Archive for the 'martial arts software' Category

The Importance of Monitoring Your Stats…

Published on December 29, 2009 in dojo management software and martial arts software. 0 Comments

Today I want to share with you THE SINGLE MOST IMPORTANT FACTOR to creating and then making a full time school a success…

But first, let’s take a trip down memory lane…

At this time of the year I like to give myself a report card, just like at school. And yes I still get butterflies in my stomach waiting for the results. For a moment I imagine myself sitting on my bed waiting for my parents to get home from parent/teacher night… ready to “have a little talk” with me.

Jump ahead 20 years and the folks aren’t there anymore to kick my butt when it needs to be kicked. Nobody is there to tell me that I better make some changes or real soon I’ll be flipping burgers at McDonalds, if I’m lucky.

Nope, as a business owner something you need to do constantly is to assess how you and your dojo are doing. It’s important to monitor certain factors, at minimum each quarter and preferably on a monthly basis, and then also do a 12 month comparison.

These are the stats I use to monitor the “health” of my school each month.

  • # active students, total, and by age group
  • $ total gross revenue
  • $ product sales
  • $ expenses
  • student attendance frequency
  • # new enrollments
  • # drop outs
  • % conversion from trial class to full student

Then every 12 months I ask:

  • Did we achieve the goals set for this year?
  • What improvements did we make for students, instructors and families?
  • Are my students still enjoying class?
  • Am I still enjoying teaching full time?

These key indicators help you keep your finger on the pulse and allow you to make corrections and improvements at the first sign of any negative trends. Without knowing your stats it’s impossible to know for sure what needs improving, and you can spend a long time chasing your tail or make changes to things that don’t require it.

The biggest thing I’ve learned from running my own business for the last 7 years is that EMOTIONS can tell you lies, but STATISTICS always tell the truth. So it’s critical to monitor those figures.

If you want to teach full time and open your own school, start treating it like a business from now on, and a hobby no longer. Get serious, invest your time (and maybe a little money), know your stats, continually make improvements and before you know it you’ll be sailing to the promised land…

To your success!

- Jason

P.S. I monitor the stats I talked about above using the KarateTools Dojo Organizer. You can learn more here.

Saved by the report…

Published on August 25, 2008 in dojo management software and martial arts software. 0 Comments

Summer is a particularly hard time for many schools with students taking time off. Personally this year we’re doing better overall than 2007 (up approx. 10%), however July was still our most challenging month.

We do our own billing but recently I’ve fallen a little behind on the administration side of my business, despite 90% of it being automated. When I ran my “Overdue Report” this morning, I just found an extra $1,104.00 which hadn’t been charged in August!

Yikes! I almost cheated myself out of $1,104!

Several years ago before I got organized with my dojo management software, I’d never have found that mistake. Granted back then it wasn’t that much, but still I’m sure I missed $100s with sloppy paperwork and hand written receipts.

  • Key Point: For long term success and rapid growth of your martial arts school you MUST be organized!

This one report today uncovered those students who hadn’t yet paid this month. If I missed that over the course of one year, we’d be talking about over $13,000 in lost tuition fees!

$13,000 lost is enough to sink many schools…

That’s why I built the KarateTools Dojo Organizer - to help me and you stay organized and keep our martial arts schools sailing smoothly. The small monthly price for the service in my case is 1.8% of the *recovered* tuition.

(Obviously I don’t charge myself for the use of my software, but I do pay the hosting company which works out about the same.)

In other words for every $1 I spend in staying organized, I recover $54 in lost revenue.

That’s smart.

How much are you losing in missed tuition fees?

Are you sure?

How do you really know?

How do you stay organized and keep your ship from sinking?

Don’t count on your students to keep tabs on their tuition payments. While some will be proactive and let you know if you’ve messed up, many think it’s your job to look after that. And quite frankly although some will know that you haven’t billed them they won’t say a word hoping to get some freebies…

Take control of your financial matters and your school will sail to the promised land. Ignore it and it’ll sink to the icy depths of the ocean floor.

- Jason

P.S. To learn more about the KarateTools Dojo Organizer, go here:

http://www.karatetools.com/

Are you a lazy karate instructor?

Published on July 21, 2008 in karate instructors and martial arts software. 0 Comments

Since summer has been a little slower for the club I was excited last Thursday when I had 12 new karate students enrol in my intro program…

Woohoo!

And the thing was I didn’t do anything recently to create this influx of students.

I didn’t do any kind of special promotion…

Nor actively look for these new students.

The phone rang and I answered.

Email arrived and I replied.

People walked in and I helped give them what they wanted.

Because of the way my martial arts business is set up, I get a steady flow of students over the year from a variety of sources, and then every now and again I get a wave of new students, and when this wave hits, I’m so glad I’m organized. I just punch in the data into my martial arts software, and avoid drowing in the paperwork.

It allows me to stay on top of things. It allows me to *remember* details about people that I speak to, or who try class. It allows me to get to know my prospects before they become students. This helps me to build a relationship with them – and when people become emotionally invovled the decision making process is easy.

This is a key point that many martial arts instructors miss – they are lazy when it comes to returning phone calls, replying to email and taking the time to help prospective members discover why they should choose their school. They are lazy when it comes to building relationships.

Don’t be one of them.

Take time to help your prospects choose you and not your competition, and your karate school will thrive.

- Jason