Special Report

The Ten Key Lessons I Learned Running A

Martial Arts School - That Changed My Life and
Made Me Millions In The Real World!!
By Andrew Wood

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 Introduction

Why should you listen to Andrew Wood?

What do I Know About The Karate Business Today?

Dear Instructor:

Recently I read an article, in a martial arts magazine by Randy Reid. It was a good article
calling out martial arts consultants with little real world experience along with those who haven’t
set foot in a dojo in ten years. I agree with most of his sentiment, but while the majority of
people rest on their laurels, I have built another multi million-dollar business since I left the
martial arts world. It’s been 20 years since I threw a punch in anger in my own school or last
signed up a student in person.

It’s been a decade since I left the karate business world and I’ve been out of touch with
everything that has been going on in the industry for at least the last six or seven years!

That, my friend, is exactly why you ought to listen to what I have to say!

You see the one key strategy that allowed me to make millions in the karate business the
first time around was that I came in from the outside. While the martial arts world did what the
martial arts did I did what the real world did!

Over the last decade I have done the exact same thing in the golf world, transformed my
self from a “nobody” outsider, to The World’s Leading Expert on Golf Marketing!

Now you can buy into what I’m telling you or you can dismiss it, but from what I see of
the current situation in the martial arts world what you have, is a bunch of guys running around
re selling information I WROTE 15 years ago!

I have hundreds of ideas, ideas that NO ONE in the martial arts business is currently
using. Don’t you think that that might just give your school the edge in a tough market?
I do!

I won’t tell you how to teach. I won’t discuss styles, associations or technique. What I
discuss is how to make a great living doing something you love for I have always believed that
as a professional you should be compensated like a professional!

These tens keys made me millions in the martial arts and again in the golf business!

All The Best

Andrew Wood

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1. Being a Great Martial Artist and Teacher is Not
Enough - You Need to Have Students (clients,
customers) to Teach!

I was sitting in my school one day when I got a call from a

friend who was friends with Chuck Norris’s lawyer. It seemed that
Chuck had been talking with Arnold and the Gov had told him he
was making a mint with his fan club. Chuck thought he could do the
same thing and wanted someone to market it for him.

Off I drive to Reseda to Chuck’s house to meet him and his

puffy faced lawyer. His lawyer asked me if I knew anything about
martial arts, I said, “Yes, in addition to my ad agency I own twelve
schools!”

Chuck gasps, shakes his head and repeats it,“12 schools, that’s amazing. I couldn’t even
keep one open! Here I was, World Champion and I couldn’t keep the doors open three times.

The first time I got into trouble James Coburn bailed me out.

The second time Steve McQueen bailed me out. The third time
my movie career had just taken off so it didn’t matter!”

“Why” I asked, “do you think your schools didn’t make it?”

He thought for a moment then said, “Because I was World

Champion and I thought everyone who came to my school wanted
to be a World Champion as well. I trained them too hard and
didn’t really know how to run the business!”

Honest answers and mistakes, from a martial arts legend,

that are repeated to this day, by half the instructors in the country.

Talent doesn’t matter if you can’t keep the doors open!

I figured this out quickly the first month I couldn’t pay the rent.

You can be a great martial arts instructor, a great teacher and a great businessman without
selling out!

In my Martial Arts Boot Camp I’ll show you exactly how to do it!

Lesson 1: Don’t Just Be a Great Martial Arts Instructor, Become a Great Businessman
That Happens To Have a Unique Skill For Teaching Martial Arts!

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 2. In Order to Have Students You Need to Know What Attracts Students
(clients, customers) to Your School in Large Numbers!

When I first started in the martial arts business, all my advertising was done through the local
Shopper or Penny Saver publications with the occasional ad in the local paper. Specifically, I
ran print ads that looked just like every other karate school’s ads. It was either a stern
looking black belt staring out from the page with his hands on his hips in a karate uniform, or a
man flying through the air about to kick someone in the head.

It never, not even for a moment, occurred to me that

people would look at that ad of me doing a perfect side-
kick at a student’s face and ever think of themselves as
the kickee not the kicker!

