# What's the Issue When It Comes to Students?



## kayrellie (Mar 13, 2019)

Hey everyone, I'm new here and wanted to get a perspective from you instructors!

I'm curious to hear what is your biggest problem when it comes to the student community side of things for your school. (Student Retention / Getting New Students / Certain Empty Classes at Certain Times etc.)

If you want to know why I ask, I'm a martial arts student that wants to make a career helping instructors fix their problems and just wanted to hear from others to make sure I'm on the right track


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## Monkey Turned Wolf (Mar 13, 2019)

Both the original post here and the 8-page discussion afterwards may help with your question, if you haven't seen this yet.

New Student: when will you quit?


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## isshinryuronin (Mar 13, 2019)

kayrellie said:


> Hey everyone, I'm new here and wanted to get a perspective from you instructors!
> 
> I'm curious to hear what is your biggest problem when it comes to the student community side of things for your school. (Student Retention / Getting New Students / Certain Empty Classes at Certain Times etc.)
> 
> If you want to know why I ask, I'm a martial arts student that wants to make a career helping instructors fix their problems and just wanted to hear from others to make sure I'm on the right track


First of all, it's hard to teach something you have never done.  So, you want to make money by giving advice on how to run a dojo?  I'll be happy to tell you since I ran a successful Kenpo school, but I'll need to deposit your check first.


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## isshinryuronin (Mar 13, 2019)

kayrellie said:


> Hey everyone, I'm new here and wanted to get a perspective from you instructors!
> 
> I'm curious to hear what is your biggest problem when it comes to the student community side of things for your school. (Student Retention / Getting New Students / Certain Empty Classes at Certain Times etc.)
> 
> If you want to know why I ask, I'm a martial arts student that wants to make a career helping instructors fix their problems and just wanted to hear from others to make sure I'm on the right track


Actually, the secret is _esprit de corps._  How to develop that is my secret (until I get my check)


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## kayrellie (Mar 14, 2019)

isshinryuronin said:


> First of all, it's hard to teach something you have never done.  So, you want to make money by giving advice on how to run a dojo?  I'll be happy to tell you since I ran a successful Kenpo school, but I'll need to deposit your check first.


putting words in my mouth lol. I ran my past business online but I didn't enjoy it, sold it recently, so I'm moving into martial arts with my experience, helping instructors integrate online strategies with their business but I'm seeking what exactly they can use it for in terms of their problems. I asked for thoughts but thanks for the laugh


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## Kung Fu Wang (Mar 14, 2019)

If you teach your students

- 6 new techniques every class, they will love to come to your class. The problem is they may learn a lot but they can't use any of those techniques.
- only few techniques in 6 month time period, they will be able to use what they have learned. But they will get boring and may quite soon.

Everybody want to be a good fighter. But a fighter's training can be very boring and not fun.


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## Kung Fu Wang (Mar 14, 2019)

A teacher can teach a student a certain technique. That teacher can also take that technique back from that student. Do you know how to do that?


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## jobo (Mar 14, 2019)

kayrellie said:


> Hey everyone, I'm new here and wanted to get a perspective from you instructors!
> 
> I'm curious to hear what is your biggest problem when it comes to the student community side of things for your school. (Student Retention / Getting New Students / Certain Empty Classes at Certain Times etc.)
> 
> If you want to know why I ask, I'm a martial arts student that wants to make a career helping instructors fix their problems and just wanted to hear from others to make sure I'm on the right track


the main issue is that a lot of ma instructors , club owners are not good businessmen,  those that are get accused of running a mac dojo. 

if classes at a certain time are empty, then the classes are at the wrong time, even my local church has caught onto this, when they moved their morning service to 5pm and trippled their attendance. 

if you open a dojo, somewhere with cheap rent, but you need an armed guard to make it from the carpark, your not going to get a lot of middle class students.


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## isshinryuronin (Mar 14, 2019)

kayrellie said:


> putting words in my mouth lol. I ran my past business online but I didn't enjoy it, sold it recently, so I'm moving into martial arts with my experience, helping instructors integrate online strategies with their business but I'm seeking what exactly they can use it for in terms of their problems. I asked for thoughts but thanks forF the laugh


Fair enough.  Now you're talking about something I've never done - online mkt'g - my  dojo ownership days were pre-internet.  Still, development of esprit de corp, getting a core of loyal and motivated students is key for retention and word of mouth outreach.  No doubt on-line mkt'g is the thing now.  Each dojo may have its own "culture" whether its combat oriented, competition, sport, kid oriented or traditional, and so the target market will differ.  Good luck.


