80 – Discovering Your Martial Arts Student’s Inner Greatness

It's great to know the real reason why your martial arts students want to join, but what if you could go one level deeper? Cat Zohar shares how.

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IN THIS EPISODE, YOU WILL LEARN: 

  • How to improve your martial arts school’s student retention
  • Member engagement vs. customer service
  • Why member engagement is like fortune telling
  • How to identify your martial arts students inner greatness
  • And more

*Need help growing your martial arts school? Learn More Here.


TRANSCRIPTION

GEORGE: Hey, this is George and welcome to another Martial Arts Media business podcast. So, I've got a repeat guest with me today, Cat Zohar, all the way from the States. Hi Cat.

CAT: Hi. How's everyone? Welcome, hello. Glad you're here if you are.

GEORGE: Cool. So, a quick intro. Why the episode number two and a bit about what are we going to be talking about here today. Recently on our Partners program, we co-created something with all Cat's expertise, all her IP, and we called it Retention by Design. Retention by Design, and Cat's going to correct me if I've misplaced the wording.

But something that we've focused on in our Partners program, we always talk about how to attract the right students, how to increase sign-ups and how to retain more members. And on the increased side, we talk about mastering sales. And with mastering sales, we're really big on really understanding the real reason why people join. Not the hey, I want confidence, but why the confidence? What is the deeper emotional reason why people go ahead?

Cat's taken that to a whole another level when it comes to retention. And instead of just uncovering and discovering what the actual emotional reason is why people go ahead and start martial arts, but she's developed a system where she can actually identify the personality traits and how to identify the actual greatness of the student in a more detailed way. Are they good at the competition, would they make a potential instructor, and so forth.

I'm not going to reveal too much from that, but what I really liked about the whole concept is it just takes things to a whole another level. And if you've got retention problems and football is a top priority over martial arts and a whole bunch of other things and you're finding price wars instead of value wars of why your martial arts program is superior, then this is going to be a lot of fun and a lot of value.

So with that, welcome again, Cat.

CAT: It's great to be here, George, thanks for having me.

GEORGE: So, just for a quick two-minute intro. Just for anybody who hasn't listened to the first episode, just give us a quick rundown, who is Cat?

CAT: Well, that's a loaded question. Cat is a person who has a marketing company that focuses on helping martial arts schools with their member engagement. Member engagement is probably a lot of my contribution to the martial arts industry and helping martial arts school owners not just sign up new members, but most importantly keep those members and keep them not just coming to classes, but keep them showing up happily and referring their friends and family members to their martial arts schools.

So, a lot of what Cat is, is a little special twist on taking a look at our relationships that we have with our students and how to be able to best serve our members. Not just in a sense of giving things, but most importantly in a sense of what they're able to receive by taking part in the martial arts class. Pretty much a combination of the martial arts business along with being a martial artist myself for over 30 years and a practitioner of the arts.

Cat Zohar

This is something that I have a good sense of direction on where martial arts instructors and well-meaning school owners tend to put more emphasis in certain areas, where if they were to shift some of that focus and attention to keeping their students through different things and not just teaching great classes, but also the process of which they help them develop personally and give them that personal development aspect in their program, they could actually do a lot less recruitment than what they may believe is necessary.

In the long run, it saves them a lot of that effort that goes into the ads and goes into the marketing and goes into the arduous task of getting new sign-ups each and every day. It definitely saves a lot of gray hairs from showing.

GEORGE: Awesome. So, let's break it down. Let's start with just the problem of this. Where did things go wrong with member engagement?

CAT: If I had to pinpoint, I always use this expression, member engagement is the opposite of customer service. Customer service waits for a problem to happen, and then figures out, what could we do to make it better, fix it? Member engagement eliminates the need for customer service because we try to pre-empt whatever that problem may be and just stop it from ever forming and ever even becoming an issue.

So, member engagement truly is, almost if you had a crystal ball and you were looking into it and you were saying, if that's the path for this new student that I have, I want to be sure that that thing that I just saw come up into my vision doesn't happen. Or, if that could be the ultimate outcome for this particular student, I want to ensure that that's exactly what their experience is going to be. So, it's almost like a fortune teller, if you will, looking into the crystal ball for the life journey of a martial arts student.

The truth of the matter is, here I am, I'm going to go off on a tangent because I guarantee my instructors never would have expected the fact that I, the geeky little six-year-old girl that signed up for martial arts classes would have been as invested into martial arts training as I am today. And I think that really is a lot of what … Instructors have preconceived notions of their students when they get started and they're not always favourable.

It's like, they're going to end up dropping out, or they're not going to end up going that far. Or they put high expectations on other students, like this is a superstar, they have so much ability, I can make them so great, and then become utterly disappointed that the student decides to pull out or they take a break or stop for football, or soccer as we call it. Yeah, that gets very dejecting in the whole school owners' job role.

GEORGE: It's really hard for this is just a practicality of life, right? Your assumption of people is generally wrong. It's almost like when you run a split test for ads. You always think that's the sure winner, and then it's typically not. And same thing with people. You can have a gut feel and some intuition with, all right this person is like this. You get a good feeling about it. But then there's all these other things that are going on that you could never predict. So, you can never really accurately assume.

And assumptions could also be dangerous. I see this in sales a lot. One thing with website development, always talking with copywriting. We always ask the question, if I had to walk into your school and ask what do you do here, what would be your answer?

Sometimes the question just goes, we started in Okinawa and we did this and there's this whole tangent of stuff. And I'm like, hang on, you lost me at 1964. I'm not here anymore. Because you completely missed the point. What I'm getting to with that, it's so easy to just assume your story is going to connect with someone, or just assume that somebody's here for confidence. But there's so much more going on behind the scenes.

And want to take this, not to a crystal ball level, of course, because it's actually a practical process that you put together. So where do we go from here? If we look at member engagement and you need to lift your game. Maybe people are dropping off and other sports are taking priority, etc., where do you start this whole process within the communication with the parents, etc.?

CAT: Great question, George. And everything that you've said so far has been completely spot-on with your analysis of where people, well, what do you guys do, what do you accomplish. And I think that is exactly where most school owners drop the ball is because they want to put someone on a trial membership, or they want to get them enrolled on something. And before that they're so eager to sign them up on a program or say I got one and celebrate that success, one of the most important areas to learn about the student is day one. It's on the intake process. It's the day you ask them to fill in a liability waiver form and permission slip to try a first class with you.

This is one of my strong beliefs is that If we were to ask better questions on that intake form, and not just one of those old lists of 50 different questions about will you be living in the area for the next year or so or questions that are a little bit less relevant to the life of the student as opposed to the life circumstances of the student is really telling.

How often is it that martial arts instructor as a parent, of say a child that's five, six, seven years old, what kind of a friend is your child? Does he get along well with others? How does he participate in group activities? These seem to be very reasonable questions for a future educator, a teacher, a martial arts instructor to learn and to know, especially from a parent's perspective before they begin teaching the student.

To me it seems like common knowledge that we would take the time to ask questions about the student that we're going to be teaching so that way we know how to teach them. But I don't think it happens nearly enough.

GEORGE: Okay, so let's look at how beneficial this is. Our goal is we want to keep more students and we want to learn more clear understanding of who they are, what they really want, what are their potential personality trait. So how do we go about uncovering a better understanding and being able to use that, not just on the sign-up process, but actually to keep them engaged throughout the program? My follow-up question would then be, how do we predict the actual times, where you were saying member engagement to actually replace the customer service. How do we go about that? I'm asking that now in case it doesn't slip my mind.

