Before a Chinese family reads your website, an agent has often read it first. And decides whether your school makes the list.

Picture this: a Tuesday at nine in the evening, and someone at an education agency in Shenzhen is putting together a family’s shortlist. They open the websites of four Swiss boarding schools. On one, the fees are in a PDF in English. On another, the Chinese version stopped in 2022. The third does not say when admissions close. The fourth answers everything on one page, in Chinese. The family receives two names the next day. Three schools will never know how close they came.

All three logged one more visit in their analytics, with no way of knowing what it meant. That is why I think a boarding school website has a reader almost nobody plans for: the person who recommends before the family writes.

What the survey says.

In 2023, the Boarding Schools’ Association, working with the consultancy Connexcel, surveyed 943 parents of Chinese pupils enrolled at UK schools or in the admissions process. Of those parents, 86.5% named agents as their main source of information, up from 74% in 2021. Next came school websites at 52.5%, recommendations from friends and family at 46.9%, and school visits at 27%.

The agent does more than inform. Among prospective families, 86.27% intended to apply through an agency, and 88.49% of families with a child already enrolled had done so, up from 78% in 2021. When choosing an agency, families valued above all the provision of guardianship services, at 97%, and accreditation, at 96%. And when choosing a school, almost all of them cared about the right match between school and child, at 97.1%, and experience of looking after international pupils, at 95.3%.

What I do not know.

The survey dates from 2023, covers only Chinese families and, as its own authors say, families inclined towards the UK. Beyond the UK, the report mentions the United States, Canada, Hong Kong, Singapore and Australia among the destinations considered, not Switzerland, but that may reflect who responded. I have found no equivalent data for Swiss boarding schools. And I do not know how many of your families come through an agent: only your admissions office knows that, if it records it.

The blind spot: the family checks.

Coming second does not make the website secondary. My reading is different: the family listens to the agent and then opens the website to check whether the agent was right. The fees, the dates, how a pupil far from home is looked after. If the only thing in Chinese is a homepage, that check cannot be done, and the family depends entirely on what it is told. A school that pays no commissions and one that does share exactly the same problem here.

The agent decides who makes the list. The website decides whether the family believes it.

Where I stand.

I believe a boarding school should write its website for two Chinese readers at once. The agent needs complete, fast answers: fees with everything they include, the admissions calendar, the documents and whom to write to inside the school. The family needs to be able to check the same things in its own language, without an intermediary, and to know how admission is decided. I would add a page for agents that says clearly whether the school works with them and on what terms. If your website does not answer the agent, another school will. And if it does not let the family check, the family checks on another website.

What I would check.

• The Chinese version. Whether it has the fees, the calendar, the documents and pupil care, not just the homepage.
• The page for agents. Whether it exists and says whether the school works with agents, on what terms and who answers them.
• How admission is decided. Whether the website explains which steps depend on the school, so the family knows what to expect.
• Where applications come from. How many arrive through an agent and how many directly, and from which countries, over the last two cycles.
• Response time. How long the school takes to answer an agent who writes while it is night in Switzerland.

Where to start.

1. Today

   Read your website as an agent would

   In Chinese, look for fees, dates and documents, and note what is missing.

2. This month

   Count the sources

   Split the applications from the last two cycles by agent, direct and country.

3. This quarter

   Publish the page for agents

   In English and Chinese, with the school’s terms and a contact who replies.

4. Every admissions cycle

   Ask the families

   Ask admitted families what they read, where, and what was missing.

Three questions worth answering before the next admissions round:

• Do you know how many of your Chinese families came through an agent, and how many would tell you if you asked?
• If an agent copies a paragraph of your website into a message today, would a mother in Shanghai understand it without anyone explaining?
• Which fact on your website can the family check for themselves, without going through anyone?

If one of them stays unanswered, that is where the work begins. The Strategic Diagnostic reads your website through the agent’s eyes and through the family’s. Whether to work with agents, and on what contracts, is for your leadership and your legal advisers to decide, not a designer.