How to start a guitar teaching business
Step 1: Prepare guitar teacher's resources
Take the stress out of teaching guitar
I know! I sell Guitar Teaching Resources so I'm bound to bang on about it but you don't want to open the door to your first customer and then just "wing" a lesson straight off the top of your head
It is a recipe for poor results and more stress than you need (trust me!)
I kind of fell into guitar teaching as part of a career as a gigging and touring musician and in the early days I did a lot of "winging it" before I realised that nearly all of the stress dissapeared if you have the resources to hand that will allow you to communicate the technical and theoretical concepts that you wish to get over to your student
I started this website after I realised that I could not be the only guitar teacher to find myself in that position
Step 2: Identify your customers
Finding the "right" guitar students to teach
There is not a single musician on the planet who can teach all styles of guitar at an advanced level
With all of the styles including Jazz, Rock, Metal, Classical, Soul, Disco, Blues, Reggae, Ska, Punk, Folk and Pop its not surprising that the most successful guitar teachers tend to gravitate towards a particular genre or set of genres and the key to success as a teacher is to know who your potential customers are
Part of the process involved in becoming a successful guitar teacher is to look at the question how good do you need to be at guitar to teach it?
The answer to that question may surprise you depending on the section of the market from which you set out to obtain your customers
If you intend to specialise in teaching advanced jazz guitar then you are going to have to have higher levels of skill, technical and theoretical capabilities than if your customers are young children encountering the instrument for the first time
As well as teaching private students many guitar teachers (myself included) also teach guitar in schools, colleges or music stores You are more likely to need teaching qualifications to regularly work in those situations and they come with their own advantages and disadvantages but they can provide a great source of regular income
Step 3: Promote your guitar teaching business
How to get customers as a guitar teacher
The best (and cheapest!) way to get guitar students is word of mouth It's great when the folks who already give you money bring other people to your business who also want to give you money and I've been lucky enough to be in a position where a large proportion (most) of my customers come to me via the reccomendation of someone else who studied with me
That's great but in the early days of setting up and running a guitar teaching business that was an impossibility because I had no students who were keen to tell their friends about the very good service that I provided (because I was not providing it yet)
I started teaching guitar back when dinosaurs roamed The Earth and I used to have a regular route around the local music stores (remember them?) making sure that my business cards and flyers were in evidence on the notice boards that most of them were happy to feature
Of course now the phone that you hold in your hand is probably the best way to communicate with your potential customers via social media etc
Your choices boil down to paying for geographically targeted advertisments to customers who fall into your target demograph or you could go the whole hog and set up devoted channels on social media sites and spend (maybe too much?) time producing "content" for them
I have "dabbled" in producing content for social media to promote this website over the years but the thought of doing it instead of actually teaching (or playing) guitar does not float my boat
I take my hat off to those who do it well (take a bow Justin Sandercoe) but the thought of filling my days gurning into a phone camera and feigning superhuman levels of enthusiasm and bonhomie brings me out in hives
I know that's just me but there is a lot of stuff on this website that revolves around "playing to your strengths" as a guitar teacher and I have found that my strength is teaching guitar
Step 4: Administrate your business
A simple way for guitar teachers to keep up to date with appointments, income and expenditure
If you are thinking of starting a guitar teaching business you could be forgiven for thinking that its all about playing the guitar. Luckily it is almost all about playing the guitar but a teacher who neglects the business, financial and organisational side of the enterprise will be more stressed than he or she needs to be
Thats why, alongside the Guitar Lesson Plans and Backing Tracks that you can find here we have also come up with a simple system that lets you keep a record of the day to day income and expenses that any business owner has to do
Its not the reason why any of us teach guitar but I cannot overstate the benefits of having a really simple way to keep track of all of the logistical and financial stuff
If you take a look at the illustration above you will see the sheets that a guitar teacher can print that will allow them to keep track of appointments and payments etc There is also space in which a teacher can keep a record of expenses incurred that can be deducted from the profits of the business
Despite all of the "progress" that seems to be flying around the place at bewildering speeds I find that there is something soothing about having thins written down on paper
I have a large desk diary beside my favorite chair and I write stuff in it and when I hear friends and fellow musicians argue about forgetting or omitting to update google diaries or disputing/missing whatssap messages I'm sorry but I can't help feeling a little bit smug
If it gets "in the book" then I live by it and the folks that I know and interact with know this I exchange texts with my existing customers/bandmates and I dont have to wonder if stuff that comes in by messaging service is a gig at the Houston Astrodome or (much more common) a meme about some idiots
If you look at the illustration above you can see sheets aimed at the particularly busy guitar teacher with a full page for a single day of lessons and gigs (rather than the ones higher up the page which allow you to record a full week of activity over two sheets
As I stated earlier the administration of a guitar teaching business is not the most "glamorous" part of the enterprise by any stretch of the imagination but regardless of this fact as a self employed operative you need to keep a handle on it. The materials on this page allow you to do that with a minimum of hassle and inconvenience
What's in the download?
You can download over 450 PDF's and more than 35 backing tracks to make your guitar teaching easier, more organised and stress free
Follow the link below to see a full list of whats in the download
HOW TO DOWNLOAD
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Cheers! Rob!