Mastering the Martial Arts Business

by Anonymous

August 15, 2004 -- Mastering the Martial Arts Business:
How Do You Get 100 New Martial Arts Martial Arts Students for your Martial Arts Business Per Month?
By Stephen Oliver, MBA

For more information about Growing your Martial Arts Business:
http://www.ExtraordinaryMarketing.com

For many years my bench-mark for my Martial Arts Business (for 4 Martial Arts Business) was that I needed a base level of 100 enrollments per month to keep my gross where it needed to be and to keep my Martial Arts Business growing.

Often I would get asked what do you do to get 100 enrollments per month for you my Martial Arts Business consistently? Often this was a difficult question to answer because is was always a mix of methods and of media.

For more information about Growing your Martial Arts Business:
http://www.ExtraordinaryMarketing.com

The Parthenon approach is compared to the great structure in Greece. Image the roof is all of your new Martial Arts Students for your Martial Arts Business each month. Each support pillar is a different way to generate intro traffic: newspaper, TV, radio, direct mail, sign, referrals, after-school programs, flyers in the schools, parent appreciation days, buddy days, gift certificates auctioned at schools or on the radio, birthday parties, mall shows, faxes, telemarketing, internet, etc., etc. The ideal is to have multiple channels for developing new enrollments and to keep them active and viable at all times.

Even though I know better – I have fallen prey to the "diving board" approach at least twice (keep in mind when something is working REAL WELL) it is easy to fall prey to the principle.

First. In the early 90's I was driving on average 200 to 250 info calls per month to my schools using a mix of our major daily newspaper (ROP – run of the paper + TV guide ads) and broadcast Television (Ophra, Ninja Turtles, Power Ranges, TV News, etc.) These major media buys – although costing $150,000 to $200,000 per year were driving plenty of Martial Arts Students to my Martial Arts Business and were relatively hands-off an non-labor intensive. Things were cranking along nicely when for some inexplicable reason suddenly it stopped working (or more appropriately I should say that a $50 to $75 info call started costing $300 to $600!)

Second, I had one of my Martial Arts Business that we were really filling up with two ideas – after school programs and flyers directly to the elementary and middle school kids. Suddenly just as we were peaking with 100+ intros a month from these sources – the school district decided to generally shut down these types of activities and specifically to shut us down. Whoops! There goes ALL of our intros.

NEVER, NEVER, NEVER rely on just ONE pillar for developing new Martial Arts Students for your Martial Arts Business.

Stephen Oliver, MBA is a 7th Degree Black Belt, owner of Mile High Karate in Denver, Colorado and Author of Extraordinary Marketing.

Learn how to Grow your Martial Arts Business at: www.ExtraordinaryMarketing.com

This article is courtesy of http://www.silatonline.com
You may freely reprint this article on your website or in
your newsletter provided this courtesy notice, the author
name and URLs remain intact and clickable.

Submit Your Article