Studio Business Accelerator

Today we speak with Mary, a client and owner of a dance program for more than 25 years. Mary talks about the nature of fear and the idea of value, and how both of them are in some way self-generated. Her business was completely wiped out by the pandemic, and she had to work hard to rebuild it and to overcome her fears.

Today we pull back the curtain and walk through one of our strategy sessions with a prospective client. Special guest Kelly King graciously joins us to talk about how the pandemic decimated her business, how she's begun rebuilding, and what's next. Mago walks her through some immediate steps she can take to overcome her fear of over-commiting to a new program and how to cover her payroll costs.

Mago presents some info today on what the word "scientific" actually means and its impacts on how we run studio businesses.  Objectivity isn't all it's cracked up to be, and it may not exist, even if your name is Albert Einstein.

Today we're discussing a chapter out of Robert Cialdini's landmark book Influence. Social proof is the phenomenon where we tend to do and believe what others around us also do and believe.  Most of the time, this steers us right, but occasionally it can lead us astray.  Inside a studio business there are plenty of ways to use social proof to work towards a common goal, one that's best for the owner, staff, students, and prospects.

Today, onward through Commandments 5-7. Evan details a beautiful website he once built that was immediately discarded, and Mago confesses his fear of the prophetic powers of the movie WALL-E.  We talk about automating instead of employing, then move on to higher-level messaging and the importance of seeking elegance. 

Our special guest Anne Lauritzen returns to talk about some business-y ideas that can help us have better, richer personal lives.  She walks us through principles like "feared things first", radical candor, and imposing a cool-off period before making any judgements or analyses of an emotional decision.

Special guest and co-director of our team, Anne Lauritzen, joins us to talk about putting leadership lessons inside and alongside of your classes.  Studios always promise to help develop things like integrity and discipline in their students, and Anne shows us the ways we can actually deliver on that promise.  It's not about seminars or bonus classes, it's about what Mago calls an enriched environment.  Plus, Evan reveals how frightened he is of checking accounts.

Today we talk about a few things the dance world can learn from the martial arts world, and vice versa.  Both industries are more similar than they are different, but we think there are some significant advantages to certain approaches.  Evan recounts watching a disturbing scene where a young mom beats the heck out of a training dummy, and Mago floats his theory that gender roles have an impact.

The finale of our three-part series on our ten commandments of studio management.  We discuss outsourcing work, the importance of elegant solutions, and the imperative to challenge the industry's conventional practices.  Mago talks about his journey through the land of software, and Evan is still bitter about a website he built for a former employer who unceremoniously trashed it after a month.

The first of a 3-episode series about our ten commandments of studio ownership and management. Today we tackle the first four. Starting with the big one, Thou Shalt Value Thy Students, we move on to honoring yourself and your art form, and then the dangers and temptations of automation. -Free Studio Business Resources -Schedule A Call With Us

Who doesn't love hearing someone wants your business to fail?  Fortunately, Mago powers his engines with negative feedback.  We examine a few pieces of hate mail we've received over the last year to try to get a reading on what the industry mood is, why people don't like beginners, and where we've let anyone down. 

Today, we focus on a specific question - when is it best to make things more inconvenient for ourselves and our business?  Evan talks about the strange relationship between inconvenience and authenticity, then Mago lays out why early adopters aren't the best people to market to (even though they are easiest), and explains why reaching the majority of people is harder but more much more beneficial.

Our friend, special guest, former studio owner, and PhD candidate Richard Hayes joins us to walk us through some industry best practices for hiring staff.  Rick's field of study is business psychology, and he shares both what the research says about hiring and his personal experience inside a studio.  We talk about defining what a job requires, keeping the interview consistent, and how to avoid wet cheese hires.

After a while we all find a plateau for ourselves and it can be extremely hard to move above it.  Today, we take a leaf out of Daniel Kahneman's book and discuss the idea of regression to the mean. We talk about our experiences falling back to that plateau (our respective means) and what can be done to achieve escape velocity.  Hint - it starts with admitting to ourselves we're not reliable observers. Thinking, Fast and Slow by Kahneman The Undoing Project by Michael Lewis

Special guest Sheri Moise joins us to talk about her strategies and techniques for keeping from becoming burnt out on your business.  Sheri is our honorary Coach and Therapist in Residence; she hosts weekly calls with clients to help them be both happier and more productive.  On the podcast, she walks us through her approach and shares some anecdotes about deleting or delegating tasks, aligning the internal and external, and gaining 100 students in 100 days.

Evan and Mago start off describing the woes of the studio owner who has to do everything themselves.  Lacking trust in their subordinates, sending employees out to fetch bad coffee, and getting stuck with every task, it's hard out there for an owner without a team. We discuss the reasons hiring good people is so hard, and what we can do to make it easier, before moving on to what life is like inside a well-oiled organization comprised of diverse opinions and backgrounds.

We're joined by special guest Nicole Madden, a dancer, studio director, and mother to talk about the good and bad of customer service.  We share some horror stories and discuss the easy ways to avoid all the pits we fell into.  Plus, a quick refresher on the first rule of sales: take the money.

The Money Problem is the tendency for your business to get more expensive as it grows.  "Once we hit x number, we'll be good," we think, but by the time we get to x, we've added more staff or a bigger space or even just way more paper towels.  Owners stuck inside the Money Problem can't seem to ever pay themselves what they're worth, or take a vacation, or save for retirement.  We talk about all this and then how to outrun the Money Problem.  The secret?  Start by talking about money, as crude as it is.

An introduction.  We explain who we are and what we're about - helping studio businesses succeed.  This podcast is an exploration of the ideas and techniques we use in our own businesses and when we're advising others through our consulting company.  Mago explains his unlikely journey from near-chemist to studio owner.  Brazilian martial arts and dance factor in, but the real kicker was other people changing their career ambitions to stay in the community he and his wife had built.  Evan is just such a person.  The arc of his life plan is long, but it bends towards the studio.  Despite his best efforts, he never achieved true escape velocity, and instead of working towards a wonk job he stayed near the studio to teach and learn from the community.