But, that was exactly what was happening!

I ran “macho man” ads thinking everyone wanted to

be a black belt, while the reader is thinking, “Hell if I go
there I could lose all my teeth!” Since everyone else in
the industry was running almost identical ads, I thought
that must be how you do it!

Twenty years later, half the ads you still see for
martial arts schools still feature the guy flying through
the air, or the Asian master scowling at the camera. Or
the exact same ad, as the school down the street, because
they all get information and ad slicks from the same
“association!”

Next time you are tempted to run an ad that looks

more or less like your competitor’s or runs in the same
place “everyone” in your business always runs ads, DONT!

Just because everyone in your industry does the same thing does not make it right. In
fact it’s almost certainly wrong!

I finally figured that out and started marketing campaigns that no one in the industry was
running. In fact I got so excited about marketing, once I found out what worked, that I even
opened my own ad agency in the back of my school. In my Martial Arts Boot Camp I’ll show
you exactly what I’d do today to out market everyone!

Lesson 2: You Must Become a Marketing Black Belt to Truly Capitalize on Your
Talents By Generating a Tidal Wave of Leads For Your School!

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3. Unfortunately When Prospective Students do Come, You Then Have to
Actually SELL Most of Them, on the Idea That Your Lessons (product,
services) are Worth Their Money!

This means actually knowing how to sell!

This is generally the last thing any school owner wants to hear. They want to train, teach,
learn and grow in the martial arts not act like some pushy car salesman. The truth of the matter is
the majority of “professional” salespeople are not pushy at all. They are courteous, polite and
attentive to helping fit a customer’s needs with a particular product or service.

I was able to make millions in the martial arts business running multiple schools for one
simple reason. I wasn’t in the business for the love of the art. I liked it well enough. The hours
were good, I didn’t have to get my hands dirty, it kept me in great shape and my customers
bowed to me on the way in and out of the dojo!

But unlike 99% of the schools I competed with, who where

all in it because they loved martial arts, I was actually in it for the
money! There I said it…

Shock horror!!! I wanted to provide for my family first!

That does not make me a bad instructor, or a McDojo,

belt factory or any other derogatory term you want to sling at
me! In fact although I am frequently quoted as saying I was a
“mediocre instructor” the truth of the matter is I have always been a
natural athlete, speaker and motivator. I was a far better than an average instructor!

The majority of business owners end up in business because of a passion, a family

connection, or by complete accident. Hardly any of these people see themselves as salespeople
and so their businesses hit a wall quickly! Businesses seldom go broke because of bad service.
Just think of the last time you where on the phone with your cell phone company, bank, or had a
computer software problem; how good was that service? Yet they all make millions!

Businesses go broke, with few exceptions, for one reason – because they don’t make
enough sales.

Do you take sales serious? When you do, you make money. When you don’t, you don’t!

If you don’t sign them up, they don’t take lessons and if they don’t take lessons they
never experience the benefits of martial arts. In my Martial Arts Boot Camp I’ll show you
exactly what to do in today’s market to outsell everyone, easily and ethically! Without high-
pressure tactics!

Lesson 3: If You Do Not Become a Black Belt In Sales You Will Never Reach Your True
Income Potential! (No matter what your business)

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4. Everything You Need to Know About Sales, Marketing, Business and Life is
Readily Available in the Form of a Book Audio or Website!

I knew nothing about sales or marketing since the phone never rang and I only had
55 students! I came to that exact realization one October morning in 1987. What followed was a
decision that changed my life forever. After acknowledging that I didn’t REALLY know the
first thing about marketing, I rushed to the local bookstore and bought all
eight of their marketing books.

I was amazed to learn how changing a simple headline could produce a

500% increase in response. How adding a picture of a scissors next to a
coupon could increase redemption by up to 35%, how reverse type (white
letters on black) sharply decreases readership, and so on. Before I finished
the second book, I ordered 20 other books! I was like a man possessed…
highlighting, underlining, and taking notes for 30 straight days.

