Member Question:

I’m struggling with “younger karate students” (Little Ninjas, Little Dragons….etc) who enroll and after 2 months want to “quit”.

I offer shorter terms for their age groups, but it’s frustrating when the parent’s won’t even comply with them.

Thoughts??

Answer - Toby Milroy

We see this issue VERY often at NAPMA.

Keep in mind we work with Thousands of Martial Arts Schools in 26
countries, and this is a “universal” issue.

The core of it is how you are “programing” your clients.
I saw in this post that an owner was using “month to month” tuition
agreements.

What message does this send to your students?
How are they now “thinking” about your program?
You are by “culture” teaching your clients that at the end of every
month, they are “deciding” to wither continue or quit.
(counterproductive)

In contrast, if you are asking for a 12 month commitment at the outset
of the relationship, you are now “teaching” the client that this is a
MINIMUM of a 1 year decision.

What we see with schools all over the world, is the more of a commitment
you ask your clients to make the more “serious” they take your program,
and the better your retention will be.

We all know that suing for every defaulted membership isn’t realistic,
but CERTAINLY you need to be setting the expectation YOU WANT for your
students to have.

It’s a dis-service to the entire Professional Martial Arts Industry to
structure your programs, or present any image to the client that puts us
in the same category as a seasonal “sport” or activity like Baseball,
Soccer, Football etc…..(and counterproductive for you in your school)

Our contribution to society, and our commitment to our students is so
much more significant, that we ALL need to be doing everything we can to
eliminate ANY reason for a parent to “think” about our program in the
same way. If you are training your clients to have no commitment, you
are shooting yourself in the foot, and frankly, de-valuing what we do.

At the root of it all, many school owners lack the “self-confidence” to
ask for a significant commitment (especially for younger students)or in
some way feel it’s somehow “unethical” to ask for a significant
commitment.

When in truth, you get what you ask for, and frankly, a student really
can’t learn the lessons we can really teach them in 2, 4, or 6 months.

**The “Nuts and Bolts” answer is, you should treat the 4, 5 and 6 year
olds EXACTLY the same as the Youth classes, and the Adult classes (so
far as it related to term and price etc….) there is simply no good
reason not to. The schools I speak with EVERY DAY at NAPMA that are
performing at the highest level require exactly the same level of
commitment as the rest of the students.**

-Hope the insight was helpful-

I’d HIGHLY recommend you surround yourself with people who will give you
the confidence and help elevate your expectations, and people who have
schools that consistently perform at a HIGH level year after year,
decade after decade!

Feel Free to visit:
www.NAPMAFreeOffer.com <http://www.NAPMAFreeOffer.com>

Toby Milroy
Vice President, Marketing - NAPMA
National Association of Professional Martial Artists

Wow, as I write this, the Election is winding to a head in the coming week.   Everywhere you turn is election coverage and headlines on the economy!

I notice that the headlines the other day were about Obama’s description of our economy being the worst since the great depression (ignoring for whatever reason the 6% unemployment rate vs. 25% then!) and, all of the commentators tell us about how bad things are looking.

You know it’s getting bad when just about everyone you talk to asks:  “Is this economy going to hurt your karate schools?”

To all of them I should be saying:  “Geez thanks for the little extra “negative programming” as if I couldn’t get enough by reading the newspaper, magazines, from the radio, or by turning on the television….gee I can’t even watch “Boston Legal” without both parties interrupting me to tell me how scared I should be about the economy!   In the mean time guess what?  The rich get richer… the poor get poorer.  Those who study and learn maintain their business while gaining market share, or skyrocket to the top.

In my case we just added regional developers for many areas including likely New Zealand, the UK, along with Miami, Salt Lake City and possibly Knoxville and Ft. Lauderdale!  We’re gearing up a Northern Virginia Mile High Karate training center and even talking to my instructor Jhoon Rhee about working with us in Mile High Karate.

My schools?   Well, record intro numbers.  Certainly some of the parents are “concerned” about losing their job or the effects of all of this “economy stuff.”  Frankly, most of our school owners and regional developers SHOULD be worried about the tax increase over $250,000 if Obama wins and, making sure it affects them!

On another front I noted that the media said not a word about the cost of a barrel of oil DROPPING to $63 a barrel or about OPEC being lead by IRAN worrying about cutting production due to falling demand in order to keep the price stable!   Wasn’t the crises dejour just recently about $150 a barrel oil and how that was going to kill us all?

Anyway, back to running martial arts schools in today’s economy.

Last month I gave you three things to focus on.  Remember what they were?

The First was:

Turn off the TV and stop listening to the Mediocre Majority.

Second was:

Create “Raging Thunder Lizard Evangelists” among your students.

Third was:

Do A LOT more marketing.    Spend more on advertising and marketing.  Invest time and energy focusing on lots of new students.

To move it to another level.  In an unstable economy you should focus on prospective students who’s income is most likely to be:  STABLE.   To run an effective business it’s important to find customers (students) who can afford a reasonable tuition rate.

I’m ready Dan Kennedy’s latest which is NO BS Marketing to the Affluent.   It’s right on target with what you must do in your school.

For year’s I’ve called this:

“Fishing in the right pond.”   What that means is IF you are continuing to raising your tuition and now hearing “I just can’t afford it.” Then one possible problem is that you are marketing to the wrong people.  There are plenty of people in most markets who can afford your tuition, market to them.