CAT: I hope I remember that question when it comes around to that part of the discussion here. Great great great pack here. An assessment. I think the number one way to be able to ask parents the important questions that we need answers to is through a simple assessment. What if this assessment was, oh, I don't know, 18-questions long and ranked them in order of different priorities as far as how they showed up most powerfully in a child's life. And a parent takes this on behalf of a child, or an adult student takes it for themselves based on how they react to different situations and things.

And giving them this type of simple, very straightforward matter of fact-type questionnaire that they could quickly take and basically, you're able to then get a little bit of a profile of who this person before you is, without making too many judgements, but just based on how their personality is showing up and how other students in your martial arts school may have also related to such questions.

GEORGE: Give us an example. I'm trying to just cut in. Just give us an example. So, assessment. If you could handpick a couple of things to give us an idea of how you go about the whole profiling.

CAT: Sure. So let's say if a student has really strong perseverance. Because we know our martial arts program teaches a student perseverance. Let me backtrack one step. Let's say that all these things that we say we teach in martial arts, confidence, perseverance, indomitable spirit. All of these traits were there. And then a parent was able to say, well, I definitely see my child, as opposed to say lacking, he needs more confidence.

What if we were able to take it from a completely different perspective? What if we were able to say that my child has so much fortitude, so much perseverance. He doesn't give up and sometimes he probably should. He's the one who stays to the end, and he's trying to be everybody's friend even when other kids may not be so nice to him in return. These are real frustrations a parent may have if they're dealing with everyday life with their child. It gets me so raging mad when I see other kids taking advantage of his good nature.

And I'm sure there's people listening to this recording right now and says, oh my gosh, I've heard parents say that to me last week. And they're probably thinking of their own student body and thinking to themselves like, I have students like that. Where if somebody took their very last snack for lunch, they would not even have a problem with it or let them do it because they're not aggressive or they're not assertive enough.

So we hear these things that parents want these things for their child. They don't want them to be bullied, they don't want them to be cornered. They want them to exude, not necessarily just confidence, but also assertiveness. They want them to be able to say when enough is enough and stand up for themselves so they're not being taken advantage of, which is completely understood.

But what if a parent was able to recognize, well the fact that they have such good endurance and what if that was really more like empathy. And what if their child's empathy was one of their strongest features and that was not a bad thing. That was a good thing. And we're able to recognize that first through the questions we ask. Like, for instance, how much empathy does your child display when working with other kids or in groups? How do they share empathy with their friends at school?

These types of questions that we're asking specifically, they may say, extremely much. He gets a five on a scale of one to five, five being the highest, that's my kid all the way. So, now we have a little bit of a different understanding of what this child really has initial greatness for because that's the way his personality is showing up. That's the way he communicates on an on-going basis. That's what mom hears from the school teacher every time they have a sit-down conference.

So, these are the types of things that now that the martial arts instructor's able to say, hey, we know you want confidence, and that's going to come with our martial arts program, but we're not going to let him lose one of the strongest qualities that he has with maybe say empathy, or maybe say fortitude or one of the other types of honour. He just has such great integrity, he's not going to tell a lie and he's going to be honest if something comes down to the wire about what happened in this particular situation.

These are all really good things but sometimes can perhaps be seen as a little bit more passive or a little bit meeker. And sometimes that could also lead to some of the reasons why parents bring their kid into a karate school or martial arts program in the very first place.

So all of that being said, gives us a chance to really hone in on where the areas are that a parent says this is great, as opposed to saying, ugh, we just need more discipline in this house because he just doesn't listen to any of the rules. As opposed to focusing the attention negatively on what's lacking, we just really want to shift the conversation and focus on the beginning of a new relationship on what's already there and build on that.

GEORGE: That's awesome. So, what I was getting at then was predictability. So we know in the program, and maybe this is a question down the line, actually because we can focus more on what we've just discussed here. But to that question because we're going to push it out and we're going to forget about it. So, let's discuss it.

So, predictability. So if we think customer service, member engagement. We want to combat problems and deal with situations before they actually arise. How do we go about looking at that journey and saying okay, white to black, let's just call it that. For example, we know in the next three to five years or whatever the journey is. Longer if it's Jiu Jitsu. That's going to be the journey of the student and there's going to be some obstacles where the student's going to want to quit, lose interest, etc. How do we go about that? That's a big question.

CAT: That really is. This may be a little bit of a more lengthy response to it as well. But in all fairness with time and our listeners' schedules here, let me address that this way. There's not a roadmap in any martial arts student's journey. There's a destination where X marks the spot. And if that's black belt, we know that that's what the goal is for a student that we want as martial arts instructors to see our students achieve.

But until that goal is also the student’s goal and the parents’ goal, we have a three-way obstacle. So, we can't just be pushing someone. The student has to want it. We can't want anything for our students more than our students want it for themselves. I didn't say it, I just probably said it better. I wasn't the first person to quote that.

The truth of the matter is if our students and our parents of these students don't want black belt just as much, they're not going to get it. Part of member engagement is really listening to find out what the outcome is that a student is looking for. And make sure that we're able to not just deliver that, but find out what the next outcome is going to be as well, too.

And, through something like the assessment where we know where a person's tendency tends to be strong, we can actually say, well given this amount of fortitude that your child has, and that perseverance, we're running a boot camp session where it's going to be a four-hour training day, but he's got the makeup, he's going to be great for this. This type of rank advancement camp, or this type of workshop that we're going to do, or this intensive training for a competition team, maybe, it's going to be right up his alley. This is going to be something he's going to do so great at.

And because he has that grit, has that perseverance that he's showing naturally, that it's there, it's within him, that's something now that we can take and expand over the course of yellow belt, green belt, blue belt, purple belt, red belt, black belt, and make that grow with him.

A parent comes in, they want confidence, we show them confidence. They say thank you very much, have a great day. We were able to do that in two weeks, that was worth it. And then you're done. But wait a minute. Because we tried to show up with something that wasn't necessarily already there. We tried to show them or give them something that we were able to throw at them or help them develop or help them gain. But we negated the fact that they already came prepared with something.

And that greatness they came prepared with is going to get us so much longer of a road to be able to work with and to be able to naturally appeal to what it is the child's already doing well at. And the parent recognizes, already on board with, keyword. They're already in alignment that yes, this is one of the greatnesses in their child. This is something they'd really excel at. You tell me what parent wants their child to fail and just fail miserably in anything that they do? And then, not only want them to fail miserably at what they do, wants them to do that consistently for about three to five years.

No. We make this into such a struggle, and that's where so many disconnects are going on with martial arts school owners because they see things as this is our curriculum, this is the way it has to be, this is everything that needs to be taught. But sometimes they miss the fact that, well, the student's probably not going to be ready for that after just two classes, six classes, eight classes. Every student is not identical. But the instruction was so great, they're always going to be ready that way. That isn't necessarily the case, either.

So, by giving them the proper instruction where we recognize areas of greatness. Let's say, perseverance, for one. They're able to then now suggest, with confidence, hey, our competition team requires a lot of perseverance from our competitors and it takes a little bit of commitment on the parents' part, too. So, I'm guessing if your kid has all that perseverance, you probably have a little bit of it up your sleeve, too. So, we're going to recommend that he gives try-outs a chance. Is that something you'd be interested in? Because he looks like he's got a lot of talent and a lot of ability to grow with that.