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## kayrellie (Mar 14, 2019)

isshinryuronin said:


> Fair enough.  Now you're talking about something I've never done - online mkt'g - my  dojo ownership days were pre-internet.  Still, development of esprit de corp, getting a core of loyal and motivated students is key for retention and word of mouth outreach.  No doubt on-line mkt'g is the thing now.  Each dojo may have its own "culture" whether its combat oriented, competition, sport, kid oriented or traditional, and so the target market will differ.  Good luck.


appreciate your thoughts my friend thank you


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## kayrellie (Mar 14, 2019)

jobo said:


> the main issue is that a lot of ma instructors , club owners are not good businessmen,  those that are get accused of running a mac dojo.
> 
> if classes at a certain time are empty, then the classes are at the wrong time, even my local church has caught onto this, when they moved their morning service to 5pm and trippled their attendance.
> 
> if you open a dojo, somewhere with cheap rent, but you need an armed guard to make it from the carpark, your not going to get a lot of middle class students.


fair point! can't believe I didn't think of it that way myself the first time around. that's true, bad foundations can't be fixed no matter how good things are done for them online


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## jobo (Mar 15, 2019)

if your a marketing guru, then you should know,  that the issue is selling something which your customers think of as tangible and valuable. and that's where ma has a problem, as often they are selling something that is intangible and of unproven value.

if you have a combat basis, like saying boxing, success is blatantly obvious, but then there isn't mass market appeal for being punched in the face 200 times a week, so your target audiance  is suitably reduced to mostly young men who have aggression issues.

if your selling fitness, then your in open compiticion with 100s of other outlets, like say boxercise which has most of boxing benifit with iut getting punched,  but just about any sport or dance class is your competitor.  and how do you pitch your level of fitness ? to much and the middle aged wantebes are out off,  to little  and the and the young and able will go and do something more challenging.

self defence classes  are largely a con trick, the fit and able may get tangible benefits, but there not the ones who sign up for self defence, that's largely the weak and vulnerable.  if you can get enough gullible people to stay long enough to make it profitable is the question.

then theres people who have get a Black belt on their bucket list,  if you catter to that profitable market, your a mac dojo.

going with something fashionable, like km,or bjk,gives you a better chance, but only till the fashion changes

write up a business plan that addresses these and a lit of other issues I haven't time to point out, then go and sell it to poorly attended unprofitable  clubs, and you should do quite well


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## WaterGal (Mar 16, 2019)

kayrellie said:


> Hey everyone, I'm new here and wanted to get a perspective from you instructors!
> 
> I'm curious to hear what is your biggest problem when it comes to the student community side of things for your school. (Student Retention / Getting New Students / Certain Empty Classes at Certain Times etc.)
> 
> If you want to know why I ask, I'm a martial arts student that wants to make a career helping instructors fix their problems and just wanted to hear from others to make sure I'm on the right track



The biggest problem we have on that front, I think, is when we have students who are disruptive to the class/community. We don't get a lot of them, but it's always a struggle when we do. How many chances do you give someone to improve their behavior, before you have to kick them out for the benefit of the other students? If you're offering benefits like focus, discipline, etc, to kids who are lacking in those things, you don't want to kick out a kid the first time they act out. You want to guide them to have better behavior, give them a chance to improve. But at the same time, they're negatively impacting your other students, who eventually will leave if they're always having to be around classmates who are disruptive or mean. So it's a tough thing to balance.


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## Dirty Dog (Mar 17, 2019)

WaterGal said:


> The biggest problem we have on that front, I think, is when we have students who are disruptive to the class/community. We don't get a lot of them, but it's always a struggle when we do. How many chances do you give someone to improve their behavior, before you have to kick them out for the benefit of the other students? If you're offering benefits like focus, discipline, etc, to kids who are lacking in those things, you don't want to kick out a kid the first time they act out. You want to guide them to have better behavior, give them a chance to improve. But at the same time, they're negatively impacting your other students, who eventually will leave if they're always having to be around classmates who are disruptive or mean. So it's a tough thing to balance.



Depends on exactly what the problem is. Small problem, more chances. Bigger problem, less chances. Big enough problem, no  chances.


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