Martial Arts World News Magazine - Volume 23 | Issue 3

Tools & Tactics
Do You Spend or
Invest Your Time?
by Ms. Chris Lee
Motivational speaker Brian Tracy is fond of citing the Pareto Principle, which is
basically the 80/20 rule.
In a martial arts school, the rule can be applied to tuition billing
in that 20% of your students will take up 80% of your time with billing
problems. In any group, there is always that bottom
20% who cause trouble – some may actually be
troublemakers, but most are suffering from an
accident or bad circumstance. Regardless of
the reason, they have problems,
and therefore you
have problems.
What if I told
you that you could
change the 80/20
rule and reduce that
20% to ZERO?
You can, with
AMS billing. AMS
will handle all
of your tuition billing, including
that dreaded 20% of problem
students, so you can invest 100%
of your time in better instruction
and promotion of your school.
It just makes sense to separate
tuition billing from instruction.
The master should focus
his attention on helping his (or
her) students improve, not on
being a bill collector. Students
who have a financial problem
should speak to a financial
counselor, not their master
instructor.
A lot of schools assign a
member of the school staff to take on the role of bill collection, to
insulate the master. However, this situation still creates an adversarial
relationship between the student
and the school. It is far better to have a
middle man to absorb the abuse, and
keep a positive relationship between
the student and the school.
Now, some people will say that hiring
a middle man is too expensive. In reality,
hiring a professional saves you money. The
AMS account representatives are trained in the
latest programs and techniques to achieve the
highest rate of collection in the industry. They will
get you more money than your staff would because
they have the knowledge and experience that your
staff does not have. Plus, they follow the guidelines of the
Fair Debt Collection Act so that you and your school will not be
subject to lawsuits for unfair practices.
Even more important is the fact that AMS is not just a tuition
billing company. They are also a marketing and management company,
helping you enroll more students, keep them longer, and
manage better. Think about it – if you took the time you and your
staff spend dealing with those problem accounts and turned that
into time recruiting new students, how much more income would
you make? Now, add to that programs and promotions that have
proven effective all over the country to add 10 or more new students
a month and thousands of dollars in income, and you have a
service that doesn’t COST you money, it MAKES you money.
So the question remains: do you SPEND your time chasing
after students for money, or do you INVEST your time in acquiring
new students?
AMS can save you time and make you money. Invest five minutes
in a phone call at 1-800-275-1600 to find out more.
MS. CHRIS LEE is a martial arts business development consultant with a background in online and
social media marketing.
104 MARTIAL ARTS WORLD NEWS VOLUME 23 | ISSUE 3
Image (right) by z_wei