Marketing 101

The tween is actively looking for work. Unlike her sister, who has been perfecting her role as a sloth and does in fact think money grows on trees, S has been thinking of ways to earn some money. She resolved to drum up some babysitting gigs, and asked if I would help her.

Yesterday, she pulled out her babysitting manual (yes, she is that anal, and yes, I know where she gets it from) and went to work creating a strategy. She spent a few hours last night working on a resume, which is not the easiest thing to do when you are twelve, or forty-five, for that matter.  I might hire her to work on mine, if I wasn’t so busy harvesting the money off the trees and providing a good sloth role model for my teen. She took another hour to make a flyer, adding way too much clip art, which is how you know a twelve year old girl made it.

After creating her marketing materials, S wanted to hand them out today. I told her I thought it would be better to walk the neighborhood to look for her target demographic then just sticking them in everyone’s mailbox. The truth is, we live in a maturing neighborhood, one without too many young children, and I didn’t think all the teens and adults and potential sex offenders needed my daughter’s email and phone number. I felt it would be more effective to walk instead of driving so we could pay attention to each house and how to tell what families might actually need a baby sitter. Also, we only printed twenty flyers in color, and I wasn’t about to waste them on people who don’t even have children.

We started out with a stack of flyers and began walking away from the house. I decided our walk could be a teaching opportunity, building on what she already learned yesterday with her desktop publishing. “Tell me what you are looking for.” I said to her as we walked.

“Houses with swing sets or toys in the yard,” S said.

“That’s a good place to start,” I said. “Check cars too, for stickers. Look for activities or preschool magnets. High school stickers let you know that family doesn’t need a babysitter.”

We saw a few houses with swing sets and those little pink jeeps that are all the rage in the under-five category. She opened those mailboxes and stuck in a flyer.

“These people are probably out of town. See that stack of mail?” I said to her. I tried to eyeball the post, looking for Pottery Barn Kids or Hearthsong catalogs, but decided actually going through the mail might be some sort of violation of federal law.

We walked on, and S noticed that a few houses had a bunch of SUV’s with monogrammed stickers parked outside.

“Those are probably teenagers, because they have girly stickers and aren’t in a garage,” she said.

“Good. And see that house? How long do you think they have been out of town?” I pointed to one with a pile of newspapers in the driveway.

“Hmm, looks like four days,” she said.

“I think you’re right. Don’t forget to look inside open garages, too, for clues. Look for small bikes or toys or those plastic cars.”

We continued to walk, and our observation of the houses intensified.

“Those people are doing some holiday shopping. See all the boxes on the front step?” S pointed out a house with lots of packages. “And those people look like they really enjoy boating. They even have a couple of tubes on top of their boat. Ooh, and those people must have just moved in. All those boxes.” She was really getting into it now.

As we walked along, it occurred to me that I didn’t just help S figure out where to leave her babysitting flyers. I taught her how to case the neighborhood. We knew who had young kids and whose were older. We knew which houses were vacant. We knew who was out of town and who had company. We knew who left their garage doors open and who had dogs and cats. It’s pretty amazing how much you can learn about your neighbors just by paying attention during a little stroll around the block.

“Well, if you don’t get any calls to babysit, at least you learned how to find potential houses to rob. So there’s that,” I said to her.

We stopped in front of our own house to examine a large hunk of dead tree trunk that must have fallen over some time over the past few weeks.  We don’t spend much time checking out our own front yard, so it was kind of curious to see a hollowed out tree lying across it.

“No one would stop to rob us,” S said. “Our yard is a mess. Look at it. Half a tree trunk. Leaves everywhere, and dead bushes that need to be dug up. And the grass is a weird beige color, and it isn’t even winter yet.  Clearly we don’t have enough money to hire someone to clean up this crap.”

“Very observant of you,” I said.

By the time we walked inside, S had received her first response to her ad. It was from a man who wanted her to dog sit over the holidays. Nowhere on the ad did she mention anything about pet sitting, and since she isn’t really all that comfortable or experienced with dogs, she told him no. I was proud of her for knowing her limitations.

If she doesn’t get any more calls, we might have to take another walk around. Only next time, we will be looking for unlocked cars and lots of store bags or shipping boxes. Maybe we can practice hotwiring some golf carts or something. Or maybe I can just pay her to clean up the dead tree trunk and rake the leaves and spare her a life of crime.

Anyway, if you are looking for a babysitter, just let me know. She’s Red Cross certified, and she knows where you live.