How To Start A Successful Tutoring Business
Tutoring is one of the most incredible businesses you can start. It's fulfilling, its incredibly rewarding, you can make a ton of money and students all around the world need your help!
But many people don't know where to begin when starting their tutoring business so use this blog as a guide to get started! By the end of this blog post you'll have the steps needed on how to start a tutoring business.
1. Pick Your Business Name
The first step to starting your tutoring business is deciding on a business name! This is such a fun step but many people overcomplicate it. Have the name make sense and encompass what you do. For example, let's say you're a tutor who specializes in math. A great name could be "Johns Math Tutoring" or "John The Math Guy - Tutoring Service".
If you're having a tough time picking a name, google "Free business name generator". This can get the juices flowing.
2. Deciding What You Offer
The next step is deciding the exact services you will offer. Will you offer one on one tutoring? Group tutoring? Math or English tutoring?
Here are my recommendations. Pick a niche to specialize in. A lot of tutors make the mistake of thinking the more you offer the more money you'll make...This isn't true! Pick one topic and become the go to expert in that subject.
One on one tutoring versus group tutoring? One on one tutoring is old and outdated and impossible to scale. I highly recommend group tutoring! You will make more money, work less and be able to scale using this model significantly more than if you offered one on one.
3. Creating Your Business Entity
You may not need to create an LLC right away but I always recommend becoming an LLC as soon as you can. A lot of tutors skip this step but it's important to do everything right from the beginning so you don't have issues later along your journey. You can either do this yourself by contacting your states secretary of state or you can pay a service to help you with it.
4. Deciding What & How You'll Charge
Deciding what you'll charge for your tutoring services is a big deal! Many tutors get this part wrong.
Do NOT charge by the hour! Instead, charge by the package. For example if you want to charge $50/hour for your tutoring, sell it as a minimum of 8 hours for $400.
I'd recommend having different options such as an 8-hour package, a 15-hour package, a 30-hour package etc...With price breaks per hour as the package increases. This will motivate and incentivize parents to invest in your larger packages.
This is what I charge:
8-hours - $400
15-hours - $700
30-hours - $1290
5. Creating Your Tutoring Contract
You'll want to have a contract in place for every customer you work with. It doesn't have to be anything crazy but it should have a few basic things such as your cancellation policy!
Make sure it states that they need to cancel or reschedule with you 24-hours or more prior to their tutoring session or they will charged 100% of the session. You can structure this however you like but this is how I do it. Before I had a contract I would have people cancel all the time, they had no commitment and they would disrespect my time.
6. Create A Marketing Plan
You need to create what's called the minimum viable sales process. What is the minimum sales process you need in order to turn someone who is interested into a paying customer?
This is a system to acquire new leads and turn them into paying customers 24/7, 365 days a year. This system will always be running in the background to bring you in new leads and customers consistently.
My process looks something like this:
1. Lead magnet w/ automated follow-up
2. Free consultation w/ automatic reminders
3. Survey - to qualify your lead
4. Thank you
After you have your minimum viable sales process you'll want to:
1. Grow your email list and email them weekly.
2. Create a website
3. Post on your social media consistently.
4. Create all your free directories like google my business, yelp, etc...
5. Start a blog
6. Network online & in your local communities
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After you've completed these 6 initial steps too starting your tutoring business you'll be ready to go out into the market place and begin growing your tutoring business.