Learn 4 Life

Advertising FAQ

Advertising - why we do it differently?

Learn 4 Life is the perfect place to advertise your service in the Educational IT world. However we only carry a very few adverts because of the company’s ethical advertising policies outlined below…

Free CPD and awareness resources

Part of the  success of Learn 4 Life is its free downloadable videos and podcasts. These are used in CPD and awareness training by a lot of CLC’s, Local Authorities, Individual schools, teachers and other educational and corporate institutions. The company is increasingly covering the whole spectrum of innovative education and resources in the UK - from pre-school to Higher Education and into adult learning.

Early adoption and innovation

Because it was a very early adopter of both audio and video podcasts Learn 4 Life has built up a steady following over the years. There’s no hype or heavy selling - there’s nothing to sell. We just go out and film and tape stuff that people want to hear and watch. Often unique and specialised content but this is where to get it. The company often invest heavily in new products or services to trial and show the educational community as well.

A unique approach to advertising - we hardly have any!

You will notice this site has a very pared down look and very, very few adverts embedded in the pages -  certainly no Google Adsense ads. Part of the reason for this is that a lot of people subscribe by RSS to Learn 4 Life content but the company also has a very ethical stance on advertising.

As CEO, I like to keep the site clean and uncluttered - easily searchable and tagged. Probably over-tagged at the moment.

Advertising through Commission

Learn 4 Life is increasingly commissioned to make films about educational change and innovation, and so, for the most part, it exists outside the advertising bubble using this mechanism.

Trust

The company chooses partners very carefully as the “brand” - if you want to call it that -  has a reputation for truly independent consultancy and in the other areas of the company we make sure nothing compromises or dilutes that community trust.

Independence

This enables us to get access to individuals and institutions where unique and groundbreaking education is happening - we have a reputation of trust and esteem within the educational community that not only allows us freedom of editorial but also access to leading edge practice. In this way we owe no allegiance to larger companies or organisations but at the same time we can report and document without constraint. It may mean we have less revenue but at least we are free to be truly independent.

Controversy

Sometimes that means the site may put out controversial and socially disruptive messages but in the field of innovation and fast-paced change that can only be a good thing and a springboard for ongoing debate in this area. In fact we are finding that the messages that were once considered controversial are becoming more and more mainstream as early adoption turns into standard practice…

Partners

Learn 4 Life’s advertising partners have often found a way to distribute their service at free or very reasonable rates - they are clever enough to know how to offer value added services to schools and colleges but also contribute to the educational community without the need for big capital outlays and the implications that has in passed on costs - they are often emerging Web 2.0 social media savvy organisations who know how to give excellent service and are highly engaged with the educational community already.

We hardly ever embed ads in videos - why? It is a big earner?

The company is rarely willing to put a pre / post roll advert in a podcast or video because we know educators hate it - simple as that.

We could enable the advertising on blip and other channels we push through but find that that is counter-productive. Teachers have very little time even to watch relevant videos - the last thing they want is ads getting in the way of viewing.

They want to watch at their convenience and ad free and we are continuing to trail video pushed out to smart phones and other platforms - we don’t want to waste educators time no matter how lucrative that may be for us.

When we do use advertising or brand - it is highly contextually relevant;  funding for this usually comes from academic, non-profit, or highly innovative organisations/ commercial firms who supply services through Open Source or other social media markets.

The average stay time on our pages is 7 minutes which would be enough to convince any advertiser because that is an aeon in terms of market “eyeballs” but we still won’t turn on the ads - we value the community’s opinion above all income made in this way…

How social media is used

As CEO of Learn 4 Life I regularly engage with the educational community on Twitter as @eyebeams. it is not done as a sterile PR exercise - I engage with the community on there fully, offering advice and free consultancy in the form of finding and disseminating any resources I find on the web that could be useful to educators - if, during my research, I find an excellent resource, I’m more than willing to share it for the benefit of the whole community. It’s part of my passion.

So how is Learn 4 Life sustainable as a business if it doesn’t carry advertising and it doesn’t sell anything? You must be mad?

Quite possibly…

People often ask me - how do you make money in this climate when you give everything away? Well it is becoming increasingly harder but I find that the contacts and networks the company has built over the years has enabled opportunities for an income stream in the most unusual areas at times. The company makes money through private consultancy, commissions, talks and paid-for services in philanthropic projects mainly.

As CEO I also do private consultancies for commercial companies and presentations which feed straight back into making media and other resources for the education world. The more you engage with a community and deepen your understanding the more insight you gain into new economies and market opportunities - it has its advantages as well as drawbacks. The one exception is, I do not give talks or presentations for free, quite simply because I could spend a large part of the year doing these and the personal financial outlay makes it prohibitive.

So what is your “business”?

The “business” of Learn 4 Life is twofold, as an ongoing lifelong personal development project and to document highly innovative and effective educational practice that can lead to personalised learning and change in education. If it sells anything - it sells ideas, aspiration, innovation and change.

Reach

The viewing stats for Learn 4 Life this year have been constantly rising and because of this with many people willing to follow us to get information on the broadcasts and resources we find our scope for disseminating and documenting change can only get bigger and the message get out to more people. We are forging new collaborations and are always open to commercial opportunities in this area.

Why we block PR firms on Twitter

Learn 4 Life does not encourage PR firms to follow us on Twitter if they are not involved in education or blue skies ICT development - we block several inappropriate followers on Twitter each week. Fortunately we find even more teachers and innovators are following because of our content than inappropriate feeds.

When we do carry advertising…

The company rarely offers advertising in the form of a short video or still image inserts before and after the current videos or series of video interviews for the reasons we give above. Like audio podcasts these are often highly ‘viral’ because the files are downloadable and can be used elsewhere for CPD. For example, the Open Source Schools videos had a phenomenal view rate in the last two weeks of January but we didn’t put in any advertising because it was a philanthropic project. But if we do accept an ad from you - you can be sure it will will travel far and wide with the broadcast and have the added plus of being associated with a “brand” that values its client base.

So if you are truly innovative…

and have any service, idea or scheme that is invaluable to teachers -  then get in touch. If Learn 4 Life  has a “brand” as such - it is one of putting educators first, cherishing teacher innovators, advisers and forward thinking policy makers. We find them and show what they do to as wide a group of people as possible - it’s as simple as that. If you have a great educational service (or very exceptionally) a great product, then get in touch. We can do business together.

Contact us at : dfee [at] btinternet [dot] com for more info.