And they say yes, great. And now this is something that's able to move them in the direction of continuing on. So, it isn't necessarily just setting the goal of black belt, but also giving them something that does resonate with them. And that is worthy of their journey.

So how do we overcome and take the predictions with a crystal ball and different things and the membership process where a student may want to stop or may want to take a break? You always refer back to what the initial goodness was in their child from the start. And recognizing that. And recognizing where they're going with that. And recognizing the progress that that area's making.

Not so much about the areas of efficiency, but more so about the areas of progress and about the areas of growth. Not only was he great at something like this when he came in, but look at how much better he's getting at it. And wow, do you see how that transfers over for now to A, B, and C.

Sometimes it's kind of funny. Martial arts instructors want to get to 100%. Say this is 100% right here, and they say, well the best way to get to 100% is not to go from the 98 percentile to make it 2% higher and get there, but what's the area where it's like two, four, six per cent. The area that's 4%, I want to start here and really make it go all the way up. Why such an uphill battle? If the goal is to get to 100%, I want to find out where are we at 90. I don't want to have to go 100 degrees to be able to get there, I want a student to be able to go from 95, 96 and there we are. Look at what we just did.

But it's just an easier way to be able to show people. And then most importantly, instil that type of success in our students through the journey that they also enjoy the process. Sometimes it's counterintuitive what's easiest to be able to deliver with our programs.

GEORGE: So, there are two paths, really. There's the linear path, and then there's the personalized path. The linear path is, yep, there's some bumps in the road and we know that typically when a student goes from this to this, there's a drop off. Or this type of season might affect it. Or change in school, going into teams, all these things. So that's sort of the linear path of the constants that you can predict.

But then what you can't predict and what we're talking about here is focusing on the higher-level, the outcome, the individual path of the student. Where are they at in their journey? So taking it to that point, it's almost like saying, all right, here's the outcome that we want. Here's the outcome that the individual wants. That's what they want. Here's martial arts. How do we form the glue? What's the glue that's going to keep these two together.

And when Johnny here goes off-path, and loses sight, now we can sort of come back and say okay, Johnny wanted to be here, how is that going. Well, you're not there yet. Okay. So let's backtrack on that. So sometimes, it can be also, I guess, reminding of where they're at and what they actually wanted and are they there yet. What's your take on that?

CAT: Evaluation and communication always has to be part of the growth process, period. So, recognizing where a student begins, recognizing where a student is somewhere after a belt promotion, maybe. Having sit downs with parents and open communication about how the program's working in their life. These are all real, important parts of keeping engagement strong with your members.

And of course, any type of relationship is going to have its ups and its downs. It's not always smooth sailing 100% of the time. Isn't that the way the saying goes? It's the turbulence or it's the rocky waves that create the proficient sailor? It's not the calm waters that create the experienced sailor. And remembering that and recognizing that with parents when they come in. It's like, oh, this is a perfect opportunity for us to be able to really, truly express to little Billy here that this is part of the road of life, and we're going to work through this together. And getting him through that period or that experience. So, yeah, definitely.

But also recognizing that so often if there's a problem, their teachers are going to address it like, she just won't keep her hands to herself, she touches and smacks the kid next to her all the time and who cares that he keeps pulling her hair, but she needs to learn to keep her hands to herself. Whatever the situation is.

So often parents are just used to hearing what's wrong, what's broken, what's not right with this particular incident. How can they “fix their kid?” We've got to just recognize from the start when parents come in that there's nothing wrong with their kid and not to assume that there's something wrong with their kid. But, instead, assume that you're here, for what? To just do better at being who you are, right?

I don't want to change you when you come in for martial arts classes. And I think this is where we really have a disconnect a lot of times with the enrolment process. Because somehow, martial arts instructors get this idea that in order for me to do well at my job, I have to completely transform and change who you are as a person, or make you into something completely different than what you are. I don't think that's what parents want, either.

Just because they come in with a concern or a problem or a reason, doesn't mean that reason needs to be 100% of the focus of the entire relationship on-going. To refer back to say, he didn't have confidence, now he does. I'm a superstar, stay with me for the next six, seven, eight years, that's not necessarily the path to success. But, instead, recognizing since your child is so great with A, B, C, since your child does so good already with this particular element, I know he's going to find a lot of success with this and this and this. In fact, this is the reason why our instructor over here, Mr. Jojo or whatever his name is, is doing what he's going today teaching classes. Because he was quite similar.

So, recognizing that the process to growth isn't always the path of most resistance, but instead the least resistance. And recognizing areas of personal development that we could see for ourselves as martial arts instructors.

When I talk to school owners, I'm always amazed sometimes when I hear them express that I know this student's going to be getting ready to quit. Or I'll even ask them a question, who's the next student in your martial arts school that's going to quit? And they give me a name. I'm like, wait a minute, stop right there. You have a name of somebody who's going to quit in your mind. What have you done to prevent that? Nothing. I'm just waiting for it to happen.

I know if I take my vitamins every day I'm not going to get a cold, but when I feel a cold coming on, and I know a cold is coming on and I say, nah, no vitamin C. I'm not going to take any orange juice, I'm not going to have anything to help combat that in any way. I'm not going to make sure my diet's clean this week. No. No, I'm just going to let it happen. It's almost like saying, what's wrong with you?

I'm asking all the listeners to this recording right now. All three of you out there. One, two, and whoever else is listening to this right now. I'm asking you, please ask yourself that difficult question. Who's your next student to quit. And then whatever name comes to mind, what are you going to do about it? What are you going to do differently? Because if you were going to do the same thing, we already know what the outcome is, you're going to be right. Congratulations, you're going to be right again.

But none of the times where a student says that they're going to quit is it completely always, I never saw that coming. It's usually they missed a class, they missed two classes. This happened. Or we hear a little bit of a soft tell. Oh, well we're running into some problems at school. I hope he can keep his grades up. We hear a different type of tune about it. We hear different things about it all the time.

So, instead, a parent comes in says, we're running into some problems at school, we're going to have to stop karate so he can focus on schoolwork. Well, when has that ever been known to help? When has that ever been known to actually fix the schoolwork? So he's going to spend all his time with the tutor then? Actually, helping him excel at something that he's great at, like, I don't know, martial arts classes, is going to be great for his confidence to continue while he tries to improve at school. So, we're going to take the one thing he's struggling the most right now and make that 100% of his concentration and focus?

How would a parent do with that? If you were to say to a parent, let's just go ahead and tell you the only thing you could do 100% of the time is work on that one project you've been procrastinating on for the last year. How are they going to feel about that? Their reactions probably going to be about the same. Yeah, everybody needs a healthy outlet. Everybody needs some way to be able to feel good. So, we just recognize where that shows up. I hope that helps.

GEORGE: So, look, we've been talking a lot of big-picture ideas, big concepts. I want to quickly make this super practical. Because it's one thing when we did the thing for our Partners, Retention by Design, we broke it down as in a process. Let's be real. Maybe this is a simple conversation or simple listening for a lot of people. But for a lot of school owners this might be next level of the head. It's like, all right, I get the concept, but now what. How do I actually make a thing?

So you've made it really practical in a way of going from assessment to actually identifying the, I say personality trait, but the greatness, their inner greatness. And that whole concept as in a process. So, walk us through how that works. How do you go about it?

