Holiday Enrollments Part II
By Darren A. Gaitan
Associate Consultant
ChampionsWay Inc.
 We
are in the final month of the year and it’s time to go out with a
bang. Don’t get caught up in the holiday spirit, and don’t lose
focus on your year end goal; to close the year strong. In December,
give as much as you can in order to secure a high number of
enrollments. If you don’t compromise some of your enrollment offers
then you feel the effect early next year. So put your business pride
aside, and solve the problem of low enrollments during December. I
always post a quote in my office that I learned in one of my
business classes in college, “Some money is better than no money”.
This couldn’t be truer, than in the month of December for all
martial arts school owners. Stay focused on the problem, LOW
ENROLLMENTS!
You’ll read this article and wonder why I’m so insistent on
donations and fundraisers. We’ll I noticed something a couple of
years back. I have a friend who owns a restaurant and his whole
family feeds the needy on Christmas. Weeks before, he asks his
customers to donate toys that his Santa will give out that day. He
also asks for volunteers to serve the guests at their tables. The
crowd that he draws is gigantic. He now has a public image that
brings customers back week after week. His operation is small and
not as glamorous as the other big competitors in the community. His
generous image is what helped him survive over the past twenty
years. In fact, he is one of three restaurants that are still in
business from the early 80’s. That tells you everything you need to
know about the importance of giving back to the community. One year
my mother and I decided to spend Christmas day as servers. It was
the best Christmas I have ever had. The experience of seeing
something as simple as a Christmas dinner and a small toy bring
happiness to a less fortunate family was life changing for me. This
satisfaction could never be matched by a school with over 500
students. Because of this I decided to combine my efforts of student
recruit and fundraising into a single mission this holiday season.
There are plenty of strategies you can use to improve your chances
of high enrollments this month. Most of which I have used in the
past and some are new strategies I will be using this year. The
holiday season is a time for giving and helping those in need. This
is the perfect time to kill two birds with one stone. Alter your
champions chat script to inform people that you are raising money
for needy families. For a small donation, people can get a coupon
for a free month of lessons to your martial arts school. In
addition, if they start using the pass in the month of December, you
will donate an extra $10.00 or match their donation. People are
willing to use this pass because it is for a good cause, and they
are more likely to use the pass or give the pass to someone that
can. The extra donation from the school is just enough to motivate
people to come into your school.
If you talk to local stores and tell them that you are raising money
for families in need they will usually let you set up a donation
station. There are plenty of ways you can raise money and recruit
new students. You can set up a small picture station with a Santa
Claus and print out pictures with your school logo on the bottom.
The people make a small donation. You can give away a starter
package which includes the uniform and pass already gift wrapped.
You can set up a gift wrapping station in front and donate all the
money to a local food bank. Get local businesses to donate prizes
and hold a raffle towards the middle of the month. This will also
increase the size of your lead database because you will ask for
their contact information. Keep in mind; I always live by the
philosophy that if I can start a conversation with someone, I can
sell them on my program 95% of the time. The other 5% will sell me
on a reason why they can’t. Do everything you can to spark
conversations with as many people as you can.
Public safety seminars are a great way to give back to the community
and enroll new students. I hold a shopping safety seminar for women.
I make sure that I advertise this seminar in as many places as
possible. I send press releases to local papers, I send invitations
to local companies (be sure it goes to the HR department), I even
get a post on the local TV station. I teach simply awareness
techniques that every mom should know during this shopping season. I
started doing this when one of my students was attacked in a
shopping mall parking lot with her four year old child. She fought
him off three different times. A couple of weeks later she asked me
for private self defense lessons. This is what gave the idea for the
seminar. I always invite the participants back to a follow up course
and I invite their children to a special shopping awareness course.
These two events will get you great community exposure and help you
enroll students. Both of these events are free for the community and
attendance is always high.
The shopping center I’m in is always busy on the weekends and there
is a lot of walk by traffic. I’m going to take advantage of this by
renting a jumper and placing it in front of the school. I’ll have a
Santa Claus for the kids and I’ll get parents to enter a raffle for
a free birthday party or another prize (maybe an XBOX 360). I will
also give them a special invitation to our Christmas party and a
special buddy class. The jumper is only $90.00 for the whole day and
the investment is worth it because I’m sure to get a high number of
leads from this. The other thing that’s great about the jumper is
that it is a kid magnet. Kids flock to the jumpers with their
parents and it gives me the opportunity to speak with the parents
directly. Now I can sell the program without having to leave the
school.
Next, I’m going to pass out door hangers in upscale neighborhoods.
Nothing new, huh! Here’s the twist, the team and I will be dressed
in Santa suits. I’m hoping that parents will make an extra effort to
come up to us and talk to us. Most of them will probably come up to
us with their kids. I’m making sure that each Santa has a picture
elf with them. We’ll be ready to take a picture, give them a pass
that has our website on it, tell them to go to our site if they want
to download it, and I’ll send them a postcard from the school with
the picture on it. This will be very powerful and should be just
enough to get them to take the next step of walking through our
door. It sounds like a lot of work, but exposure does equal results.
