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| Email 3 of 3: Why I Love Teaching Group Lessons... and Would Never Go Back! |
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During the last three weeks, I have sent you an incredible amount of information.
- How to get parents on board a group program
- Lies and myths about group lessons
- An in-depth interview with a successful group teacher
- A case study of a young teacher who converted a studio to group
- My blueprint for success in group lessons
- My roadmap for setting up a group studio
What more is there left to say?!?!?
That is the topic of today’s lesson. We tie everything together today.
I want to give you a sense of the experience of teaching group lessons.
This email will take about 7 minutes to read --- and is worth every minute of your time.
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| Then and Now: How My Studio Changed |
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| I began teaching in 2004.
By 2008, I had about 50 students. It took about 38 hours per week to teach all of them. At the time, I was teaching a mix of students in studio and on a travel schedule.
I had a problem. I needed to make more income with the limited time I had in my after-school hours.
And… I didn’t want to teach on the weekends!
I remember thinking: “If only I could teach a full work week … 40 hours of studio time. I could do an amazing amount of business with this job! But, that would require having 80 students at a half hour each…. It just can’t be done!”
I was right. It couldn’t be done using the model that I had. I had to think outside the box.
Thinking outside the box changed my career!
When I began to add groups into my teaching, I began to see changes in my teaching studio.
Here’s the number of students I averaged per month for the year:
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And here’s the average number of hours I worked per week:
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You’ll notice the sharp drop in hours worked in 2013… that’s because I completely ended my away lesson schedule at the end of 2012.
When I ended that schedule, I lost MANY students who didn’t want to travel to me.
I quickly replaced them with new students… that I put into group lessons!
This resulted in a drop of almost 10 hours per week of “in studio” time.
It felt glorious. It felt like freedom!
My average daily calendar during the school year looks like this:
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I’m in the studio from 3.5 to 5 hours per day. I have enormous amounts of free time… while making six figures a year.
No bragging. Just facts.
People have asked me how I’ve had time to create a blog, create videos, work with other music schools, travel, and read as much as I do.
You are looking at the reason right here!
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| How You Could Make This a Reality in Your Studio |
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For this final email, I wanted to give you one more helpful “HOW TO” guide.
Here’s what you would need to do to live the reality that I’ve just shared with you.
Over a dozen teachers that I’ve worked with have made the plunge in the last year (including Jon, who I wrote about on Wednesday).
And they did it much faster than I did! Instead of taking years... they did it in a matter of just a few weeks or months.
Why?
I didn't have a guide. They did.
You could do this too!
Here’s how:
1. Begin with the End in Mind
You need to nail down your outcomes.
Do you want to jump in head first and convert your entire studio? Or, would you rather “test the waters” first with just a few groups?
If the thought of converting your entire studio stresses you out, then maybe start with a single group. Or two.
If you are the kind of person who just "jumps in" (like me), then go for it!
You know yourself… what will make this fun? Make THAT plan and go with it.
2. Invite Families into the New Format
If you have visions of some huge rollout, dozens of phone calls, tense conversations with parents, and a huge amount of work… well, then my plan isn’t the plan for you.
My idea involves inviting people into something new.
Seth Godin (a philosopher and brilliant businessman) can offer us some advice here.
Don’t force it.
Use permission-based sales.
Create something good… and then invite people to enjoy it.
Now, that involves knowing HOW to create something good.
More importantly, it involves knowing HOW to persuasively show parents that this new format is the “answer to all their prayers.”
This is the secret to getting families on board the new format in your studio.
3. Schedule Your New Format
I once heard Tony Robbins say something that I’ve never been able to forget:
“What's talked about is a dream, what's envisioned is exciting, what is planned becomes possible, but only what is scheduled becomes real.”
Make it EASY for parents to say yes.
Invite them into your new group program. Assure them that this will make their lives convenient.
When they say “yes”… Simply offer them a spot on your new schedule.
Better yet, roll this program out in conjunction with your school year scheduling process.
I have written EXTENSIVELY about the “no hassle” way to schedule for fall lessons.
If you integrate this into your normal scheduling process, you will be shocked at how easy this is to get started.
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Would you like help in creating a new chapter in the life of your studio business?
