By Master Fred Parks

Any successful venture into the world of martial arts business will require a great deal of scrutiny and evaluation. To ensure your success you must evaluate five key areas.

The First Area Is Your Product

Like it or not, your martial arts classes are treated like a service or product. You have to ask yourself is this a service or product that people want and can afford? Does it offer the user true value? Is it good enough for your mother, brother or best friend and would they buy it even if it wasn’t you selling it? Is it something that you can believe in? Will your customers (students) keep coming to class on their own or will you have to convince them every class that they should come back again?

The Second Area To Consider Is The Need In The Marketplace

Is there a true need for what you teach and offer?

How will you make it available to people? (full time school or part time program). Does what you teach and offer appeal to the masses or only a few like minded rough necks? What about competition from other well established schools and how will you overcome their presence?

The Third Area To Evaluate Is The Company

Are you going to partner with a strong existing school or company from another area for support? If you start a brand new company will you be stable and well capitalized? Does your support partner have a good growth record? Are they successful or are they another start-up? What do the industry analysts say? Have you checked with a professional association about start-up assistance and support?

The Timing By Far Is The Most Important Area To Be Considered

The key to success in any industry is to get in front of the growth curve, what the experts call “First Mover Advantage”. What time of the year do most schools have their best enrollment numbers and are you going to be open in time for that boom season?

The Final Area Of Evaluation Is The Compensation

Is there really any money in this or is it another dream? How soon can you begin making money? Although no instructor truly does it for the money, you can’t do it without the money. Is there a plan or billing process in place or can you get a billing service to handle it? Is there residual income or are you going to have to sign up new people every week to keep operational money coming in?

If you can answer all these questions then you are probably prepared to open a school that will have long term success. If not, I suggest a great deal of research and training before you jump blindly into the martial arts business.

About the author:
Fred Parks is a traditional TangSooDo Master and star of “The Martial Arts Success Show” on the Action Radio Network Tune in each week to hear his friendly and effective advice for traditional school owners.