Cat Zohar

CAT: That's a really tough question to verbalize since it's so heavily based on visual aids. And unfortunately, I don't have my brochure with me right now. But one of the things that is really important is after we take the assessment, we do an evaluation on the assessment. And the assessment's easily broken down into six different categories, or six different areas. And each one has a rank of up to five points per section.

And basically, what we're looking for is out of three areas, which I refer to as our centralized qualities, we also have three contributing qualities. Every centralized quality is going to get matched with one contributing quality. And when these two come together, a centralized quality and a contributing quality, they make a butterfly. We call these butterfly themes. Each student has a unique butterfly theme. And there's nine different butterfly themes a student could actually fall under.

These particular themes aren't my creation as far as how they show up, but instead, science. It's different learning styles. It's the way that students learn best or tend to do best in certain environments. Some students tend to do better visually. Some students tend to do better by hearing the instructions broken down step by step by step. Other students do better when they actually get to demonstrate or physically participate.

So based on what a person's learning style is, we then are able to kind of direct or guide how we go about teaching the classes, how we go about instilling confidence in that student and for whatever their path is. And basically, use this as a little bit of a tool to be able to leverage what recommendations we make for this students' martial arts journey.

So, really after we have their butterfly theme figured out, the next step is for us to be able to communicate that with the parent and then give the parent some ways that this is going to benefit their child at home, too. So, when it comes down to cleaning up their room when they're asked, what's the best approach to get them. What's the best way to give that direction for the child? We're not just going to say it's always this way.

No. Instead, we're going to take it based on how their personality shows up and then recognize what kind of learner they are. And then from that be able to clearly and confidently share with the parent, one of the best ways for you to be able to coach your child, like we do here in the martial arts school in the art of personal development. And it's to give them this command for cleaning up their room. And them recognizing when it happens, that this was done by the process of what. Where their natural greatness tends to fall in.

It really helps you incorporate the martial arts that you teach at your martial arts school with parenting martial arts in a sense that they're able to give out to utilizing the same type of information that we just uncovered based on the assessment for them as well.

GEORGE: Awesome. So, I think here's what we're going to do. We could talk about this forever. it's a lengthy topic, so I want to be respectful of your time. I think here's what we're going to do. If you're listening to this podcast, you're going to have to head over to martialartsmedia.com and find this episode. We have not really planned this, so this will potentially be the worst presentation.

CAT: What are we doing here, George?

GEORGE: This is potentially the worst attempt at a cool offer. If you are still intrigued, listen on. So, we're going to put together something that you can take the assessment and you can implement this whole process in your business from front to back. And head to where the episode is. Just look for Cat Zohar on martialartsmedia.com.

We haven't worked out the details, which is why I'm saying this is probably the worst attempt at a sales offer on a podcast, ever. But the cool part about it is, if what we've spoken about is cool, if you have problems with your retention. If you know that understanding a student's true greatness is going to be super beneficial to understanding how that works.

And to make it in a practical way that you don't have to be a genius with a crystal ball to and really figure things out, but to have a practical sort of step-by-step way of going about it. Then, head over to this episode. We'll have a link where you can access more details. I think we'll shoot a quick video just to give a bit of a breakdown on what that actually is and how that works. How was that?

CAT: Yeah, sure. Sounds great. We'll give the assessment to anybody who wants to take it. So, if this has piqued your interest at all, good. Take the assessment. We'll send you back what your evaluation comes back as and have a conversation about your results. I think that sounds great.

GEORGE: We should ask. Where can people find out more about you and more about all this what you've got going on? And thanks for being on, again, Cat.

CAT: My pleasure. I love being able to share with martial arts community. This is where I grew up and this is where I plan to stay. This is my livelihood, so whatever I'm able to do to help martial arts school owners around the world is truly a good passion of mine and I'm happy to help any way I can in that way.

Best ways to learn about me are either my website CatZohar.com that has the links to all the different creations that my mind comes up with. There's BeginnerMinds.com too, which is the program we're discussing. Any of those sites are the best way to keep tabs on me. Or of course send me a Facebook friend request if you watch this and I'll be happy to connect with you over social media as well.

GEORGE: Awesome. Cool, cat. That sounds cool when you say it like that. Thanks for being on.

CAT: Why, thank you.

GEORGE: Thanks again for being on. As I mentioned, you can check out, obviously, all of Cat's websites. Catzohar.com and BeginnerMinds.com and we'll put together something special for you guys as a podcast listener. So, head over to the website, check that out, martialartsmedia.com. Cat, it's been great having you on again. Always great speaking to you and I'll speak to you again soon.

CAT: You too, George. Awesome. Thank you

GEORGE: Cheers.

Awesome. Thanks for listening. If you want to connect with another top, smart martial arts school owners, and have a chat about marketing, lead generation, what's working now, or just have a gentle rant about things that are happening in the industry, then I want to invite you to join our Facebook group.

It's a private Facebook group and in there, I share a lot of extra videos and downloads and worksheets – the things that are working for us when we help school owners grow and share a couple of video interviews and a bunch of cool extra resources.

So it's called the Martial Arts Media Business Community and an easy way to access it is, if you just go to the domain named martialartsmedia.group, so martialaartsmedia.group, g-r-o-u-p, there's no .Com or anything, martialartsmedia.group. That will take you straight there. Request to join and I will accept your invitation.

Thanks – I'll speak to you on the next episode – cheers!


Here are 3 ways we can help scale your school right now.

1. Join the Martial Arts Media community.

It's our new Facebook community where martial arts school owners get to ask questions about online marketing and get access to training videos that we don't share elsewhere – Click Here.

2. Join the Martial Arts Media Academy and become a Case Study.

I'm working closely with a group of martial arts school owners this month. If you'd like to work with me to help you grow your martial arts school, message me with the word ‘Case Study'.

3. Work with me and my team privately.

If you would like to work with me and my team to scale your school to the next level, then message me with the word ‘private'… tell me a little about your business and what you would like to work on together and I'll get you all the details.

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61 – Cat Zohar – Simple Member Engagement Tips For Martial Arts Student Retention

Cat Zohar shares simple martial arts student retention tips that any school owner can master.

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IN THIS EPISODE, YOU WILL LEARN:

  • Cat Zohar’s martial arts life, being an innovator and a visionary
  • How to establish rapport on the online platforms
  • The benefits of relationship marketing
  • The challenges in building relationship within large martial arts schools
  • Cat’s proven techniques for improving customer retention
  • And more

*Need help growing your martial arts school? Learn More Here.


TRANSCRIPTION

Of course, you can. If you can take your hand, putting it in front of you, look at it and then give yourself a direction to smile – smile. And be able to do that, you can great somebody when they walk in the door, I promise. You can train anybody to do that. If you are able to handle that little interaction right there, you can train someone to be friendly.

GEORGE: Hey, this is George Fourie and welcome to another Martial Arts Media business podcast. Today, I'm joined by Cat Zohar. I didn't check – Zohar, am I pronouncing that right?

CAT: That's correct!

GEORGE: Alright, awesome. So Cat will be joining me and about 11 other also martial arts instructors and business leaders at The Main Event and that's in San Diego, 26th to 28th of April, so that's next month. Depending on when you're watching and listening to this. So we’re going to have a bit of a chat and Cat has some amazing things going on in the industry. She got started when she was a 6-year old and I'm here to learn about what Cat does and have a great conversation and of course, bring great value to you. So welcome to the show Cat!

