Clarifying your business concept and services requires the following:
• Creating a student profile (or profiles, if you are serving more than one type of client)
• Determining the purpose of your program through a mission statement
• Clarifying your delivery methods
• Defining your market niche
• Outlining your programs and services
• Creating a system of evaluation
Creating a student profile
The types of services you offer will depend on the types of students you have. Are they immigrant children, students from overseas attending high school, adult international students, or recent immigrants in the workforce? Do they attend school during the day and require extra help at night, or are they free during regular business hours? Do they have special needs and therefore require special services?
Determining the purpose of your program through a mission statement
The key to big picture planning is to clarify your school’s purpose. Consider the following questions:
• What do you aim to accomplish with your services?
• What do you strive to provide to your students?
• What do you hope your students will be able to do when they complete the training you offer?
• What makes your services different from those offered by other tutorial services?
In short, what is your mission statement?
For example, suppose you decide to target certain students. You know that these students are more interested in gaining confidence through the overseas experience than in working hard to improve their academic performance. You also know that your market does not fit into the regular school system and therefore prefers to have flexibility with regards to lesson content, delivery, and lesson times.
Clarifying your delivery method
With your mission statement in place, your next step is to clarify how you plan to make good on your promises. How will you ensure that your study times stay flexible? How many and what kind of tutors do you need to hire in order to deliver unique, custom-designed tutorials?
For instance, let us imagine that your services target at-risk youth and students with special needs. You will likely need to draw from a pool of tutors who display great patience and are willing to work flexible hours. Your tutors will also need to have strong interpersonal skills and be able to read people well. Skilled tutors who specialize in working with people who have special needs would be particularly helpful. Lastly, your employees (or contractors) need to be able to think on their feet. They should be able to quickly and accurately assess a student’s needs, abilities, and goals, and be able to create a tutorial plan that matches the student’s profile.
Defining how your services fill a market niche
In Chapter 3, you had an opportunity to think of things that make your services special or in some way different from those of your competitors. Articulating your uniqueness clearly and concisely will help you create marketing materials that grab the attention of your target market.
In the case of 123 Tutoring Services, for example, the most unique feature is the market itself. Few schools or tutoring companies focus on helping at-risk ESL learners, and even fewer are specifically designed for those with physical challenges. Students who fit these descriptions would want to know that they are not only welcome at 123 Tutoring Services, but that they are preferred clientele. Letting them know means creating marketing materials that highlight these points.
Outlining your programs and services
Turning to practical matters, your next step is creating a schedule that shows potential customers what your programs and services are and when they are available. Because the schedule will be used for marketing purposes, the information should be clearly laid out and easy for second-language learners to understand.
The schedule should include information on specific programs. For example, you might offer an after-school program for public school students, an academic English program for university-bound international students, or a “study buddy” conversation program where two students work with one tutor. Your schedule should also include hours of operation and fees, and any related services and activities you offer (e.g., transportation and accommodation services and extracurricular activities).
Because tutorials are typically one-on-one sessions, a “program” can last as many weeks or months as a student wants. Programs that have more than one student in a session may have start and end dates. Smaller operations, with a varied market but limited tutor availability, may want to reserve certain parts of the workday for a specific type of customer. For example, the 3:00 p.m. to 6:00 p.m. period may be reserved for public school students.
Normally, tutorial services are designed to accommodate any level of student. However, not all tutors are comfortable working with students at every level. To ensure a comfortable match, you may need to develop a student-assessment system that identifies a student’s strengths and weaknesses in English. Having information about a student’s language abilities can help a tutor better prepare to work with the student.
Assessment systems can be found in textbooks and on websites. You can also create your own signature assessment system, with your own brand of coding and criteria (see the next section, “Establishing an intake and assessment system,” for more information).
While some tutorial services have set times for specific programs (e.g., Academic Preparation in the evenings, Monday to Wednesday), many businesses keep their program times relatively flexible. What they monitor carefully, however, is their hours of operation. Smaller companies with fewer tutors available might only be open for business four or five days a week, but for 12 to 14 hours a day. For example, tutoring might be available from 7:00 a.m. to 9:00 p.m., Wednesday through Saturday. Larger organizations with more staff are more likely to be open seven days a week.
Another thing that needs to be considered is travel time during the peak hours of the day. In small towns, commuting time is rarely an issue; tutors can move from one student’s home to another’s quickly. But in large urban centers, traveling during rush hour can be a nightmare. However, if a tutorial service has a fixed location, the onus is on the students to brave the traffic and be on time.
When developing your schedule information, ensure that your tutorial options and times are clearly coded and easy for language learners to read. Also include information about the other services you offer. For example, if you know your target market is interested in developing both language skills and social skills, you might offer a range of tutoring options, plus fun guided tours and activities that encourage communication between students and native English speakers. In addition to services designed to attract students with attendance issues and/or physical challenges, you could offer transportation and even accommodation.
Establishing an intake and assessment system
Once you know what programs and services you will be offering, you need to set up a method of intake and assessment that allows students to access your services and find the right tutorial match.
In both large and small tutoring businesses, the intake procedure might consist of an interview or “consultation” that establishes a student’s level, goals, needs, preferences, availability for sessions, and budget. During the consultation, the student would be given information about tutors, programs and services, and schedules.