Manage the group – don’t let any particular mouthy parent/student dominate the discussion/questions.
Have a variety of diplomatic but firm phrases at hand to steer the conversation back to what’s important for the majority of your people. I love the earlier suggestion to bring the tour into a classroom and let them sit and then to ask relevant questions : fantastic!
The real highlight of our greatest tour was the rising sr guide’s enthusiasm- not nutso gung-ho rahrah, it just came through that he liked the school and his experience and was confident about his choice to go there. He had also learned enough about other depts and and activities he wasn’t even involved in to share that with us. Too bad it was a college my kid wouldn’t go to. It really was the best tour, even in pouring rain (he got us umbrellas.) He was very comfortable speaking with parents, too. Great kid and I hope he is successful, rich and happy today.
Yes, manage the group and see if you can stifle the questions that become too specific, too focused on one dept or EC, or where one parent takes over. This one is a life skill. So is finding something positive to say, even if you run into a snafu. Not over-selling, just the right tone.
And OP, don’t take them to the worst rooms, vet them first. One tour took us to a room that was so trashed it should have had yellow tape across the doorway.
A few things:
Hope this helps - you asking shows you really want to do a great job. This probably means you are already a great tour guide! Best of luck!
We bring granola bars or something along when we know this will be the case…but I am not above jumping off the tour in the student union to get coffee and a snack. When I do it, without fail, at least a couple of other parents look longingly at my stuff 
My daughter has toured quite a few colleges. She said she liked the guide at North Texas the best. The young woman remembered ALL of the names of the kids, along with their majors. As they went around the campus, she pointed out things that would be of interest to each kid, and addressed them by name. My daughter was so impressed!
Read this as what NOT TO DO.
http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/1531831-moments-that-make-you-scratch-your-head-during-tours.html
One time we went to tour two rival colleges in one day. It was pouring out.
The first one had a group of 15-20 climbing up and down hills in the rain. I was at the end of the group and could only hear the rain hitting my umbrella. The second one only had two families per guide. The guide tried to stay indoors as much as possible to stay out of the rain while still trying to show us everything.
I guess I liked some of the traditions mentioned as after a while, all the colleges seem the same. Obviously don’t over emphasize it.
I’ll second Midwestdad3’s advice about knowing your audience. Before the tour begins try to speak to each student and find out where they are from, what their interests are, and what places they really want to see on your campus. My son’s tour guide stopped and actually walked back to him and discussed one of his interests and showed him where he should go to explore it further. At the end of the tour she came over to our family and asked us if we had questions and patiently answered them and told my son she hoped she would see him next fall. Another tour guide from this school was very informative, but not as personable as she was. She stood out because of her personal touch.
Congratulations! A good tour guide is a real godsend to students and parents. The more opportunities you have, the harder it is to make sense of them. A good tour guide gets to the heart and soul of a place, which matters way more than the bricks and mortar and ivy.
First off, the fact you bothered to ask for advice indicates you will be a good tour guide. Listening is just as important as what you say. The very best tour guides do what TonyK just described - they make a connection with each kid as the tour congregates and then they tailor comments for each kid’s interest(s) as the tour passes relevant landmarks like the science hall with that specific lab or apparatus, the band practice area, the volleyball arena, the dorm where the Honors Program lives etc… Furthermore, they give a sense of the student body and what drives them.
You have a very unique college experience to sell. And it’s partly because it’s not just a four year thing you offer. I think your school is one of merely about 5 that I could truly rave for. Hopefully you feel that way too and so it will be a joy to describe something you love. But as you know from your own deliberations and decision, you have to address some potential concerns about it being small/remote or that it will somehow “label” you. People may not express those concerns but they are assessing them and it is your job to somehow deal with them during the tour and stress the incredible virtues of the place.
We have a child much like you and we toured a fair number of colleges. The best tour guide we had was so far off the charts from any other it was ridiculous. He happened to say as we talked to him afterward that he had not really intended to apply there (1000 miles from home) but stopped in since he was nearby for a family Thanksgiving reunion and a tour guide changed his life. So it was his mission, four years later, to pay it back by becoming a tour guide and changing someone else’s life. He succeeded with our daughter…
If you approach each tour seeing it as an opportunity to change someone in that group’s whole life, you will be just fine.
Good luck!!
Don’t be afraid to say, “I don’t know, but I’ll get you an answer” and then follow up, ideally before the family with the question leaves the school.
Small tip: everybody wants to see a typical dorm room. If the policy is that you don’t show a dorm room, tell the group that up front.
If the group is large, ask all the students to walk up front so they can hear you and the parents can follow. From what we’ve experienced it enables more interaction. Also, be honest in answering questions. On one tour, we asked a question and the guide asked “do you want the honest answer?” We responded absolutely and she confirmed what we had already thought. It helped determine whether the college was a good fit (it wasn’t). Best wishes!
Chime! with everyone who’s said to project your voice. We’ve toured 17 colleges to this point, and there have been precisely 3 tour guides who spoke loud enough for everyone to hear all the time.
The best we’ve had at this so far was our tour guide at Colgate, who not only spoke loud enough but also made it a point to interact with the students more than the parents.
It’s unclear what types of tours you’ll be doing, but if it’s individual or small group tours, it’s not a bad idea to do what our guide at Muhlenberg did, which was to ask a few questions of the students in her group (name, where they were from, intended majors, any particular interests) and actually wrote down the answers and referred to her notes to make sure she was hitting important points for all the prospective students who were there. Not really workable if you’re doing huge-school cattle-call type tours, but it’s still possible to have a bit of that same sort of feel—our tour guide at Miami managed to point out things that would be of importance to at least most of the 15 or 20 students in her group. (I figure that’s a skill that has to have come over time with serious practice.)
^We also had tour guides that got our email and emailed answers.
I agree that a good tour guide tries to find out a little about students before they start.
The tour guide I remember best was at Caltech, she seemed to be friends with everyone on campus! Other students were constantly saying hi to her and joking with us. I like hearing about traditions - at least the ones that really everyone participates in or at least experiences.
Be honest - our guide at American was in a forced triple, but explained that they all actually ended up really enjoying it and the discount they gave them on room and board. If there are large lecture classes don’t deny it, but explain how many a student is likely to have to take and what the TAs are like and how accessible the professors are.
And if you can’t show off a dorm room (a perfectly reasonable policy) then suggest the admissions office do what some colleges do, have videos that give students a good idea of what the rooms are like. Here’s an example: Carnegie Mellon has floor plans and videos of every single dorm. http://www.cmu.edu/housing/residence-types/residence-halls/boss-house.html
How wonderful that you’re asking!! I’m guessing you’ll be a success simply because you care enough to find out what people want.
The best tours we’ve seen this far have found out the majors of the kids on the tour, and directed as much as possible to the kids. So, for example: “That’s where your Sports Management classes will be” and “Your art classes will mostly be there” type of stuff.
Obviously you’ll want to take care of the basics: know your stuff, be sure you can be heard, don’t walk so quickly that people have trouble keeping up.
Know that some of the kids simply don’t know what to ask, and that others are too intimidated to ask much. So hit the major areas: academics, dorms, social life-- not just the big parties, but things like whether kids play X box and things like the shuttle that gets you into town.
Parents want to know things like banking, medical care, blue lights, career counseling, internships. (Again, if you can tailor those last ones to the majors in your group, it would be great. I would love to hear that you knew someone with my son’s major who had, or is going to, intern with ___)