CAT: Thank you so much for having me George, I'm happy to be here! And hello everyone!

GEORGE: Awesome. So, let’s start right at the beginning – who is Cat Zohar?

CAT: Well, I think Cat Zohar is a martial arts innovator, martial arts visionary for the industry. I started martial arts practice when I was 6 years old in Cleveland, Ohio where I grew up. And it's something I've been most active in my entire life, so this is just the continuation and the next chapter of Cat Zohar, I guess you would say.

GEORGE: All right. So you mentioned innovation and visionary – can you elaborate a little bit on that?

CAT: I've done a lot of firsts in the martial arts industry. I started girls only martial arts program, designed just for young girls between the ages of 3 and 10 and we set up the Karate Princesses Program, which was designed specifically to teach real martial arts techniques and skills for protection – princess protection more appropriately referred to. But actually, giving them a base to take part in martial arts. When I was a young girl starting in my martial arts classes, my mom used to be like, girls don't do karate. So our motto and our tagline was, girls do karate too and that was really a big focus.

This was actually pre all of the pink belt stuff that you see today, so we actually had to make our own karate princesses belts out of cool princey pink fabrics and things like that. So we had a whole bunch of ways for the girls to earn bling for their belt by participating and doing princess like behaviors around their community as well as their household too and school.

So there was a bunch of things like that I've done over the years that have been… well, innovative for the industry and I've seen many different trends come and go over the years as well, but a lot of the things that I like to visually express to the people that I connect with is we’re taking what it is that they want to see happen and sometimes giving them the steps to be able to make that happen and how to be able to market what that is. Or maybe help guide them a little bit where I could see the direction developing or progressing fast for the people that they service.

GEORGE: Ok. And you mentioned you've seen a lot of things come and go: what's been the cool thing that you feel has stuck around over the years?

CAT: Well, here's another way where I feel that I bring that vision to the martial arts industry, where I actually coined the phrase that came into the industry is member engagement and one of the big things that I really focus, the most part of my recent career on has been developing and building those relationships with our students and parents. And if it comes down to it, the one thing that I feel will always be here, the personal connections and the relationships, despite the era of digital, websites and connecting and not answering phones and stuff like that. I still believe that that personal element and that interaction has got to be there. And not only does it have to be there, there are so many ways to be able to make it by design, so it works.

Not just for a school owner of multi-locations, but also a single school owner, or a single operator. And a lot of times, that's something that they have but they don't necessarily recognize what they have. They want to try and make your marketing, make them look super big, whereas their greatest marketing effort is actually just harvesting and nurturing those relationships that are small or that are intimate to them and that's some of the greatest ways that they're able to grow. What's interesting to me is, you'll see a lot of great big organizations trying to appear smaller, so that way they have that personal bond and connection. So it works both ways.

GEORGE: Very true, because that's been, just looking at the shift of the internet over the last few years: I think it really came to a point where everybody wanted to automate. Automate and how can you separate yourself from being connected, where now it's becoming, you can see all the changes happening in Facebook, especially – the focus is really, how do you facilitate more relationships? How do you facilitate more one to one type of relationships and connections? So how would you go about that? So if you wanted to create member engagement and you wanted. I assume you're talking through online platforms, right?

CAT: Yeah, it could be anything though. I mean relationships that I specifically refer to though is the actual connections that they have with the parents in the martial arts school and the kids that take part in their program. Or breaching that gap, it's for me what takes place. A lot of parents will drop their kids off to the martial arts program and then for a lot of times, they have even nannies or sitters that bring them to the classes and the parents don't actually get to see what their child learns, or what they do. Maybe it's with the exception of when they come to a belt promotion, or testing or grading.

So these are the types of things that when they do show up, they're like, oh, I didn't even recognize this was here, but the interaction with the instructor and the parent may not be that strong. But how can we actually make it that even an absentee participating parent is still involved with the school, where they feel like, oh, yeah, that's where my kid goes to martial arts, this is what we do. And where they feel a connection with it as well too. Which is not that foreign thing, my kid does that, it's his activity, it's whatever. It’s Tuesday night at 6 o'clock – no, it's more about how they actually can make that relationship grow stronger with the parents, so that way their parent is the ally. I hear so often martial arts school owners say, oh, it'd be great if it weren't for the parents.

Well, it's because they don't build that reform with the parents! They connect with the kid or they get the kid to like it and then they get hurt when the parent says, we’re going to pull him out, or we’re going to do another sport or we’re going to do another activity. Where one of the biggest things then that I see from a martial arts school owners perspective is, why would you do such a thing, you don't know! It’s because the school owner didn't communicate with them, or I told them, or it's because the parent doesn't see. Well, if the parent doesn't see, how do you show them? How do you tell them, how do you get them to be able to recognize that? How do you get them to see something bigger than just your sport, or your martial arts school as an activity for them? So these are the kind of things that I like to dive in on.

GEORGE: All right. And I can hear you're really passionate about that and it gets me thinking, that's really the.. It’s sort of the elephant in the room, right? Because you've got the student and you see the student every day, so you're building a relationship with the student, but the student is not the one that's paying the bill. So it's much easier for the parent to say, well, soccer is cheaper. Or easy to make that shift, because they're not part of the relationship. And I mean that most transactions, people might get started with the idea and for the skill set, but then they hang around because of the community. So I can see the value in that really involving them in the community and getting that happening. So the question is, do you have sort of a checklist or a process that you go about to facilitate that?

CAT: Yeah, actually there are several different tactics that we use, but the strategy that we overall build is developed on day one, is actually sitting the parents down and when we have our first lesson, letting them understand just how important it is to keep that communication going, but more importantly, to actually stop, take a minute, have a one to one conversation with them – not just, fill in this form and I’ll be right back, but instead, hey would you mind filling our permission slip to get them started and then we can take an interview together and see if this is a good fit and actually discuss what they want to see their child gain from the program.

And get them to open up about some of the things that they've seen or experienced in their child's behavior or mannerisms that may be concerning to them. And probe a little bit to actually get them to expand a little bit on why they feel for themselves their child needs either things that we deliver: better focus, better confidence, better self-esteem, stronger relationships with their classmates, better friendships – any of the millions of things martial arts can provide. Get them to actually have an experience, where you're discussing this with them and then from that, actually deliver that to them through your lesson.

And a lot of it just comes down to listening and most of it is that the processes and the things that we use really come down to just communication. You know, so often, we’ll hear a parent wants to pull their kid out and typically, not listening to the reasons that they say at that point is the reason why so many people don't return back to martial arts. I was always in the unique position, because I've had so many former students come back to the training after three months, after six months, after six years, after breaks or periods of time that they wanted to return back and it's because I never stopped treating them as a member, even after they weren't there. So we continually kept in contact or connection or random phone calls here or there out of the blue, where I wasn't doing anything more than just being like, hey what's going on? Missed you, how have you been? You know, or getting to be able to keep that contact going.

And now with social media, so we talk about what are some of the strategies we could specifically use. If you're using a closed space group for your members to be able to communicate anything that goes on in your classes, stop communicating so damn much about your classes! Nobody cares about the curriculum videos of the week and the month and posting all the videos and all the pictures of all these silly things, it's Greek to them. But instead, host conversations that actually spark a discussion, that get them to say, hey, this is what we do, this is how we handle this, or even as simple things as what's for dinner on Tuesday night? You know, giving them the chance to actually open up and build connections, so they feel they're connected to your martial arts school in a greater way than just that place they drop their kid off two days a week.

