Why Dance Studios Should Offer Less To Increase Profit

These days we hear a lot about “niching down”. What is it, and how does it apply to your dance studio or teaching career? Put simply, “niching down” is focusing on a smaller and more specific slice of a larger market. Below you’ll not only find out how to do it, but why it’s important to your life (and sanity!) to move your dance studio in that direction.

1. What is “Niching Down”?

Niching down in business is making what is offered a more narrow, specific part of the overall industry the business is a part of. For a dance studio, the overall industry would be “dance education”.

Many studios take the first step of niching down automatically in that they decide on a specific style of dance to teach or decide to focus on a specific group of dancers to serve. However, in today’s financial climate, studio owners can and should look at more ways that they can narrow their focus in order to deliver a better quality product and so increase their income.

2. How Offering Less Can Make You More

During my career I owned a very successful ballroom dance studio. Why was it successful? Because I learned that if I kept trying to offer everything to everyone, all I was going to do was work my tail off and not have much to show for it. The moment I decided to offer less my studio took off. Here’s what happened:

• We had been open for about a year. We were a ballroom dance studio that focused on adults only.
• In the United States there are 3 major styles of partner dancing. Like many studios, we were attempting to teach all of them.
• Our group classes were fairly small and our parties were only partially successful as our students had trouble dancing with those who were not learning the same style.
• We were teaching 6 days a week, trying to squeeze all the classes and styles into that time and struggling with it.

I realized something had to change. During the second year I began to devise a new program, one that was radically different than any other I knew in the ballroom industry. It was scary, and exciting.

Although not a conscious decision, we had already niched down somewhat by focusing on adults, which had helped us get a small but loyal student body. But it wasn’t enough. So..

I decided to focus on only one style of ballroom dance. I chose it based on the location of the studio and the surrounding demographics. It was super scary because all the other studios around us offered everything. We were smaller in size than they were and younger as well. I didn’t know if it was going to work, but when I considered it, offering only one style seemed to make sense. The students would all learn the same thing. At the socials, they’d all be able to dance with each other. This would foster a stronger community and connection among the students. It would require less training of new teachers, less classes, less work for everyone.

It was the best decision I ever made. Truly terrified, I went ahead with my plan. For six months I watched and hoped. My workload became less and my classes became bigger. When a new student would call it was easy for them to understand the program. Our classes had plenty of students in them. They’d get excited and sign up. Eventually we had a waiting list for our Intro to Ballroom class. From there, all our classes became bigger over time because teaching only one style had the added effect of better retention of dance students as well.

I didn’t realize how successful we’d become because of that one decision. It changed everything.

So what can you do to Niche Down?

3. How To Niche Down Your Dance Studio or Teaching Career

There are three questions you must be able to answer in order to successfully niche down your dance business. They are:

1. Who Do You Serve?
2. What Problem Do You Solve?
3. What Makes You Different?

Question #1: Who do you serve?

You must define very closely who you want to serve. It’s not enough to know you want to serve kids instead of adults or ballet students instead of recreational students. You’ve got to go deeper and get more specific.

In the example above, I determined that I wanted to work with adults between the ages of 25 and 60 who had type-A personalities and were serious about learning to dance as amateurs. I also determined that I wanted to work with students who had no experience and raise them up from the beginning as opposed to those who already had experience and were coming from other studios.

Get as specific as you can in regard to who you want to serve. The more specific, the clearer will be the answer to the next question.

Question #2: What problem do you solve?

Once you’ve determined who you want to serve, you must ask yourself what problem this group of people has that you would like to solve.

In my case, I was solving two problems for my adult dance students: how to learn how to ballroom dance well when there were no actual programs for adults nearby, and how to meet people with similar interests/become a part of a community while doing something they enjoy.

Understanding what problem you are solving can take some time and effort. Look closely at your group: what problems are specific to this group of people? If you don’t have a lot of experience teaching dance, it may be easier to start with point #3 below, then answer #1 and #2.

Perhaps you are serving kids who want to learn ballet in order to prepare for a professional career. What problem would they have? Is there a lot of quality training nearby? If not, you’ve just solved a common problem for that group of students.

Maybe you’re serving adult students who have always wanted to dance but never got the chance. A common problem with this group is that there are not enough introductory classes for raw beginners with no experience. Perhaps you could offer an introductory series class in a few common styles, such as jazz or ballet. Problem solved.

Think along these lines and get as detailed as possible with what problem you solve for this specific group of people.

Question #3: What Makes You Different?

The answer to this question will propel you forward in the promotion of your dance studio or teaching career.

What makes you better able to serve the group of people you outlined than others who are offering the same or similar service?

In my case, what made our studio different was that we had an actual program for adults. Meaning that we were not just a “drop-in class” studio.  Our adult students had to follow a clear program to learn to dance, with clear prerequisites, levels, and examinations. That lead to comprehensive dance skills, which led to confidence, which led to our students loving to dance.

Another thing that distinguished us was our strong community. One problem I experienced in my freelance years was that most ballroom studios had a kind of cliquish, exclusive, “we know and you don’t” attitude among the student body towards beginners. We solved this problem by providing an organized dance program where new students could make friends. In addition we initiated a no-tolerance policy on drama and gossip.  This resulted in a happy place where people felt accepted.

If you’re teaching freelance, discover what it is about you that keeps students coming back. Ask students or their parents what it is about you that makes them enjoy your classes vs. going somewhere else.

Perhaps you have a warm and welcoming attitude or you’re great at getting kids inspired about learning to dance. Maybe you are excellent at teaching all different types of learners, or you have a very diplomatic attitude that allows you to better teach couples dancing. Find problems unique to the group of people you serve to guide you in finding what you do better than your competitors. What special problems does this group have that you can solve?

If you own a studio, discover what is special about your studio experience. Perhaps you have the cleanest and newest facilities around. Maybe you offer accompanied classes or live music. Perhaps you focus on a very specific style of ballet, or you offer classes in styles of dance that other studios don’t. Whatever it is, it needs to be real and clear to you what distinguishes you from other dance studios.

Once you discover what makes you different, use it to promote yourself or your studio in your social media posts, flyers, postcards, website, etc. Make sure that everyone knows what it is that makes you different and why it allows you to serve your students better. Once you get the word out, those who are in the specific group of clients you serve will be even more attracted to you. Make sure it’s easy for them to recognize the unique care and attention they will receive if they become your students.

Niching down is one of the most important ways you can work less and make more. As a dance studio owner or freelance dance instructor, it’s worth spending the time to discover your special niche. You’ll thank yourself in the future!

Courses on how to grow your dance studio’s revenue are coming soon. Until then get on the list for real dance data that will increase your joy, fulfillment, and income from dance!