How to Market and Sell Group Music Classes with Sophia Hardesty (Part 4 of 4)

Promote Group Music Classes

A lot of music studios struggle with marketing and directing new students into their group classes. They list their group classes on their website but most people are interested in private lessons. They understand what private lessons are. They have this narrative in their mind as to what a successful private lesson is going to look like. They don’t have a narrative in their mind as to what the group class is going to look like. If anything, they perceive the group class as being of lower value. So it’s your job, during the sales process to show the customer, that the group class is either of equal value or even greater value than the private lesson.

Are Your Group Classes of Higher or Lower Value than Private Lessons?

But first, you should ask yourself, are your group classes really bringing something that’s unique, different, and potentially of higher value than the private lesson? I believe the secret to highly desirable group classes is that they have to create a completely different experience than the private lesson. That different experience has to be appealing to the parent.

The only way to successfully direct a parent wanting guitar lessons into a group is by painting a picture of what that guitar class is going to look like. The parent has to ultimately think “well, that really sounds like something that’s going to be a better fit for my child, than the guitar lessons.”

I think it’s much more beneficial if you can look at your group program and ask yourself “how can I add value to this? How can I create an experience that the child will never get in the private lesson?” You will have created a winning formula if you can add that value and express it in your sales copy and the conversations you have with customers.

Pricing and Promoting Your Group Classes

If you don’t think that your group classes are of equal value, to your private lessons, if you feel like your group classes are simply a more affordable option or that yes, the child’s not going to get the same one-on-one experience then you should price the group class at a lower rate since it’s of lower value. Your pricing structure will have a significant impact on how you promote your group music classes.

What Value Do You Place on Your Group Classes?

I think it’s much more beneficial if you can look at your group program and ask yourself “how can I add value to this? How can I create an experience that the child will never get in the private lesson?” You will have created a winning formula if you can add that value and express it in your sales copy and the conversations you have with customers.

How to Fill Your Group Music Classes

In this episode, I speak with Sophia Hardesty of Naptown Sings and Plays. She offers private voice lessons, but she also has a program called Glee that she really feels strongly about. It’s doing well. She has a lot of kids in it, but she wants more students in the program.

On today’s show, we’re going to do a sales role-play, where she’s going to play the role of a parent and I’m going to play the role of a studio owner. I’m going to try to persuade Sophia to sign up for her own Glee program! I don’t really know all the details about her class but she shared some of them with me so I had to make up a lot of the details on the spot.

The Impact of a Sales Role-Play

I do think sales role-playing is a great way to improve your salesmanship. It can be an uncomfortable or awkward experience but if you want to get better at sales, more importantly, if you want your office staff to get better at sales, I encourage you to work into your training program.

I’ll be honest with you. I only did a sales role-play once or twice with my staff. I was actually the worst one at it on my team. We all learned so much from this experience. I really encourage you to try role play with your staff. Let your staff know that it might seem awkward at first but show them that you’re committed to keeping working on and improving this skill as a team. If you can have a successful sales role-play, the real sales calls will be a piece of cake.

Put the Script Down

I encourage you to avoid having a script. What I encourage you to do is get a piece of paper and just write out a bunch of ideas as to the benefits of whatever it is that you’re trying to sell. The benefits framed from the customer’s perspective or specifically the child’s perspective. Instead of talking about what goes on in the lessons and your, your academic values, talk about the child and the growth that they’re going to experience, the transformation that they’re going to experience from what you do in the lesson.

Instead of talking about the scales and the chords and the theory and the methodology of the lesson, talk about how your methodology specifically helps a child in their personal growth.