GEORGE: Alright, cool. That's perfect, that's awesome. So what do you see as the biggest obstacle here? Because I mean, there's this big transition right, if you're a small school, then it's very easy for you to facilitate this one to one relationships. Also, obviously, I mean, things like Facebook groups and so forth make it a lot easier, which is a real soft way to build that community feel. But then what if you start to scale and you're in the position of, all right, school number two, number three is opening up – how do you facilitate that through your staff and making sure that they are on track with the same strategy?

CAT: They have to be trained. People say, oh but I'm not a people person, or they use excuses like that, like, I can't teach charisma or anything like that and I think all that's bs! Of course, you can! If you can take your hand, putting it in front of you, look at it and then give yourself a direction to smile – smile. And be able to do that, you can great somebody when they walk in the door, I promise. You can train anybody to do that. If you are able to handle that little interaction right there, you can train someone to be friendly.

They might not have the personality of highness and warmth but you can condition them and practice through training and rehearsal and performance and reality and videotaping them and getting them to actually see themselves. And get them to be able to say, hey, welcome to our martial arts school! I'm so and so, I'm so glad to meet you and actually get them to learn these processes. And when we follow different types of pre-written scripts or material that we’re able to actually rehearse in training with our staff members and our coworkers and things like that and go over these things, well then, when we actually do it for real, it's not as awkward.

It might be a little bit at first, but here's the truth: everybody at first has awkwardness. It's like a first competition in the tournament, then by the time you've done a hundred of them, it's no longer awkward. In fact, you're like, can we get this stuff over with already! You know, I mean, I competed for 18 years, I know what that game is all about. So I mean, when the repetitiveness at first, you get that anxiousness, but the more they do it, the more comfortable they get at it, the more second nature it becomes. So you don't have to be a people person, but you have to at least care. And I wouldn't hire anybody that didn't care.

GEORGE: Awesome, I like that part. I was speaking to a client last week. We run a program called the Martial Arts Media Academy, where we help with marketing and facilitating all the connection, but I also really try to simplify the online space and really leverage programs. And it's something that came up in the conversation was, really trying to scale and having this problem where you're talking about member relationships and engagement, but the problem was that they found that most of their instructors are introverted. And they just don't have that very outgoing personality to really connect. And that was a big obstacle, or is currently a big obstacle for them is, how do they take that introverted personality to scale and be that outgoing person, or do they need to completely shift gears and train someone else, get someone in from the outside to take that front enroll.

CAT: You know, it could be both. One of the schools of thought that I subscribe to is, not everybody is engineered to do everything. Some people just naturally gravitate to certain areas. Bunny rabbits will never be able to swim, OK? That's just the way that they've been engineered and made, they're not going to be climbing trees either. So I mean, if we’re going to ask a bunny rabbit to climb a damn tree, he's going to fail. He's not going to do very well with that. You ask a monkey to climb a tree and then be, oh my god, you're a black belt at this stuff, how did you get so good? Oh, he's natural, right? Well, yeah, because some of us are actually naturals at certain things.

As far as communication, I believe with training, if they're able to get up in front of a group and be a martial arts instructor, they can just as easily be the martial arts instructor to the parents in the lobby and build those relationships the same way. When there's a disconnect is that they think that the parents are no longer their students too.

So when they take a different approach and a different lens through which they're seeing their martial arts school crew and actually recognize that the parents are there to support their children, so thus, the parents need the training to be able to better endure that role. The parents don't know how to do that necessarily unless they're taught and trained how to be able to do that.

So the person to teach them, who would that be? Well, the martial arts instructor, because what's their job? Their job is to teach! So if they see it not so much as, this obstacle or this barrier, but put it in terms of what they're already naturally selected and gifted for, hey I want to be a martial arts teacher, understand though that who we teach isn't just the person on the classroom floor, but it's everyone within the walls of our school.

And I think when we start viewing our martial arts school not just as a place that begins when we bow on the mat, but instead actually from the front door for whoever walks through, it's no different then. If you say you want to help people, or you want to change lives, or you want to be a martial arts instructor, we can be picky and choosy about the people… let me reshape that: yes, we can be picky and choosy about the people we take and the people we help; however, we have to recognize who are people that need our help.

And sometimes we think, well, the parents don't need our help – sometimes the parents need your help more than that kid on the mat, you know? They're the ones that actually are signing up, not just to be able to give their kid an activity, but also to learn how to better handle and parent their child. And to be able to do that, a lot of times it just comes down to better training and better practice with communications and drilling scenarios, both on the practice floor and how to be able to handle those announcements with the parents too. So making sure that the lobby is never a part of their martial arts school that isn't under their control. If that makes sense.

GEORGE: Yeah, for sure. I think to make it really practical, I like what you said, if you can look at your hand and smile, that's a really, really good start. Just a smile can do wonders. And I think I'll add to that, it's just really being present. Really being present in a situation is, if you can do those two things, and really smile and be present, understand where people are at, I think that's a good stepping stone. What would you add to that?

CAT: The only thing that I would add specifically is when they are given an opportunity to build a connection or a relationship with a student, understand that the student in front of them isn't just maybe the child for the class, but it's the parent or the guardian or whoever brought them to this practice as well. And be inclusive when you're teaching and let them recognize, let the instructor specifically recognize that being able to teach martial arts is part of the job, is also being able to enroll them and being comfortable with talking to them and having that connection.

Because if they want to help that kid that's going to be doing their classes, they have to have communication with that parent. Because if there's ever going to be a situation, that kids going to tell their mom or their dad first. And if the parent has enough respect for you and the program and what it benefits them with, they're able then to go back and relay that information to the instructor. Because the first person that's going to hear about the kid wanting to give up classes, or stop or runs into a challenge, maybe because they stubbed their toe in sparring or something silly like that, that we don't even give consideration, but could be very much a factor of why somebody doesn't want to take part or continue – if that's explained from the beginning, parents are heck of a lot more prepared for it when it does happen.

And we just kind of have to stop hiding the fact that there might be a time when they're going to say, I don't want to go to karate tonight, or I don't want to do martial arts or anything like that. Or I'd rather go out and play with my friends when the weather gets nice and that kind of thing that it's going to make a huge difference if they understand that and they know how their job as the parent is to support their kid in becoming a black belt, or becoming a martial artist I prefer to say, as opposed to just setting an end goal on it. Like get your black belt and then everybody wonders why they got one. They did it, that's what you told them they had to do! But yeah, get the parents to recognize. The first person they go to when there's a challenge is going to be that martial arts instructor to help them with it and see it through.

And the job of the instructor is to teach the parent that that's what they have to do. If that means they have to call them when they first get started, or if they have to keep that path of communication flowing – text messages are great right now, because if a parent wants to shoot you over a message about something that took place. But more importantly, if you want to shoot over that parent a video or a selfie, or something going on from class, especially if they're not present – it's the best way to be able to interact, engage and connect.

GEORGE: I like that, I like that. Quick selfie. This really reminds me  – and I don't know who I'm quoting yet, it could either be Dean Jackson or James Schramko, but the story comes from experiences, customer, experiences. And the stories about, if I walk into a coffee shop or a restaurant for example and they treat me bad, I get bad service and I just feel bad about the experience – that's 100% of my experience with that company is negative, 100%. But on the reverse side, if I'm a regular and I walk in there every morning to get my coffee, I get treated with respect, smile, all these things that we just spoke about and about my 10th trip to the coffee shop, they slip up and make a mistake – that's 10% of my experience with them that's bad.