All through the Christmas holiday I soaked up marketing information

like a sponge. After taking it all in and completely changing my approach (I
designed some new ads to run the second week of January. Bingo!

The phone rang off the hook. I signed up 30 new students in a single
month, as opposed to the five I typically signed up! I was ecstatic, but
realized there was still work to be done. If I could get such a massive
increase in response just by studying the gurus of marketing, perhaps I could
capitalize on these leads even more by improving my sales skills. I purchased
tapes from the likes of Tom Hopkins, Brian Tracy, Joe Girard, Zig Ziglar,
and others. Suddenly, instead of closing two out of ten leads, I was closing
eight out of ten and it didn’t cost me a dime more to do it!

Next, I turned my attention to techniques like customer retention,

newsletters, thank-you cards, and follow up. I adopted the tactics I found in
books like Carl Sewall’s Customers for Life. By the end of the year students
were staying an average of six months instead of three.

At 27 years of age, my second year in business, I walked out of an

1148-square-foot karate school in a suburban strip mall with $128,000 in my
pocket — a net gain of $121,000 over my previous year’s income. Over the
years I have repeated this process to become an expert on Internet marketing,
direct mail, social media, leadership and a host of other topic. My friend
Brian Tracy says, “You must invest 3% of your income in yourself.” I say if
you are not listing to a non-fiction book every two weeks you are way behind the cure!

Get a huge head start here www.CunninglyClever.com

Lesson 4: Are You Committed to The Principle Of Kaizen? Continued Never Ending
Improvement. If you are, then success is just a few pages away!

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5. When Students do Sign up You Have to Entertain Them, YES Entertain
Them or They Will Leave. If They Leave, You Will Never Teach Them
Anything!

Now most instructors in any sport (martial arts, golf, horse riding), or professional sales
and even marketing people like me don’t ever really think of themselves as entertainers. But
make no mistake about it my friends; if you are NOT, then you are losing thousands of dollars a
month in income!

Many instructors have a hard time with this but the fact of the matter is that although you
may be in the personal development, self-defense of fitness business you are also and primarily
in the entertainment business. A student’s choice of competing activities includes baseball,
soccer, swimming, bowling, movies, video games, “hanging out at the mall” and a thousand
other distractions.

You must use all of your teaching skill, motivational skill, leadership skill, creative skill,
social media, twitter, blogs, Facebook. Every contact and communication with your students
MUST BE an opportunity to:

Educate Your Students –

Your communication must be of value
and timely to your students. The more
valuable your content, the more
people will read it and pass it along to
others, thus growing your lists. Don’t
forget half the time the parent is the
one you should be communicating the
value of the education with!

Engage Your Students – You

must engage your students. Be asking
for their opinion, their tips, stories,
pictures, feedback, and participation.
Let them enter to win free prizes,
discounts, and insider specials
reserved only for readers. Use ALL
the social media you can.

Entertain Your Students – You MUST entertain your students. Fun classes, fun e-
mails, fun events - that goes for adults too! All they are is BIG KIDS!

If you strive to do these three things in every class, e-mail or communication with your
students (customers, clients) your retention will improve dramatically.

Lesson 5: You Must Educate, Engage and Entertain Your Students at every
Opportunity to Increase Retention and Referrals!

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 6. Think Big – Rent Small

Big buildings create big overhead, not just in rent, but in taxes,
insurance, maintenance, heating, cooling, and decorating! For about 18
months in the late '80's my karate school had been growing incrementally in
a very steady and profitable manner. However, it got to the point where we
had two hundred fifty students packed into a studio of just 1148 square feet.
Over the previous few weeks we had gotten an increasing number of
complaints from students and parents about overcrowding in the school.
Luckily for us, the yogurt store next door to my school suddenly closed.

The landlord called me up and offered to lease me the additional

space, which also happened to be 1148 square feet. I was very excited and
was looking forward to having the additional space. But that night I went
home and started to think about the landlord’s proposition in more detail.
While on the one hand having the extra space would certainly come in handy, I put my feelings
aside and started to think about the additional costs I would incur. For starters, my rent would
essentially double. Then there was the additional expense of hiring another instructor. On top of
that, there would be additional factors of air conditioning, heating, etc. After some quick
calculations I realized immediately that I would need to sign on 100 more students just to pay for
the additional space. Even with things going extremely well, that could easily have taken nine
months, which would be nine months of less income with the eventual hope of making more in
the future to make up for the loss. I was in a quandary about what to do.

