| Friend,
Look, I'm just going to say this without any mincing words...
A lot of you suck at marketing.
And the thing is, it's not your fault. For one, you've been getting bad advice on marketing all your life. Everyone from your family and friends, to your teachers, to your customers, to ad reps and business consultants (yes, even them) has given you just awful advice on marketing.
And second, you've seen a lot of bad marketing over the course of your life. Sadly, you probably thought most of it was good, simply by virtue of the fact that you saw it over and over and over again.
And thirdly, since you've seen tens of thousands of bad ads and marketing campaigns over the course of your life, bad marketing principles have practically become ingrained in your subconscious.
So, it's no wonder so many martial art schools put out bad marketing. When your whole concept of what makes marketing "good" and what makes it "bad" is completely turned around and confused, what choice do you have?
Well, don't feel bad, because even a lot of successful school owners absolutely suck at marketing.
Yep, you heard me right - a lot of successful school owners suck at marketing. As do a lot of corporations and large companies. I see it all the time, and it's a crying shame how much money goes right down the tubes simply because these folks don't understand good marketing.
It drives me nuts. What's funny (to me anyway) is that my wife has to hear about it, all day long.
I'm sure she's gotten tired of it by now. We'll be driving down the road, and suddenly I'll shout out, "Oh holy hell, that's awful!" while pointing at a billboard or sign. Then I'll rant for five or ten minutes about what made that sign or ad so bad.
Just the other day, we saw a billboard on the highway here in Austin for a large national restaurant chain. The billboard said, "Dinner Is In The Bag", and it had a picture of a bag with what I assumed was some kind of food in it.
Only problem was, we had no clue what was in the bag (only a vague idea that it was "dinner") because YOU COULDN'T READ THE LOGO ON THE BAG.
Why? The ad company who had designed the ad had failed to recognize that things get a lot smaller when you've looking at them from 150 feet away.
Sadly, that restaurant chain probably paid a large ad agency a few hundred grand for that ad campaign. Then they paid tens of thousands of dollars to rent those billboards and produce those signs (the cost of which they likely passed on to the franchisees, I might add).
Only to have their ad money wasted on crappy, ineffective marketing.
Same thing goes for a lot of martial art schools. For example, there's a new dojo opening up down the street from me. I've been watching their marketing campaign since I first heard they were opening.
Now, the first thing you should know is that they did something right - otherwise, I never would have heard about them.
But, they are doing A LOT wrong. Their website is all wrong, their marketing is focused on all the wrong things, and their signs...
...oh, for love of all that is holy, their signs are practically unreadable. We were driving home one day, and my wife pointed out the window and said, "Is that where that new school is going in?"
"Why would you think that?" I replied.
"Well, because there's a sign there on the side of the road that says 'martial arts'," she responded.
This ended up becoming an argument between us, because I swore up and down there was no sign there, and she swore up and down there was. Sure enough, there was, and once again it was a sign you couldn't read. My wife only saw it because she was in the passenger seat and happened to be looking that way.
(And why would my wife lie about something like that, you ask? Actually, I take it as a point of pride that I can spot a martial art school sign from a mile away, and I was sure she wouldn't be able to spot one before me. Yep, these are the silly things married people argue about... so go ahead and get married, I dare you.)
The thing is, this school might end up doing okay. They might end up figuring the marketing thing out, or they might not. But they could still survive in spite of all the marketing mistakes they're making.
So, how can a business survive when they're making a lot of marketing mistakes? The same way that any business survives, even though their marketing is awful.
Listen up, because I'm going to tell you a little secret about marketing...
Even if your marketing is bad (and I mean awful), if you do enough of it, it'll probably still work. That's right, even bad marketing will work... if you do truck loads of it.
The only problem with that approach is that it gets really expensive. Unfortunately, most small business owners don't have the cash to survive more than one or two bad marketing campaigns. And most of us surely don't have the money to push enough bad marketing to make it work well enough to keep us in business.
And that's why I've decided that the newsletter topic for the next week or so will be why martial arts marketing fails.
So, over the next several emails I'm going to be explaining all the reasons why your marketing might not be working, and what makes good marketing campaigns tick.
If you ever felt like you were throwing good money after bad in marketing your dojo, you're going to want to read this email series. So, keep an eye out for the next email on this topic tomorrow morning.
Until next time,
Mike Massie MartialArtsBusinessDaily.com
P.S. - You're probably wondering why I don't just go over to that new dojo and offer my services. Here's why - unsolicited advice is generally treated as unwelcome advice. Think about the last time someone gave you advice you didn't ask for - how'd you take it? Not well, I'm sure. Over the years, I've learned that I can't save everyone, and most times when I try to step in and help someone who didn't ask for my help, I just end up with egg on my face. So, I don't even bother these days. It's not worth the hassle.
P.S.S. - Later today I'm doing an interview with a coaching client of mine who is just killing it in his jiu jitsu school. I should have that episode of the podcast edited and ready by the middle of the week. I'll let you know as soon as it goes live, because I know you're going to want to hear how he went from 50 students and teaching part-time to 150 students and quitting his day job in about a year's time. So stay tuned for that interview! | 