So when it comes down to that, you have a bit more understanding and you feel a bit more, OK, well, they slipped up, it's OK. Because you've got that relationship and understanding. And I think that relates to a lot of what you're saying here because a martial arts journey is going to have its ups and downs. And it's coming, the bad experience is coming, the “I don't know if I want to do this anymore” is coming. So if you have the relationship to back all that up, chances are you're going to be able to save that relationship, save that student and keep them back on their path.

CAT: George, amen – that was exactly it! One of the big things they say is the difference between customer service and member engagement, because people say, oh, it's the same thing, it's customer service, and I'm like, you're so wrong, I want to say something else, but I remember I'm a martial artist and I don't do those kinds of things. Instead, though, I say to myself, well, you know, customer service is dealing with problems. If you ever have a customer service – I laugh when somebody says customer service department is going to return the martial arts student calls, and I'm like, you have a customer service department? What do you need that for? That's like where, what does that mean? That means problems and that you're just expecting to have lots of problems to have to deal with if you have a whole ton of staff doing customer service.

Member engagement though is pre-empting that, recognizing oh, we've been doing this for this many years, we recognize it – hey, this is a common occurrence and it's going to happen. It's not if it does – if you're the unicorn that this doesn't happen to, no! It's not going about it that way, it's expecting that, hey you know what, this is part of the game, this is just what happens. It's going to come in time, and when it does, this is what we're going to do about it. But member engagement is recognizing that. The kid who has floods and you don't teach an Okinawan system of martial arts, where their pants are up to their knees.

Their parents are not buying them a new uniform – you think that's because they have plans and aspirations for him to stick around another 5 more years? I mean, I probably would disagree. But giving that kid a new uniform, making the kid feel more comfortable then, forgetting about the $30 or the $20 or the $50 or the $100, I don't care how much your uniform is, but whatever that amount is, and saying, I care more about the relationship than I do about the uniform and I want to see this person stay – you make that gesture, you push that forward, hey: if we can give a new uniform to a new guy that we don't even know, why can't we give on to a kid who does practice in our program and doesn't have a proper fitting uniform.

Talk to the parent, it might be a budget thing. It might be not a high priority thing, but I’ll tell you who it's going to make a difference for that kid on the mat. That's member engagement, that's recognizing, man, that kids got to be embarrassed by the way he's getting a wedgie in the middle of his class. And it doesn't allow him to do anything because his mom won't buy him a new pair of pants, I mean, let's be real here, you know? I mean, this is what's going on, I mean, in the day where we have over… I don't even know what the correct word is, but just so much abundance of bullying going on, throughout the world.

This is real life crisis, it doesn't matter where you're at, but that's definitely something that… let's make sure that this doesn't become a zone where the kid is going to get bullied because some other smartass kid says something to him and says, your uniform is too short, or doesn't your mom love you enough to buy you new pants or whatever. Give them the respect of saying, hey, I recognize this. Because any parent is going to appreciate that, so it's just a matter of saying or recognizing where you see a situation, let the light bulb go off and say, that isn't right, let's do something about it.

I mean, everything gets triggered. We know this, right? Somebody misses a class for two weeks, chances are, you're going to get a phone call, or you're going to get a notice from the billing company, or you're going to get some kind of information, or a credit card payment isn't going to go through. And then another two weeks, so you know what's coming. So you can either pick up the phone or here's something better: what if we knew that was coming right on the same day they were supposed to be there and they weren't there? If I would date somebody and they say, oh, that was a great first date and then I don't hear from them for like a week or two weeks later and they send me a text, hey – they're not getting a response! Please! If you want to actually build a relationship with anyone, you have to have communication.

You've got to show that you care, you've got to recognize that, oh – this person actually does have my best interest in mind. And if you can convey that, you're not going to have a problem then when that parent has a situation they want to… or like you've mentioned: when you drop the ball. I ordered you the wrong size belt, I got you your belt, but unfortunately, it came in 5 sizes too big and all this. Well have another one for you in the next 4 or 5 days, but here – use this one for now. They're going to overlook those kinds of things. It's definitely in our benefit as martial arts school owners and operators to make sure that we get to know our people and connect with them and recognize when these things happen. Because customer service is too late, that's overcoming objections and that's like, it's such a buzzword. It's such a sad way of trying to build things around something that's already gone, so see it before it happens, you've got to catch it before it happens.

GEORGE: I like that. Awesome. What I really like about that is really, you eliminating the objections. And looking for the opportunity to build relationships is really what it is. And I like what you mentioned about the bullying part because there's always so much focus in advertising, we’re always fighting the bullies and build the confidence and build the fun, but then sometimes there's a disconnect on the actual mats. That was the ad, but is that what you're really doing in your school? Are you really paying attention to that, because as you've mentioned, bullying is a big thing and in Australia right now there's the no bullying week, so there's a lot of promotion and things going on about that. And I don't know if that's in the States as well, but a big thing about that is, is there an opportunity to be bullied right there in front of you? Or just feeling adequate, or not in place? Because of the social pressures.

CAT: I think it's more responsibility than ever. Any teacher, any teacher, any educator, not even in martial arts; a dance teacher, a music teacher, a school teacher has to recognize those things and recognize why someone might be getting singled out, or pushed out the same way and making sure there's a stronger connection with them, because you might be that only connection with them.

GEORGE: Awesome. Cat, it's been awesome speaking to you. And I'm looking forward to seeing you speak at The Main Event.

CAT: I’m looking forward to it!

GEORGE: Yes, and that's going to be awesome. Just a few last words: if people want to connect with you, find out more about you, how should they do that?

CAT: Send me a friend request over Facebook. I love to be able to connect with people, especially if you're in Australia or some other part of the world where I want to travel to one day and get a chance to vacation, I would love to connect with you and be your friend.

GEORGE: Is that what this podcast is really about? All right, awesome.

CAT: Find me on the Facebook, that's the best way to connect with me. And send me a PM if you have any questions about what we talked about today, I'll be happy to talk to you more.

GEORGE: Fantastic. Cat, it's been great speaking to you and I will see you in San Diego soon.

CAT: Pleasure is mine, thank you, George. Have a great day mate!

GEORGE: Thank you.

Awesome – thanks for listening, thanks, Cat Zohar. Great energy, great content. If you're enjoying the show and you're getting great value from it, please, let us know! A good way to do that would be to give us an awesome review, like a 5-star review on the iTunes platform, or Stitcher if you're listening to this on an android mobile device. So for the iPhone, I know you can go, there's a little purple icon, the podcast app and you can just go through the show there and give us a review. Stitcher, probably just follow the instructions, or wherever you're listening to this – just give us a feedback. We’d love to hear from you, I can see you are listening because I see the numbers, but podcasting being a very one-way communication platform, it's hard to get the feedback.

So it would be great to hear from more guests – that would be awesome. And if you need any help with your marketing, with marketing your school, especially on the tech side, the digital platforms that are forever going and changing, then get a hold of us. Get a hold of us on martialartsmedia.com we would be happy to chat with you and I look forward to bringing you another interview, another lady! And it's kind of ironic, four ladies in a row. It’s just pure coincidence. It's not because it's been a women's week, or anything like that, depending on when you're listening to this. It’s been pure coincidence and I'm hoping you're enjoying the change in perspective and change in energy and viewpoints, which is what this show is really about. How can we create good content, good things, good insights that you can apply to your business and that way we all learn and grow.

