NZ Music Teachers
MICHAEL STORY
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NZ Music Teachers
Fostering a life-long love of music by helping connect people with talented, passionate and experienced music teachers in New Zealand.
www.nzmusicteachers.co.nz
Web Directory for music teachers
Teachers join - Create a Page
Custom Branding, Business Info
Public browse and contact teachers Directly
Teachers Pay a subscription (Monthly/Annualy)
Private music education is a bit of a cottage industry...
- lots of freelancers who teach from home, perform, do some teaching in schools.
- marketing can be expensive. Not everyone wants lots of students BUT... there is no one central place for the public to BROWSE and COMPARE teachers and contact them directly
Why... how/who is this helping?
NZ Music Teachers is part of the Global Music Teachers network whose mission is two parts:
- make finding and connecting with a local music teacher fast and easy.
- foster a community of talented and experienced music teachers and help connect them with people looking for a music teacher
Since 2011...
MUSIC
New Zealand
Melbourne
Sydney
Brisbane
London
NYC
New Jersey
NZ Dance Teachers
NZ Personal Trainers
What I have learnt...
- small target market who have varied fluctuating needs
- small capacity, some can't take on large numbers of students
- setting a low price point to target freelance private teachers is way too low for businesses (music academies)
- I need to automate as much of the business so I can continue to experiment as it grows
- it is hard to get those early adopters on board to a platform no one is using. Dance teachers grew to 50 businesses in 4 days which was amazing compared to music teachers, hence why I'm looking at other verticals.
- SEO and daily promoting of teachers on Facebook has lead to success in NZ but it is challenging to replicate this quickly
- balancing growing into new markets whilst paying the bills
Biggest challenge...
Freemium
vs
Free then Premium only
vs
Free then Free trial/Premium
vs
Premium only from launch (buy traffic)
What I wish I knew at the start...
- the sites could generate a really nice income
- teachers were doing really well off the site so I should have gone premium in NZ sooner and at a higher subscription rate
- building a community needed to be at the front of the project, I was fortunate in NZ that I was able to do that by providing a great free service initially. It is now the number one place to go for teachers in NZ
- I should have automated as many processes from the beginning... big mistake, I loved and still love working in the business but it's just busy work and I could have expanded sooner by replacing myself with a machine!
What impact has the business had in NZ...
- almost 25,000 students enquiries, supports 1,000's of teachers across the network. Also kiwis can travel and join other directories
CASE STUDIES
- Eliette's Music Academy started and joined the site in 2014 on the top plan and is now a multi-teacher multi-instrument academy in Auckland about to hit 500 students
- Remuera Music Academy started with 2 teachers and now has 2 campuses (the other in Albany) hiring 20+ teachers with hundreds of students
nzmusicteachers.co.nz
michael@nzmusicteachers.co.nz
miked.co.nz
come to RNZB session of Hanzel and Gretel later this week - thurs, fri, sat
Symposium Dectet at Little Andromeda this Sunday