I was having a conversation a couple of days ago with Inner Circle Member Jonathan Metcalf about this.  In his case it was the opposite.  He was having blowback on:  “that’s a lot of money for martial arts lessons.”  Upon further exploration it turned out that a couple of things were happening.  First, a lot of the enrollments for kids were with only one parent.  In other words, mom brings “joey” down for classes, says dad doesn’t need to be here and then goes home to try to sell her husband.   That doesn’t work very well.

Next problem was that just about all of the enrollment conferences were being done on the first visit.  Now, if they are referrals or came in from birthday parties or something maybe that works fine.  However, if they have not been well introduced to your school then that can be a problem.  I’ve always preferred two lessons and the conference after the second lesson for kids.  And, always REQUIRE both parents at the conference and at the intro classes.

But, let me clarify.

Tom Hopkins distinguishes this way.  A Condition is something that you legitimately can’t change or “reframe.”  Ie. I can’t enroll through Black Belt because we are moving to another state in three months.  Not much you can do about that.   An objection is something that you can handle or answer and still “make the sale.’

When it comes to pricing a condition is:  I’d love to but I don’t have a job and we can’t afford bus fare to get to classes.  An objection is:  “that’s a lot of money for martial arts classes, we don’t think it’s worth that much.”

During your introductory process if you are getting much of the later… in other words many people are saying that it’s not “worth” what you are charging then you have a serious problem with the introductory class and process.  The reason for Mile High Karate that we’ve created such an elaborate introductory process along with videos that support the process, lots of parent testimonials, and an elaborate benefits based introductory process.

All the way along the process it’s very important to build value.  Done properly you should never have a student say the price is high.  Some will say they can’t afford it.  If you have many saying they can’t afford it then you are likely “fishing in the wrong pond” ie. Bringing prospective students who are unable to afford to take lessons in your school.

Now, none of this is a value statement.   You are welcome to create a scholarship program or find other ways to accommodate those who otherwise can’t afford your tuition.  However, in order to be truly charitable it’s useful to first turn your school into a properly running and highly profitable business.  Once you  make your school very profitable do then it’s possible to create scholarship programs (in Mile High Karate we aim for between 5 and 10% of students on scholarships of some sort, usually for special needs students in addition to those who have financial needs.

Failure Mindsets continue to wreck havoc on otherwise successful school owners:

I’ve encountered many counter productive mind-sets recently.

Many years ago in a fortune cookie I received a “fortune” that said:   “Expect no gratitude and you will never be disappointed.”   I kept that one taped in the front of my day planner for years (until I moved to my Palm Treo.)  From staff, students, and friends it’s proven accurate many times over the years.  Dan Kennedy describes it in horse racing terms as “They all go lame.”  As teachers we know that unfortunately most every student will drop out sooner or later, unfortunately most sooner not later.

In our circle I’ve seen several metaphorically pull out a pistol and with great concentration aim at their foot and blow off their big toe.  One recently started working with me and went from $14,000 a month to $37,000 a month and then decided they had “arrived” and with only a few months of new found success decided to stop working with me and become an “expert consultant.”   Another recently joined our master-mind group and decided that after a $100,000+ improvement in results  that they were “too smart” for the room and moved on.

Be very careful about deciding that you’ve arrived.  Start growing and continue to grow.

More feedback from Extreme Success Academy.

I continue to hear from raving  fans of the Extreme Success Academy.   It was an incredible event that exceeded all expectations.  Unfortunately some scheduled themselves too tightly and flew in a little late, or left on Saturday missing some of the best content on Sunday morning.  If you missed this event, you should be kicking yourself.  Some of the highlights will be seen in member materials, but the entire event other than edited highlights won’t be made available.

For all events, often the “hallway conversations” along with the small “round-table’ discussions are often the most valuable.  I know for a fact that MANY school owners are going to have a record fall, and a huge start in 2009 due to the new ideas and implementation plans that they put together from the event.

Your Quantum Leap
The next live event is coming up in March.  It’s completely different and, completely different from anything we’ve done.  A FREE Bonus for members only is “The Ultimate Martial Arts Marketing Bootcamp” which previously has been $2,750.   I’ve volunteered myself to have to work double time, this time covering Marketing A-Z and, covering the primary financial drivers for your school at the same time.  We’re still nailing down the speaker roster but clearly I’ll be put to work thoroughly.

What are your guaranteed to learn?

Well we’ll be covering sales and persuasion thoroughly.  We’ll be covering the new student introductory and enrollment process in depth:  Pricing, handling objections, building value,  moving prospective students through the process smoothly.  We’ll teach everything you want to know about upgrades and renewals.  Building value.  Using social proof and creating real value throughout your program.  And, ultimate strategies for student retention and creating a flood of Black Belts.

Of course, in the Marketing Bootcamp we’ll be covering everything you need to know in 2009 to fill your school with new students.  One day will focus on what’s working currently on the Internet.  How to generate on-line traffic, leads, and appointments.  Another day we’ll cover direct response marketing thoroughly with an emphasis on many different media but especially on using direct mail.  Finally, we’ll cover every known strategy for generating referrals, family add-ons and other internally generated students at little or no cost to you.

In the past participants in just the Marketing Bootcamp has universally left confident that they could add $100,000 or more to their school.  Follow-up on these showed that the universally EXCEEDED their expectations!   You’ll implement new strategies that will truly let you take a “Quantum Leap” in your financial results.