Nursery marketing
Marketing for nurseries, starting with the free channels
Where parents actually find a nursery, what each channel costs, and which ones a good website makes cheaper. The honest version, with the DfE figures.
Nursery marketing is everything that gets a local parent from not knowing you exist to booking a show-around: your website, your Google Business Profile, reviews, directory listings, word of mouth, open days and, if you choose, paid search. For most settings the free channels do the heavy lifting, because a parent searching “nursery near me” 165,000 times a month in the UK is already looking for you.
How parents choose
The Department for Education asks parents every year. For children under five, the top factors in 2024 were convenience (64%), reputation (57%) and the type and quality of care (56%). Word of mouth was the most used information source at 44%, followed by the school (36%) and social media (24%).
Source: DfE Childcare and Early Years Survey of Parents 2024, published 10 July 2025.
Convenience means distance
Parents search by neighbourhood and station. A website with a page for each district you draw from answers the first question before it is asked.
Reputation means reviews
Google reviews and daynurseries.co.uk. The regional Top 20 awards there need at least five published reviews. We build the review request into the settling-in process and respond to every one, in your voice.
Quality means showing, not claiming
The report card, the key person approach, a typical day, the food. Facts a parent can check beat adjectives, and they are what AI assistants quote.
The channels, honestly
| Channel | What it costs | What it is good for |
|---|---|---|
| Your website and district pages | Build once, £50 a month care plan | Every other channel sends people here. The place fees, hours and the report card live. |
| Google Business Profile | Free | The map result for "nursery near me". Photos, hours, reviews, posts. Set up in every build. |
| Google Ads | £2 to £6 a click in Essex towns, top bids over £10 (DataforSEO, Sept 2026) | Fast, and it stops the day you stop paying. We do not run it. |
| daynurseries.co.uk and Childcare.co.uk | Free listing, paid upgrades | Reviews and the Top 20 awards. Worth claiming and keeping accurate. |
| Meta ads | Ad spend plus management | Open days and recruitment. Some specialist agencies do only this. |
| Local authority Family Information Service | Free | Where the DfE says charges can be published. Parents on funded hours look here. |
| Word of mouth | Free | 44% of parents. Helped by a site that is easy to forward. |
What we offer
The website, then an optional search and AI visibility retainer that works the free channels above every month. Nothing else.
Local
£497 a month
10 keywords
Ten keywords, usually your town and the two or three districts around it, plus AI visibility work on the same pages.
Choose LocalArea
£1,997 a month
50 keywords
Fifty keywords across every district, room type and search phrase you compete on, plus AI visibility, for groups or settings in dense boroughs.
Choose AreaWhat a nursery website costs here
- Starter from £1,495, live in 2 to 5 weeks
- Nursery from £2,995, live in 3 to 5 weeks
- Group from £5,995, live in 4 to 6 weeks
Fixed price, quoted in advance. The care plan is £50 a month and covers domain, hosting, backups and updates; it is optional. Search and AI visibility retainers start at £497 a month. Full pricing.
What nursery owners say
Firefly Nursery
The team designed and developed our new website and continue to work with us on an ongoing basis through their SEO and AI Visibility package. They’re helping us strengthen our presence on Google and across emerging AI search platforms, so more local parents can discover our nursery online. It’s great having one team looking after both our website and our long-term digital visibility.
Oak Tree Nursery
We wanted a website that really captured the warmth and personality of our nursery and gave parents confidence in choosing us. The finished website does exactly that. It showcases our setting beautifully, explains what we offer clearly and makes it incredibly easy for prospective parents to arrange a visit or get in touch.
More enquiries from local parents
Our new website has made a huge difference to our online presence. Parents can quickly understand what makes our nursery special and easily take the next step to arrange a visit. We’ve had fantastic feedback on how professional, welcoming and easy to use the website is.
Questions nursery owners ask
Do you run social media for nurseries?
No. We build the site and work on search and AI visibility. For paid social there are specialist nursery agencies, and we will say so rather than sell you something we do not do well.
What is the cheapest thing a nursery can do this month?
Claim and complete the Google Business Profile with real photos and current hours, publish the fees page properly, and ask the last five families who settled in for a Google review. All free, all in the Starter build.
Is recruitment marketing?
For most settings now, yes. Seven in ten cannot staff to capacity (NDNA, June 2025). A careers page with real vacancies and the job-posting markup that Google reads is in every build above Starter.
How do you advertise your nursery?
Most enquiries start with a parent searching for childcare near a place they already know: a station, a school, a high street. In practical order that means a page for each district you draw from, a Google Business Profile kept current, real reviews from current parents, a fees page a parent can read at 10pm without ringing you, and listings on the directories parents actually use. Paid ads work but are rented: "nursery chelmsford" costs £4.43 a click.
What is the best way to market a daycare?
Answer the questions a parent asks before they enquire, on pages they can find. Fees and funded hours, ages per room, opening hours, what a day looks like, how far you are from the station. Settings that publish those plainly get fewer time-wasting calls and more show-arounds booked. Word of mouth still fills most rooms; your website is where word of mouth goes to check you.
Is a nursery a profitable business?
Margins in UK early years are thin and depend heavily on occupancy and the gap between the funded rate and your cost per hour. That is why the website matters commercially: the difference between 82 per cent and 92 per cent occupancy is usually a handful of enquiries a month, and those enquiries start with a search. We are not accountants and this is not financial advice.
How much does SEO cost in the UK?
Small-business SEO retainers in the UK usually run from about £300 to £2,000 a month. Ours are £497 a month for ten search phrases and £1,997 for fifty, both including AI visibility, both rolling monthly with 30 days notice. Anything charged as a percentage of your revenue, or sold with a ranking guarantee, is worth walking away from.
How much does a nursery website cost?
A nursery website in the UK costs between about £1,000 and £6,000 as a one-off build, plus £20 to £60 a month to keep it running. Ours are £1,495 for a single setting of up to eight pages, £2,995 for an established nursery and £5,995 for a group of two or more, with a £50 a month care plan on top. Monthly-only offers from £15 to £40 exist, but you usually rent the site rather than own it.
Start with the website. Add the rest only if it earns its keep.
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