Having given the matter careful consideration, I suddenly came up with a plan. I decided
that instead of taking the space next door and expanding my business I would try instead to make
more money from my existing situation. I then did something that few people would have the
nerve to do – I doubled my prices overnight. It should be said that I didn't double my prices on
my existing clients. Instead I offered each of them the opportunity to buy future months at their
existing rate. The vast majority of my existing students took this option to buy 6 months to a year
of lessons in advance. This provided a great deal of extra cash flow.

The very next person who walked into the school to sign up their
child, having no previous knowledge of the old price, simply signed
them up at the new rate with no questions asked. So did the next person
and the next and the next. Within a matter of weeks I'd increased the
school's income by over 50 percent a month with only a slight decrease
in the number of students. Because we had slightly less students, classes
were a fraction smaller. Therefore we were able to increase our service
and increase our income at the same time. Now there’s a thought! By the end of the year, with
the natural attrition of some students and the influx of additional new ones, I had succeeded in
doubling my income without doubling my space!

At my Martial Arts Boot Camp I’ll show you how to lower your lease payments now!

Lesson 6: Never, Never, Never Rent More Space Than Absolutely Necessary!

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7. To Grow Your School You Must Systemize it. Otherwise it Never Gets
Bigger Than What YOU Can Personally Do! That Gets Old Fast!

If you look at the success of most major companies, like McDonalds, Federal Express,
the Body Shop or Gold’s Gym the most common factor in all of them is a methodology, a unique
and systemized way of doing business. They create a method that permeates every level of the
organization and indoctrinates every employee to the cause.

Apple has a very systemized way of launching its products. KFC has a very systemized
way of cooking and serving its chicken. FedEx has a highly sophisticated way of initiating
picking ups, tracking and delivering packages. It’s not necessary to be a multi million-dollar
business to make massive gains in your operation by copying this concept.

For example, are your sales

presentations written and orchestrated so that
no two instructors will answer the same
question differently? There is only one perfect
way to answer most sales objections. If your
people are adlibbing, one of them is winning
and one of them is losing. It’s highly unlikely
they will both get the same sales results using
different scripts. Find the answer that fits best
and make that the script everyone uses
without exception. This is the process that
makes companies like Disney and Ritz
Carlton so consistent and so successful.

You need a method for every part of your business. You need predictable method of
generating leads. You need a predictable method of training new staff. You need a predictable
method of delivering your instruction on the dojo floor. You need a predictable method of
forecasting revenue, paying your bills and reporting on results. This should be done on a set day,
every week or every month, not when you have time or feel like it!

The more of your method, your unique way of doing business, you write down,
orchestrate and share with your staff the more successful your business will become.

Or you can just align with someone who has already done it!

At my Martial Arts Boot Camp I’ll show you the systems I have developed in the golf
business which are far more sophisticated than those I developed for Martial Arts America a
decade ago!

Lesson 7: The More Methodical You Make Each Part of Your Business The More
Predictable The Results Will Become!

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 8. In Search of Prime

In every business there is an optimum place to make money. If you stay short of it you have
to find ways to keep growing. Go beyond that place and there is a big gap between where you are
now and your next growth in net profits!

It's often best to stay where you are successful, rather than expanding, diversifying, buying
competitors, etc.

You will most likely ignore this advice, as the majority of entrepreneurs confuse growth with
profits, but let’s give it a shot anyway.

In order to grow your business you need more

staff.

In order to grow your business you will need

extra space.

All of these things cost you more cash outlays

with little or no guarantee you’ll actually see a
return!

Which business do you think makes more

money, a karate school with 250 students or a
karate school with 350 students?

In my experience all things being equal, the

karate school with 250 students wins!

