Recently I came across some videos I did for a station in 2007. Every Friday we’d hit up a high school football game, dance with the cheerleaders, throw shirts or whatnot into the crowd, and take LOTS of video. The students loved it! Honestly, so did we! We had a blast at every event. At one game, I challenged a 10 year old to a hotdog eating contest. The little things like this can make such a huge impact.

When creating promotions, you don’t have to ONLY look at the big picture. Find out what schools near you have events coming up: Easter Seals fundraising, homecoming games, dances, sports…pick one a week and show up! Make sure you call the school first and clear it with the athletic director and principal. Announce every Monday where you’ll be that week. Have students call in asking you to come by for their event.

Order station gear specific to what you’re doing. We threw out little footballs with our station logo on them for the Friday Night Lights games. You can have generic giveaways like phone cases with your logo, pop sockets, lanyards…

School is out in about a month for everyone. A lot of grade schools have end of the year competitions (water balloon fights, scooter racing…) Those are prime opportunities to show your face and get the kids involved.

School pranks are still a thing…can you get involved? Obviously, you need to make sure it’s a legal prank and something that won’t get the kids in trouble.

These are all prime opportunities to gather a ton of footage and content for websites and social media. Bring someone who’s job is only to take pictures and get video. From this you can create Tik Tok vids, Facebook and Instagram Reels, youtube videos…keep the footage and reuse it.

Clearly, you don’t want to step on sales’ toes. If it’s something that’s sellable, let them know your ideas.  When it comes to schools, the more you get involved, the more your station will be seen.