MA Business Success 76: Not-for-profit Schools

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Phil Britten:
Hey, and welcome back to 2017 podcast with TIMA Martial Arts Business Success. My name's Phil Britten ...

Graham McD:
Graham McDonnell.

Phil Britten:
Well, Graham, you've been away for about six weeks.

Graham McD:
I have been. The joys of having a great business partner, a great system in place with the staff; I can go away and feel comfortable the place is pumping. So I've come back and I'm catching up with everything.

Phil Britten:
We've been doing some catch-up podcasts in January, just because of our time away. Both have been away but Graham has definitely been away, which has been good. We're up to episode number 76 which is fantastic. We've really got to revolutionise a yes or [inaudible 00:00:44] made a bit of a switch this year with some offers, some opportunities, for you to take action on us helping you.

One of them that I want to talk about is the free online course called the Introductory Martial Arts Boot Camp. We've had a tonne of people join onboard with that there. You see, last year I created a course, its a free course, there's a lot of great material in there. It's like the 1 0 1 of running business, you know. We've got a yearly marketing counter that we use, year after year. We've got Instructor Assessment sheets that you can download, four levels of Instructor download sheets. You can literally download those sheets, you can assess your instructors and see where they're at; and there's also some reception check-lists in there for your admin staff, as well. That's absolutely all free; plus some other video course material, as well.

What do you need to do to get that course, that free course? Head to our website tima.com.au. Scroll down, you'll see it there, free course, get in there and enjoy. Enjoy the free course stuff.

Graham McD:
Hey guys, just again, a massive shout out to Phil for really sort of getting his hands in there and really kind of putting a new spin on things. There's a tonne more content that's in there, great free stuff. If you are a current member I'd get in there, guys, there's a stack of new material for 2017. A great place, that we've spent a lot of time really kind of developing, but also implementing in our own business to be able to serve you guys. Get in there and have some fun.

Phil Britten:
Cool. So, episode number 76, what's our topic for today? Well, today's topic comes from someone who reached out to us, Frank Royer, I believe he's from Sydney; possibly has a BJJ School, I think, I hope I'm right. He's a none for profit school. I've had this, actually, quite a fair bit, where people reaching out saying "I've got a non-profit school ..." Funds are limited, obviously, because non for profit school. They've got another job, as well, a day time job which probably funds a little bit of the non for profit school; but they want to be seen, they want more students.

This is a bit of a tricky one, I think, and whether you're a non for profit ... there's probably a few out there, not many ... Or whether you're a school that's just ticking over, I think this podcast is going to be really helpful for you, as well. I guess let's touch on non for profit, you know. If that's your thing, high-five, well done, congratulations. But you are going to hit a glass ceiling, you are going to hit a point where the growth of your school is dictated by how much money you put into it. You've got to ask yourself where is that money coming from? Is it coming from your other job, your other job's supplying the cash flow for your non for profit? Your student numbers are supplying the running of the school but there has to be some profit in the end. Graham, what's your take on this?

Graham McD:
Look, this one's really quite a touchy subject for some people. I know that in the years that we've done this, being professionals often we've had the die-hard martial artists who've said we've sold out; we've sold out because we're charging for martial arts. I remember when I first started training, it was $2 for three hours, in the ice-cream tin and away you go. It really wasn't a huge profit sort of school. But, at the end of the day, we've resigned ourselves to know that we charge for martial arts but we reinvest most of that money back into our students. To really help give them a better level of service, give them more opportunities to develop themselves. Really, I guess that's the thing that, as a martial artist, you've got to understand.

Non for profit, great, fantastic; but what is your goals and instructive? Do you want to change the life of one person? Or many people? That's something that we've done, by having resources or finances there to be able to expose ourselves and be able to reach more people allows us to change more people's lives. That's our drive, our goal is to help people develop themselves, be a better person, change their community, change their family. To do that, unfortunately nowadays it does require some capital to do that. That's why profit can be a dirty word for some, when used in the wrong way and just keep it for yourself; but we definitely look to reinvest that back into it and expose it to more and more and more people.

Phil Britten:
One of the biggest failing points in any business, for that matter, is that they actually don't reinvest their money back into their staff, into their culture, into their business; they do take the money and run, so to speak. Just touching on non for profit, I think what we have to remember is that at any point of growth of a school, whether it's a non for profit or a profit school, if you want to grow you're going to have to spend more time in it. If your non for profit school's got 50 students, you've got a day time job, it's functioning fine, it sits around that level, you've just got to ask yourself is that the lifestyle you're happy with? In the level of instruction that you can give.

If you want to grow more, you're going to have to spend more time there. Either removing yourself from your day time job to use more time in there, or, having someone else run that school for you, which means you're probably going to have to pay them. You know, if cars just ran on love, I'd be rich myself, because I'd just plug that in. At the end of the day I think what you've gotta do is go ... I always say reverse engineer the end goal. What is the end plan, and work backwards. If you're happy with that life-style, if you're happy with that input and output, then why change? You don't have to be a million dollar turnover school, you don't have to do it full time, you don't have to do this, you don't have to do that. If you're happy, you're happy. That's all that really matters.

Graham McD:
Yeah, for sure. Let's get down to the nuts and bolts ... Let's forget the profit side of things because I know that most schools are "How do I get more exposure?" Really, that's, I guess, the point that the guys are talking about, whether you charge, you don't charge, whatever. It's how do you get yourself seen? I know that we've done a lot of this stuff throughout 2016, years before, and we'll be currently doing that in 2017, is getting out into our community. Be seen that way, because Google ads, you know, anything you do online is important, but it costs money. Whereas time investment going to school fetes, if that's your target audience, kids, or, where is your audience ... What is your niche client, where do they reside, where are they doing business, where is their attention at?