I was involved with hundreds of karate

schools of all shapes and sizes, from 900 sq feet
to 15,000 sq feet and the most profitable model I ever saw was a studio around 1,200-1,500 sq
feet with 250 students!

It was the optimum size to grab the cream of the market in any area while being run by
one full time and one part-time instructor to keep the overhead low.

At my Martial Arts Boot Camp I will show you how to reach prime, then go out and do it
again somewhere else!

Lesson 8: There is a Prime Size For Your Business Where It Will Produce Maximum
Revenue In It’s Current Form, Find Your Prime!

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9. The Score Factor

Top school owners, sports stars and entrepreneurs play to win. To play to win you have to
keep score and while the P&L statement will be your ultimate record of success, the more
different ways you can find to keep score along the way, the faster you will get there.

Keep score on:

• Your leads
• The number of outbound calls your salespeople make
• Your sales
• Salesperson closing rates
• Student acquisition costs
• Sales costs
• The number of contacts in your database
• Number of students
• Estimated market share
• Your web traffic
• Your email open rates
• Your response rates to individual offers
• Media mentions
• The number of friends, fans, and followers on
your social media pages
• The number of inbound calls you receive
• Number of orchids (praise)
• Number of onions (complaints)
• Number of referrals
• Lifetime value of a students
• Your profits
• Employee turnover
• Lowering your debt
• Increasing your net worth
• Progress toward your personal goals
• Your number of renewals and upgrades

The more factors you can list to keep score in your business and to help you measure
incremental improvement the more effective your business will be in doing the things necessary
to grow rapidly! Study these numbers weekly and take action on the results at least monthly.
Most entrepreneurs don’t start out as “numbers people” but almost all successful ones become
numbers people! As Churchill once said “However beautiful the strategy, you should
occasionally look at the results.”

At my Martial Arts Boot Camp I will teach you how keeping score will dramatically
increase your performance in every area of your school.

Lesson 9: If You Don’t Keep Score, You Are Really Not Playing To Win!

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10. Don’t Hang With the Herd -They Are the Last to Know What’s Really
Going On in The World!

When I started my school I didn’t have a billing company or any real support from my
association so I immediately looked outside the industry for ideas. This turned out to be very
fortunate for me, for the ideas I borrowed quickly grew my business.

95% of your competitors in any city or industry will

be selling and marketing in exactly the same way as
YOU are! They belong to the same organizations, read
the same trade journals, subscribe to the same box
packages and show up for the same trade shows. That’s
why it’s so important to look beyond the martial arts
industry for ideas and opportunities!

In the late nineties I enjoyed tremendous success by

looking at what type of business-to-business services
were available in the “real” world and then adapting
them to the martial-arts business. At that time very little
information existed on how to run a karate school as a
profitable business. I combined a little MLM philosophy
with the boom in personal development to create a boxed
package of sales, marketing, motivational, and training
materials specific to martial arts school owners. This was nothing particularly original, BUT
no one had taken the concepts that were working in the real world and customized them to
the martial-arts world. Since almost every business runs on the same basic principles, you
will often find new and innovative ideas outside your field that can easily be adapted to your
situation. All you have to do is look.

Step outside your normal group

By the same token, you will often find that going outside your own organization or circle
of friends to consult a colleague in a totally different position can pay interesting dividends.
Ask him to offer suggestions about your particular problem. He won’t be burdened by your
emotional attachment to the problem or share the same baggage of mental constraints, real or
perceived. You will often see approaches to solving problems that are totally different from
those used by people in your particular circle. Sometimes this produces instant results. In
other cases, even though it doesn’t produce the exact result you want, it does stimulate a new
line of thought that ultimately yields the answers you sought.

At my Martial Arts Boot Camp you’ll enjoy cutting edge ideas NO ONE in The
MARTIAL ARTS INDUSTRY is using! Think that might give you an advantage?

Lesson 10: GET Advice, Ideas and Mentoring From Outside the Martial Arts Industry
to Spot the Trends in Other Industries That Are Easily Adaptable. That’s Where the
Breakthroughs Come From!

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