If you live in a community like mine you’ll probably have some sort
of holiday parade or tree lighting event. I plan to have my students
march in this parade and have the swat team walking in a Santa suit
and a black belt. The kicking Santa’s will perform different karate
stunts on the route. The Santa chukcers will have chucks with a
candy cane design on it. I even have some friends who are amazing
dancers that will march and be the breaking Santa’s. Parent
volunteers will pass out glow stick necklaces with our pass on them
and candy canes with the pass on it. After the parade we will be
working the streets and we will have a booth in front of a business
taking donations for our charity drive. Many of the things that I
mentioned above will be part of this booth.
By the end of the holiday season everyone will see us as a school
that gives back to the community. I have two goals for our
community. I want everyone to either be a student of mine or know
who I am and what I do. This should be your goal to. People usually
judge you by what you give, not what you ask for. Keep this in mind
when you are planning your marketing for any community event.
Enrolling students during this time of year is also about great
exposure. Meaning, people associating your school with the character
of good will, will bring you students. There are great ways to get
exposure. For example, having toy donation barrels put up in local
businesses with your school logo on it. Don’t make it to obvious,
put it should be strong enough to be embedded in peoples
sub-conscious. On the weekends you can have your swat team go around
neighborhood and ask for donations. They will be dressed up in
school entire of course. If the traffic is good, have a team set up
in front of a business on the weekend and ask people for toy
donations or financial contributions. I’m even having a student
dress up like a Santa Claus and wave a big arrow sign at the cars
passing by. When people come up it’s the perfect time to start
talking about your school. When parents see that you’re teaching
children about the importance giving to those that are less
fortunate they will pass the word along to others. You get help
families in need and you gain students at the same time. It’s
fantastic.
While I’m talking about this year I’m also thinking about what I’m
going to do next year. I’m going to implement a candy drive to
compliment my fundraising efforts. I have a company that will
customize candy bar wrappers. I’m going to have a special coupon
printed on the inside it. It will be a fundraiser that the entire
school will participate in. Students will sell candy bars, I’ll have
them at all my events, and I’ll place displays at local businesses.
There will be a prize for the student that sells the most and a
prize for finding the golden ticket inside one of he bars (I
borrowed this from one of my favorite movies as a kid). All the
proceeds will go towards buying presents and meals for families in
need. I even have a couple church groups looking to pursue a joint
venture next year. This is going to be huge.
Next year I’m also going to change my website so that people can
donate money online. I’ll pass out flyers about the fundraiser and
drive as much traffic as I can to my site. People who visit the site
will most likely take a few moments to explore the site and the
chances are high that they will inquire about the school. I’m also
looking to come up with some type of match offer that will match the
money donated. I’ll probably split the match offer with a couple of
local businesses who have shown interest in this endeavor.
Another idea I’m working on is to take advantage of the crowds of
people at the malls. This could produce all the leads I need for the
rest of the year. If the booth isn’t too expensive then I’ll rent
one for the holidays. I’ll offer gift wrapping and donate the money.
I will also be promoting a secret Santa contest. People will look
for others wearing the school t-shirt and ask them if they are the
secret Santa. If they are then the people will win the prize. I’ll
have a cash grand prize of $500.00 that I will give away. I’ll have
t-shirts that say secret Santa with a question mark on the back.
I’ll also have some info about the prize on the back of the shirt.
People will get gift cards to our school if they ask someone wearing
this shirt, but only one person will win the money if they ask the
right Santa. When my staff walks around the community they will be
constantly approached by new leads everyday. You probably think the
contest is extreme but it is still in development and it is the
major marketing campaign I’m going with next year. I can envision
the returns on this promotion and they are huge.
I’m not going to beat around the bush; you’ll be working hard this
December. Believe me it’s necessary to insure the financial
prosperity of your school during the first business quarter of 2006.
Face it; no one is successful by sitting down. At one point or
another they had to work long hours in order to get where they are
today. I enjoy working really hard because there is no better
feeling than the enjoyment of success. The quality of our work can
be measured by the results we produce. December is a time to get
more aggressive and more giving. Even if you try and don’t get the
results you were looking for then at least you gave it your best
shot. A black belt quality we should all embrace. Take the ideas I
have presented and make adjustments where you see fit. One last
suggestion, be sure that you always send out press releases to local
news agencies. Keep them informed of you efforts because you’ll need
the local exposure.
Look at your stats and set a goal to break your best December month
this December. If you need any help or are looking for other ideas,
please feel free to contact me at ChampionsWay: Darren@championsway.com
Darren A. Gaiten
Associate Consultant
ChampionsWay Inc.
877.774.5425
darren@championsway.com
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