What Do You Actually Get When You List Your Nursery School on Find My Nursery?

From the parent's first search to enrolments in your inbox: a full walkthrough of visibility, claiming, the dashboard, and the numbers behind itRight now, somewhere in South Africa, a parent is typing "creche near me" or "nursery school in [their suburb]" into Google. That search is happening whether your school shows up in it or not. The question this guide answers isn't really "what features does Find My Nursery have," it's the one a school owner actually asks: what do I get out of this, in plain terms, from the moment a parent searches to the moment they enrol?

It starts with where parents are already looking

Most ECD marketing advice assumes you need to build an audience from nothing. You don't. Parents are already searching, in large numbers, for exactly what your school offers. Our own data on how South African parents actually choose a preschool backs this up: search is where the decision starts, long before a parent ever calls or visits.Find My Nursery exists to sit in front of that search traffic. It's South Africa's largest nursery and ECD directory, with 1,550+ schools already listed across 90+ suburbs and areas, which matters for one practical reason: more parent searches actually land on a real school page instead of nothing at all.

Getting listed: the part that costs you nothing

Every nursery school, creche and ECD centre in South Africa is automatically listed on Find My Nursery for free, permanently. This is the "Listed" tier, and it means your school is publicly discoverable, can receive likes, and shows up in local search, with zero cost and zero setup on your part.

Claiming your profile: from being found to being in control

Here's the part most schools don't realise: being Listed gets you found, but it doesn't get you a dashboard. You can't log in, reply to reviews, or see your enquiries until you claim your profile and move to at least the Essential plan. Claiming starts with a 7-day free trial, no card required, so you can see everything below yourself before paying anything.

See exact pricing and compare every feature side by side →

Inside the dashboard: what each feature actually does

A feature list only tells you so much. Here's what these features actually look like and do once you're logged in, in the order most owners actually use them: manage your profile, then handle what comes in.

Your profile and listing

Essential and up The profile editor, including the live status pill parents see on your public listing.This is where you control everything parents see: your description, opening hours, programme and operations details (capacity, staff ratios, meals, transport, languages), social links, and a live status pill you can flip between Enrolling Now, Limited Spaces, Waitlist, Fully Booked, Tours Available or Temporarily Closed. A complete profile is also scored out of 100%, so you always know what's missing.

Photos and video

Tier-limited Listed schools get zero photos, Essential gets 1, Premium unlocks 10 photos plus 3 video slots.Listed schools show up with no photos at all. Essential unlocks a single photo, enough to put a face to your school. Premium unlocks 10 photos and 3 video slots (YouTube, Vimeo, or a direct upload), which matters more than it sounds like: a profile with real photos of your classrooms and playground is one of the simplest ways to earn a parent's trust before they've even messaged you.

The enquiries inbox

Essential and up Every enquiry in one place, with a direct reply-by-WhatsApp option.Every enquiry a parent sends through your public listing lands here, whether you're on Essential or Premium. You can see who enquired, reply by email or jump straight into WhatsApp, and mark enquiries as read as you work through them. This is usually the single feature that most directly turns into enrolments, simply because it stops enquiries from getting lost in a busy inbox or missed calls.

Reviews and the QR review card

Essential and up, QR card is Premium Reply to reviews from the dashboard, then hand parents a QR code to leave their own.You can view every approved review and reply directly, which becomes a public, threaded response on your listing. Premium schools also get a branded, downloadable QR code card designed to be printed and put up at your school, so parents can leave a review in seconds by scanning it on their phone. If you want a deeper playbook on this, we've written a full guide on how to get more parent reviews for your creche.

Online tour booking

Premium only Parents book a real slot directly from your public profile, no back-and-forth calls needed.This is the most fully-built feature in the entire dashboard. You set your weekly availability, and parents can book a real 30-minute slot straight from your public profile. You can confirm, decline or reschedule, add walk-in bookings manually, and the system handles the email side for you: a confirmation to the parent, a calendar invite to you, a reminder the day before, and a follow-up a few days after the tour so you can tag the outcome (enrolled, lost, or still deciding).

Analytics and Google rankings

Basic on Essential, full on Premium Premium's full analytics view, including how you're actually ranking in Google search.Essential gives you a basic search performance card: impressions and clicks this month versus last month. Premium unlocks the full picture: a KPI grid, a 30-day trend chart, an engagement breakdown, and a Google Search Console rankings card showing exactly which searches are bringing parents to your listing. Premium listings also get automatic priority placement in search results, with nothing extra for you to configure. For the broader picture on getting found in Google search itself, see our guide on setting up your Google Business Profile.

From dashboard activity to actual enrolments

Put together, this is the chain: a parent searches, finds your listing, sees a complete profile with real photos, sends an enquiry or books a tour, and you close it. The two features that tend to move that chain fastest are the enquiries inbox, so nothing gets missed, and, on Premium, online tour booking, since a parent who can book on the spot is far more likely to actually show up than one waiting on a callback.

Already have your own website? Here's why this still matters

Even schools that already have a website often aren't getting the SEO benefit you'd expect from it. A static website only changes when someone rebuilds it. Your Find My Nursery profile is different: it compounds. Every new review, every profile update, every bit of activity feeds back into how it ranks. We've seen cases where a school's Find My Nursery profile actually outranks that same school's own website in Google, purely because it's the page that keeps moving while the website stands still. Think of it less as a replacement and more as a second channel: your website is your owned destination, Find My Nursery is an additional discovery, enquiry and conversion channel sitting alongside it.If your school doesn't have a website at all yet, your Find My Nursery profile effectively becomes one: a real page parents can search for, land on, and act on, with nothing to build or maintain. And it's worth knowing what's coming: Premium profiles are getting a more personalised redesign soon, built to feel less like a directory listing and more like an actual one-page website for your school, with the same dashboard and tools behind it.

Ready to see it for yourself?

Claiming your school takes a few minutes, and the trial is free for 7 days with no card required.Claim your school and start your free trial →Keep exploring:

• Introducing the Business Centre, the data platform this dashboard runs on
• Network partnerships, for schools that belong to a larger group or franchise
• How South African parents choose a preschool
• How to get more parent reviews
• Google Business Profile for ECD centres
• Full pricing and plan comparison

Common questions from school owners