Most flight school owners we talk to have run an open day at some point. And most of them will tell you the same thing: they posted about it on social media a few days before, unlocked the hangar, and waited for people to show up. A handful did. Nobody enrolled. They concluded open days don't work.
The thing is, open days do work. They're probably the single highest-conversion lead generation tool a flight school has access to. But they only work when you treat them like a structured marketing exercise, not a hope-for-the-best morning at the aerodrome.
We've spent enough time around flight schools — and run enough marketing for them — to notice a pattern. The schools that convert open day attendees into enrolled students do a few specific things differently. None of them are complicated. Most of them are things you could put in place before your next event.
The Four-Week Promotion Window
If you're promoting an open day less than two weeks before it happens, you're relying entirely on people who already know your school exists. That's not an open day — that's a catch-up with existing contacts.
The schools that fill their open days start promoting four weeks out, and they structure those four weeks deliberately.
Weeks one and two are about awareness. Social media posts introducing the event, email to your existing database (former enquiry contacts, discovery flight attendees who didn't enrol, lapsed students), a Google Business Profile event listing, and a dedicated landing page on your website with a registration form. The landing page matters more than you'd think — it gives you a URL to point every piece of promotion at, and it collects contact details before the day.
Weeks three and four shift to urgency and conversion. Countdown posts. "Limited spots remaining" messaging when your registrations hit a threshold. Retargeting ads to anyone who visited the landing page but didn't register. A personal email from the chief pilot or head of training to registered attendees the day before, confirming the schedule and building anticipation.
If you're running an open day around a seasonal demand peak — school holidays, early spring when people are thinking about new activities, the start of the academic year — extend that to six weeks. Seasonal open days have a bigger potential audience but they take longer to reach.
What Actually Happens on the Day
Here's something we've noticed: the flight schools that convert well from open days run the event like a structured experience, not an open hangar.
That means a defined schedule. Registration on arrival. A welcome briefing that covers safety and the day's structure (this is also a CASA requirement if people are going near aircraft). Then a rotation through stations: a classroom session where an instructor explains the training pathway, a hangar walk where they see the aircraft fleet and meet instructors, and the centrepiece — a discovery flight or cockpit experience.
The discovery flight is where conversion actually happens. Someone who sits in the left seat and feels the rudder pedals respond for the first time is experiencing something no brochure or website can deliver. That moment is why they chose to attend. Don't rush it, and don't treat it as an afterthought.
Pricing Psychology on the Day
Should you charge for the discovery flight? Yes. A reduced rate — somewhere around the cost of your standard discovery flight minus 30 to 50 percent. Free flights attract people who came for a free activity, not people considering flight training. Charging a modest amount self-qualifies your attendees and covers your direct operating costs.
More importantly, have a specific enrolment offer available only to open day attendees. A discounted first lesson package. A waived registration fee. A training credit applied to their first five hours. The offer needs to be real, time-limited, and presented clearly during the event — ideally right after the discovery flight, while the experience is still vivid.
Schools that present an enrolment offer on the day convert significantly better than schools that just say "contact us if you're interested." The difference is the difference between someone making a decision while they're standing in your hangar and someone intending to call you next week.
The Follow-Up Sequence That Most Schools Skip
Here's the part that almost every flight school gets wrong. The open day ends, everyone goes home, and nothing happens. Maybe a "thanks for coming" email. Maybe.
The schools that convert 20-plus percent of attendees into enrolled students have a follow-up sequence that starts within 12 hours and runs for at least two weeks.
Within 12 hours: A thank-you email with a photo from the event and a clear restatement of the enrolment offer, including the deadline.
Within 48 hours: A phone call from an instructor to anyone who expressed interest but didn't enrol on the day. Not a sales call — a "how did you find it, do you have any questions" call. The instructor is the right person to make this call, not an administrative staff member. The personal connection matters.
Day seven: A second email with a student testimonial and a reminder that the event-exclusive offer expires soon.
Day 14: Final reminder email with a hard deadline.
After 30 days: Move anyone who hasn't converted into your regular email nurture sequence.
This sequence sounds like a lot of work. It isn't. Most of it can be automated with a CRM and email marketing tool. The only manual step is the 48-hour instructor phone call — and that single call is responsible for more conversions than everything else combined.
How Often Should You Run Them?
Three to four major open days per year is the right cadence for most flight schools. Align them with seasonal demand: early spring when daylight hours are increasing, school holidays for younger demographics, and early autumn before weather windows narrow.
Between major events, offer regular weekend discovery flight sessions. These are lower effort to organise but keep the pipeline flowing. The major open days should feel like events — something worth clearing your schedule for. If you run them monthly, they stop feeling special and your attendance drops.
What This Means for Your Website
Your website plays a specific role in the open day cycle: it hosts the landing page, it collects registrations, and it's where the follow-up sequence drives people back to when they're ready to enrol.
If your website can't display a clear event landing page with a registration form, or if your enquiry form is buried three clicks deep, the promotion work you did in weeks one to four is being undermined by the destination you're sending people to.
If you're wondering whether your flight school website is doing its part in this process, that's something we can look at for you. Get a free aviation marketing audit at offthegroundmarketing.com.
The Bottom Line
Open days work when you structure them. Four weeks of promotion. A defined schedule on the day. A discovery flight that creates an emotional connection. A specific enrolment offer presented while people are standing in your hangar. And a follow-up sequence that starts the same evening and doesn't stop until they've either enrolled or told you they're not ready.
None of this requires a marketing degree. It requires treating your open day like what it actually is: the highest-conversion marketing event your flight school will run this year.
If you want someone who knows aviation marketing to help you plan and promote your next open day, book a 30-minute proposal call — we only work with aviation businesses.
Or start with a free aviation marketing audit and we'll tell you what we see.