That's something, you've got to make sure that you're in front of those people when they're in that ... Not in buying state, but just when their attention is there. So, for us, in particular, we're big on kids' martial arts, family friendly, so we look at events. Think during school holidays, where are the kids, where are their attention? Let's make sure we position ourselves there so they can see us, come up and talk to us. Again, adults, where are their attention throughout the year, or different months? It's important to understand what's your niche client and where is their attention; and make sure you're in front of those guys.

Phil Britten:
Absolutely. So, while you're speaking there, I'm thinking of how I can best describe what I would do. If I was in a point where I was Jim, you know, like I've got lucid funds and I want to grow my school. This is what I would do, and I just thought of it [inaudible 00:07:30]. I would write a list, like three or four lists. The first list would be what are all the no cost marketing things that I can do, like no cost. Things like going to see businesses ... List some, Graham, what are some no cost things?

Graham McD:
[crosstalk 00:07:44] business, business ...

Phil Britten:
Referrals, all that stuff. Like whatever low cost ... Do a big list of low cost. Sorry ... no cost. Then do a list of low cost. Then do a list of medium cost and high cost. Then, basically, what you're going to do, is you're going to spend x amount of your time on all the no cost activities. You're going to find out what money you have to invest in marketing, and you're going to try and figure out what's the low cost, medium and high cost things, and "What's going to be my best return on investment?" You may not know that, because it always changes, the environment changes, the economy changes, the community changes; but you have to test and measure.

What you don't want to do is go "Oh, I'm paying for SEO, I'm paying for Facebook, but not doing this." That's your quickest way to failure. It takes, on average, 16 to 20 times for someone to see your brand before they make a buying decision; so you need to spend a lot of time hitting the pavement. Get out there in your community, as Graham said, you've just got to hit the pavement, work hard, do all the low cost, no cost things ... As many as you can, because that's all you can do. Then you go "All right, I've got x amount a month to spend on this one high cost thing." Test that for a month, two months, three months, does it make any different? Switch, change.

Test and measure, test and measure, test and measure; but don't take your eyes off ... Don't just focus on the paid stuff, don't take your eyes and focus off the no cost or low cost things, as well.

Graham McD:
I know you hit the nail on the head saying test and measure, and something that businesses will do, and martial arts schools, they will record the inquiries that come in. The source, where did they come from, that gives them a pretty good idea of how the leads are coming to them. We go a step further and actually record how they join. For example, we may have had 10 people join, 20, 30, 50 people in a month ... Where did they come from? So, not only the inquiry and find the source, but what got them over the line? What made them a better client? For example, we may have found 10 people joined, actually joined the school, from a Facebook ad. We may have had 30 or 40 people inquiries in our system, but jeez, that ad was pretty good; that actually got the person not just coming in the door but to join.

So, you've really got to follow the trail down the hole because you may have had 30 people come from that really high-paid ad but zero of them joined. When you talk about return on investment, that was a great way to get them in but something stopped, something happened as a road block. Whereas you did this really quite low cost event and 10 people joined from it. What happened there? Again, return on investment, test and measure, not just on how they're coming in, but follow them down the hole and make sure they're converting as well.

Phil Britten:
Excellent. Guys, well, look, there's some great information in there to help you get more clients, more leads within your business. There are so many strategies out there, you can just ... This is what I would suggest, too, don't just look at martial arts businesses for your ideas for marketing, all right? Look outside the square. Like what are other businesses doing to market? What are their low cost, no cost, things that they're doing, and how can you bring that into your martial arts industry. That's how you really start innovating something.

All right, we've given you some ideas, some thoughts, some things to go and think about, maybe talk to your team about. If you have any questions about what we spoke about, if we hit a chord, or anything that comes to mind, please, give us a shout out and you can email us at [email protected]. It's been a while, we've been away on holidays. It's [email protected]. Send through your questions for the podcast.

I just want to give a shout out to one of our sponsors, Hyper. Hyper have come to the party, especially in 2017, with helping our community out. Hyper have a membership platform called Hyper Pro School. Pro School you get access to the Hyper which is the tricking type curriculum, and also fight club, as well. These bits of curriculum are great add-ons into your school, so if you're looking for a little bit of a flair, a bit of a flavour, a bit of a change for an up-grade programme or maybe just to put some spice in your current curriculum, I suggest go out and check out Hyper. Go check out the Hyper Pro School, and if you use the code TIMA ... T-I-A ... T-I-M-A ... Jeez, I'll get it right ... Then you'll get a hundred dollars off each month of their package there. Which is pretty cool, hey, Graham?

Graham McD:
It's awesome, but there's stacks of stuff in there. Bullying stuff, you name it, it's done for you so you don't have to reinvent the wheel which is always a great thing and something we actively use in our schools which is awesome, as well.

Phil Britten:
Last but not least, as we spoke about in the start of this podcast, we have the free course which has got some great material in there for you, as well. As a podcast listener, we're going to give you a really sort of behind the closed door access at our paid membership. We have a paid membership access for $99 a month, now because you're a podcast listener, or viewer, all I'm going to say is we're going to give you "Try 5 for 5." So, try five days for just $5, and you get to have a bit of a look at what's in that material there, see what it's like to be a member, make sure ... Check it all out and make sure it's up your alley, and then after those five days then you can follow on with your membership. If you go, again, to our website, tima.com.au scroll down and see the complete martial arts business solution. You'll see it's worth $99, you type in for the code 'try 5' ... that's T-R-Y and the number 5, you're going to get 'Try 5 for 5' which is $5 for five days.

What more could you ask for, guys? Get in there, get your elbows dirty and have fun this week, guys! We'll see you on the flip side.

Graham McD:
Take care.