If so, I want to share with you something that I’ve created behind-the-scenes. Almost 2 dozen studios and music schools have used this training in the past year to:
- See more students
- Make more money- Lower costs (for studios with multiple teachers)
- Increase their job satisfaction
It is a complete, step-by-step guide to starting a group program in your studio… whether you convert all at once or test it first with just a few groups.
This training is called Successful Group Lessons.
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Here’s what’s in the training:
- 12 hours of video and audio lessons that will thoroughly prepare you to start your own group program
- Detailed lesson summaries that will act as "checklist" for creating your program
- Live group Q & A... I love working with people. Thus, we will have a number of live Q & A webinar trainings to make sure every question you have or problem you experience is taken care of.
- Email followup... you are a client for life. Feel free to email before, during, or AFTER the training to help with any question you have
- Incredible community support… Join a small, elite group of teachers who have already been through the SGL training. These teachers share their wisdom, lessons, and even marketing strategies in our private community. You get access to this community during and after the SGL training.
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This training will take place over the course of several weeks in July… just in time for you to launch something new for the fall semester (if that's what you want).
The trainings will be spaced out to give you time to process the information.
You will have time to do the work of prepping your studio for the new program!
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Here is just a taste of what you will find in the Successful Group Lessons training program:
- How to take any curriculum (Faber, Alfred, Piano Pronto, Piano Safari, your own, etc.) and quickly adapt it to my model... you don't need a new curriculum if you don't want one!
- How to create fantastic teaching without lesson plans... no matter if you are teaching 3 or 6 or even 12 kids at a time
- A complete shopping list of equipment you will need... it's a smaller list than you might think
- My administrative systems that allow me to run a studio of 95 kids without headaches... I spend less than 10 hours per month on admin
- How to get parents on board this program with just 3 emails. Many of my past SGL students have converted over 100% of their studios in just a few WEEKS with no headaches using the principles I teach in this training
- How to get parents to pay you MORE for group lessons... this training alone would be worth the entire price of the course
- How to make $125/per hour (or more) with a group lesson program
- The exact emails and scripts that I have sent out to get parents to happily switch over to my group lesson program
- Time Management: How you can cover a dozen concepts in a single lesson without running out of time or feeling frazzled
- Six Educational Principles for Group Success: This is the best piece of training I’ve ever created.
This hour long video presentation gives away the secrets of how I get 100% of my students to sight read notes and rhythm perfectly by the end of their second lesson.
It’s how I am able to enroll my students in the rigorous Royal Conservatory achievement program. Even my youngest group students get First Class Honors or Highest Distinction scores year after year.
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| The Biggest Benefit of All |
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I have no interest in dumping a bunch of dry information into your lap.
I am not the kind of teacher who will just throw you into the deep end of the pool and encourage you to swim.
----> I want to see you succeed. <-----
The biggest benefit of this training is that everyone who takes it will have as many groups as they want running in their studio by the end of this course. I do not take this promise lightly.
You are joining a small, elite group. We will go step-by-step through my process.
Together, we will:
1. Gather the equipment you need
2. Write your persuasive email and send it to your studio
3. Design your script for getting 100% of your new students on board with this program
4. Troubleshoot your marketing and teaching
5. Launch your program by the end of the training
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If this sounds like the program for you, here is what is coming:
This coming Monday morning (June 26th), I will send out an email at 12pm EST / 9am PST.
That email will contain more information and a link to a registration page.
If you are in, simply click that link, add the program to your cart, and click "BUY."
You can use credit or debit card.
The training will begin the first week of July.
Here's what I'd like you to do right now...
If you are in or pretty sure that you are in, send me a message right now.
Your message could be as simple as: "I'm in!"
Or, you could introduce yourself and your studio to me. Tell me why this will have a HUGE impact on your studio. Tell me what you are most excited about learning!
If you're on the fence... I'd love to receive a message from you, as well.
Tell me what you need to learn or be able to do to make it a NO BRAINER for you.
Thank you for reading this rather lengthy email! I look forward to hearing from you!
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Best,
Daniel
PS> This isn't the end of what I have to tell you about my group program and this training.
I still have ideas to share with you next week... I can't wait!
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