I’ve worked with ABC Learning Centres for almost three years now. This is from the days of Eddy Groves and over 1,200 centres to the realities of today where they work with receivers to keep as many centres open as they can. While the business operation of ABC has been constantly changing, the one thing that doesn’t change is the fact that childcare is a bloody important (and necessary) service which lends itself to being an extremely passionate topic of conversation.

With this in mind, I am happy to (and will shamelessly) promote the new forum developed by ABC and our agency, DP Dialogue. It’s called Childcare Chat and it is a forum for current, past and potential parents to ask questions and share experiences with each other.

Over the years, one of ABC’s biggest battles has been constant negative word of mouth between the public and in the press. This extends to online dialogue across a number of platforms but especially in parenting forums. Social networks are hugely popular for mums, however, ABC did not have a strategy in place to join in these conversations. The idea of this forum is to bring the majority of these conversations back to a centralised place where we can have parents who can talk to each other to better understand childcare and if needed, ABC will join in.

We know we have parents who love ABC. We have parents who don’t like ABC. We know both sides can be very vocal, willing to express their opinions and share their stories. This forum will give parents considering and attending childcare a balanced and unbiased support network. It’s bound to have its ugly moments but it will also have its positive stories. As long as it means that real stories and real dialogue will be exchanged, it means that Australian parents have a great resource at their fingertips in their childcare decision process.

As expected, within the two weeks of launching there has already been negative (and hugely biased) press about the forum. ABC tends to attract this. However, it’s good to see blogs such as mUmbrella and Online Community Engagement recognise the progressive actions ABC are taking in this forum. Fellow DP Dialogue’er Matt Granfield posts more about the development of the reasoning behind the forum here.

This is a big jump forward into the social media realm for ABC. There’s no huge structural or technogical development but the potential to move the ABC brand forward is massive. Feel free to have a look as marketers, advertisers and social media professionals and let me know what you think.

www.childcarechat.com.au

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