a parent scrolling Facebook with a half-eaten sandwich in one hand and school search tabs open in the other, your ad might look... like everyone else’s.
That’s not a dig, it’s a pattern. We’ve analysed over 100 school ads running right now in the UK, and most sound eerily similar. Same phrases. Same format. Same promises.
So we built a simple test, just a mirror. A moment of reflection. If you passed your ad in the wild, would you know it was The King’s School Chester? Would a parent?
The King's School Chester in the Wild
This is your current Meta ad. Let’s look at it through a parent’s eyes.
What’s Working
✅Great clarity: The logistics are solid. Parents know exactly when, where, and who the Open Day is for.
✅Proof of prestige: Mentioning the award shortlist is smart. It adds external credibility and positions the school as a top-tier option in the region.
✅Inclusive image: The photo choice is positive, showing a mix of uniforms and diversity—but it’s more of a formality than an emotion-grabber.
What’s Getting Lost:
🔁 No real human voices: No mention of student perspectives, parent stories, or lived experiences. A single sentence about “hands-on activities” doesn’t cut it when every school is saying the same thing.
❌Static structure: It leads with the date, not the reason to care. There’s no headline or hook to stop the scroll—just another event announcement.
Without being too cringy - this causes something called paradox of choice. When every option looks the same, people don’t feel empowered. They feel overwhelmed. So they scroll past, not because they didn’t like what they saw, but because nothing stood out. If you're not subverting the pattern, you’re at risk of getting skipped over.