Simpedia

Neil Moore, California

I want to make sure that there is a clear understanding of the nature of Introductory Sessions, and what’s involved in running them successfully. I’ve done hundreds of them, with as few as three people and as many as 300 at a time. At times, in fact over extended periods of time, I have run four Introductory Sessions per weekend, three weekends per month, 12 months of the year. Having done so many, I know what makes or breaks these events, and I know how to complicate them by not having them properly set up. I have trained teachers to do these events, and when they follow the guidelines, they produce consistent results.

Firstly, in the past in Australia, we have done an Introductory Session on each of my last two visits. These were quite different than the norm, and were set up as ‘general information’, ‘meet the founder’, ‘come along and check it out’ type events. However, this is not the usual thrust for my Introductory Sessions. When I am doing these as I usually do, I run them as focused, enrollment events, with one and only one purpose in mind – generating students. I give up my weekends to do them, and I am committed to having the maximum number of students enroll into lessons, whilst they are actually there at the session itself. I create enrollment incentives (discounts) for people who are willing to enroll immediately; I have enrollment forms and pens ready to be handed out. When the crowd is larger, I have pens under the chairs themselves, and I actually hand out a little package which includes a flyer, a copy of an article and an enrollment form. I am set up to accept credit cards for those who wish to enroll immediately, and for larger numbers, I always, always, always, have several teachers available to answer the questions and concerns of prospective students, and subsequently maximize on-the-spot enrollments.

In the proposed Perth Introductory Session, given that there are so few teachers who are ready and able to do groups, we need to strategize. Given that we are working towards maximizing the value of the forthcoming article, which obviously requires the teacher body in Perth to be trained and prepared to handle larger numbers, I am aiming towards using the Introductory Session as an enrollment event but more importantly, a training tool. (It’s the “feed them a fish, teach them to fish” adage.) In order to have the Perth Introductory Session work effectively, I need to as closely as possible replicate the Introductory Session experience that the average teacher can expect to strive towards doing themselves. For the most part, an average teacher will do Introductory Sessions for five or 10 prospective students, not 50 or 100 at a time. Obviously, the nature of a five or 10 student event is profoundly different than a 100 person event. My intention is to try to capture the feeling, intimacy and energy, that can only be achieved by replicating as many of the same conditions as possible. Hence, it is far more advisable to have several teachers at the event, but not so many as to create a disproportionate relationship between the number of prospective students and observing teachers. Likewise, having a large number of current students at these events actually creates an entirely different type of energy to that which is unique to a room full of prospective students. The questions asked are also very unlike the questions that prospective students ask. It becomes a different type of event, which is fine in its own right, but not the purpose of the event we are trying to achieve this time. Furthermore, I have found without exception, that when there are existing students at these events, and they are there with their parents for example, then commonly they wish to come up and say hello, and meet me, and talk to me, and have me meet their children, and talk to their children – all of which I LOVE to do, but none of which helps me address the questions and concerns of the prospective students, who are really the people that the whole event was set up for in the first place.

With regard to having flyers, there are several issues to address here. On a broader look at the subject, my experience in enrolling students is that flyers are unnecessary if the teacher has a source of prospective students available to them. In those circumstances, the teacher doesn’t require the use of any peripheral materials. I personally have experienced that luxury, but not until my foundations were established, and even then, only by building a significantly large enough student body to such a level as to where the referrals that I was receiving meant that I no longer needed to advertise.

In spite of the above, I have always invested in building the foundations of my studios. I have always maintained a multi-pronged approach – letters to schools, flyers in letter boxes, flyers in shop windows, business cards at music shop counters, ads in local school newsletters, ads in the local and regional newspapers, flyers at libraries, brochures at Day Care Centers ˆ I have always maintained a consistent and professional look, investing significantly in image and overall impression. And on top of that, I am always talking to people, talking to people and talking to people.

I stand by the principal of the need for all teachers to understand that the expenditure of energy and money is a completely natural and necessary part of building a business. In coaching teachers over the years, I have never once seen a teacher who is an exception to this, yet I have seen much resistance to this. I have never seen a teacher who has invested significant time and finances over an extended period, not be rewarded with a large, healthy student body, and one that subsequently generates referrals – provided the teacher is well trained, sticks to the program, is well guided and the whole system is well handled.

For the teacher who has very limited resources, they obviously have to work within their limitations. If those limitations are such that it is too costly for them to produce really nice looking flyers and ads etc., then the teacher may chose to do less expensive ads. Unfortunately, I have found that ads which look less than professional consistently produce significantly fewer enrollments. Nonetheless, if advertising and promotional funds are not available, then the teacher needs to find opportunities to talk to prospective students, and those opportunities need to involve little or no financial expenditure. Such opportunities are usually harder to find, there are usually fewer of these available, and they require significantly more effort on the teacher’s behalf. However, if the teacher is committed to growth and has a ‘no matter what it takes’ approach, then its just par for the course, and that’s what’s needed under the circumstances.

More specifically, regarding flyers for the Perth Introductory Session, these may or may not be necessary. It depends on whether teachers want to have prospective students attend, and whether they have their own means of generating them. If they do, then flyers are not needed. If they don’t, then the teacher has a choice to make. It’s as simple as that.

Regarding a suggestion I had about each teacher only needing to have a small number of prospective students attend, there were two components to my thinking. One was merely a suggestion, whereby I was trying to have everybody see that by merely locating two prospects, this still generates significant numbers when duplicated by many other teachers. Essentially it was an attempt to not pressure the teachers. Having said that however, if any new teacher had five or 10 or 20 prospective students that they were wanting to have attend, then they need to be very conscious of having those people well served. I have found that you need to be VERY prepared at these events. If you have eight or 10 people who wish to enroll, but have several questions that need answering in order to do that, then how does one teacher address all the questions of all those waiting, and in a timely fashion? If each prospect needs three or four minutes to have questions answered, and two or three minutes to enroll, that can mean a 40 or 50 minute delay for other people waiting for their turn. It just doesn’t work. Alternatively, the teacher now needs to hope that another teacher is free to handle and enroll students for them, and this is somewhat unfair and potentially impossible if the other teachers are attending to the two or three prospects of their own. Larger numbers can be enrolled in less time, but this requires that the event be handled differently yet again, and not in accordance with what we are aiming to achieve from this visit.

So, there are just some ‘off the top of my head’ thoughts on Introductory Sessions, and the role that any and all teachers need to play when choosing to be a part of such an event.