Awesome, well that's it from me. I will be back next week with another show and speak soon – cheers!

 

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General Website Terms and Conditions of Use

We have taken every effort to design our Web site to be useful, informative, helpful, honest and fun.  Hopefully we’ve accomplished that — and would ask that you let us know if you’d like to see improvements or changes that would make it even easier for you to find the information you need and want.

All we ask is that you agree to abide by the following Terms and Conditions. Take a few minutes to look them over because by using our site you automatically agree to them. Naturally, if you don’t agree, please do not use the site. We reserve the right to make any modifications that we deem necessary at any time. Please continue to check these terms to see what those changes may be! Your continued use of the MartialArtsMedia.com Web site means that you accept those changes.

THANKS AGAIN FOR VISITING!

Restrictions on Use of Our Online Materials

All Online Materials on the MartialArtsMedia.com site are Copyrighted and all rights are reserved. Text, graphics, databases, HTML code, and all other intellectual property are protected by US and/or International Copyright Laws, and may not be copied, reprinted, published, reengineered, translated, hosted, or otherwise distributed by any means without explicit permission. All of the trademarks on this site are trademarks of MartialArtsMedia.com or of other owners used with their permission. You, the visitor, may download Online Materials for non-commercial, personal use only provided you 1) retain all copyright, trademark and propriety notices, 2) you make no modifications to the materials, 3) you do not use the materials in a manner that suggests an association with any of our products, services, events or brands, and 4) you do not download quantities of materials to a database, server, or personal computer for reuse for commercial purposes. You may not, however, copy, reproduce, republish, upload, post, transmit or distribute Online Materials in any way or for any other purpose unless you get our written permission first. Neither may you add, delete, distort or misrepresent any content on the MartialArtsMedia.com site. Any attempts to modify any Online Material, or to defeat or circumvent our security features is prohibited.

Everything you download, any software, plus all files, all images incorporated in or generated by the software, and all data accompanying it, is considered licensed to you by MartialArtsMedia.com or third-party licensors for your personal, non-commercial home use only. We do not transfer title of the software to you. That means that we retain full and complete title to the software and to all of the associated intellectual-property rights. You’re not allowed to redistribute or sell the material or to reverse-engineer, disassemble or otherwise convert it to any other form that people can use.

Submitting Your Online Material to Us

All remarks, suggestions, ideas, graphics, comments, or other information that you send to MartialArtsMedia.com through our site (other than information we promise to protect under our privacy policy becomes and remains our property, even if this agreement is later terminated.

That means that we don’t have to treat any such submission as confidential. You can’t sue us for using ideas you submit. If we use them, or anything like them, we don’t have to pay you or anyone else for them. We will have the exclusive ownership of all present and future rights to submissions of any kind. We can use them for any purpose we deem appropriate to our MartialArtsMedia.com mission, without compensating you or anyone else for them.

You acknowledge that you are responsible for any submission you make. This means that you (and not we) have full responsibility for the message, including its legality, reliability, appropriateness, originality, and copyright.

Limitation of Liability

MartialArtsMedia.com WILL NOT BE LIABLE FOR ANY DAMAGES OR INJURY THAT ACCOMPANY OR RESULT FROM YOUR USE OF ANY OF ITS SITE.

THESE INCLUDE (BUT ARE NOT LIMITED TO) DAMAGES OR INJURY CAUSED BY ANY:

  • USE OF (OR INABILITY TO USE) THE SITE
  • USE OF (OR INABILITY TO USE) ANY SITE TO WHICH YOU HYPERLINK FROM OUR SITE
  • FAILURE OF OUR SITE TO PERFORM IN THE MANNER YOU EXPECTED OR DESIRED
  • ERROR ON OUR SITE
  • OMISSION ON OUR SITE
  • INTERRUPTION OF AVAILABILITY OF OUR SITE
  • DEFECT ON OUR SITE
  • DELAY IN OPERATION OR TRANSMISSION OF OUR SITE
  • COMPUTER VIRUS OR LINE FAILURE
  • PLEASE NOTE THAT WE ARE NOT LIABLE FOR ANY DAMAGES, INCLUDING:
    • DAMAGES INTENDED TO COMPENSATE SOMEONE DIRECTLY FOR A LOSS OR INJURY
    • DAMAGES REASONABLY EXPECTED TO RESULT FROM A LOSS OR INJURY (KNOWN IN LEGAL TERMS AS “CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES.”)
    • OTHER MISCELLANEOUS DAMAGES AND EXPENSES RESULTING DIRECTLY FROM A LOSS OR INJURY (KNOWN IN LEGAL TERMS AS “INCIDENTIAL DAMAGES.”)

WE ARE NOT LIABLE EVEN IF WE’VE BEEN NEGLIGENT OR IF OUR AUTHORIZED REPRESENTATIVE HAS BEEN ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES OR BOTH.

EXCEPTION: CERTAIN STATE LAWS MAY NOT ALLOW US TO LIMIT OR EXCLUDE LIABILITY FOR THESE “INCIDENTAL” OR “CONSEQUENTIAL” DAMAGES. IF YOU LIVE IN ONE OF THOSE STATES, THE ABOVE LIMITATION OBVIOUSLY WOULD NOT APPLY WHICH WOULD MEAN THAT YOU MIGHT HAVE THE RIGHT TO RECOVER THESE TYPES OF DAMAGES.

HOWEVER, IN ANY EVENT, OUR LIABILITY TO YOU FOR ALL LOSSES, DAMAGES, INJURIES, AND CLAIMS OF ANY AND EVERY KIND (WHETHER THE DAMAGES ARE CLAIMED UNDER THE TERMS OF A CONTRACT, OR CLAIMED TO BE CAUSED BY NEGLIGENCE OR OTHER WRONGFUL CONDUCT, OR THEY’RE CLAIMED UNDER ANY OTHER LEGAL THEORY) WILL NOT BE GREATER THAN THE AMOUNT YOU PAID IF ANYTHING TO ACCESS OUR SITE.

Links to Other Site

We sometimes provide referrals to and links to other World Wide Web sites from our site. Such a link should not be seen as an endorsement, approval or agreement with any information or resources offered at sites you can access through our site. If in doubt, always check the Uniform Resource Locator (URL) address provided in your WWW browser to see if you are still in a MartialArtsMedia.com-operated site or have moved to another site. MartialArtsMedia.com is not responsible for the content or practices of third party sites that may be linked to our site. When MartialArtsMedia.com provides links or references to other Web sites, no inference or assumption should be made and no representation should be inferred that MartialArtsMedia.com is connected with, operates or controls these Web sites. Any approved link must not represent in any way, either explicitly or by implication, that you have received the endorsement, sponsorship or support of any MartialArtsMedia.com site or endorsement, sponsorship or support of MartialArtsMedia.com, including its respective employees, agents or directors.

Termination of This Agreement

This agreement is effective until terminated by either party. You may terminate this agreement at any time, by destroying all materials obtained from all MartialArtsMedia.com Web site, along with all related documentation and all copies and installations. MartialArtsMedia.com may terminate this agreement at any time and without notice to you, if, in its sole judgment, you breach any term or condition of this agreement. Upon termination, you must destroy all materials. In addition, by providing material on our Web site, we do not in any way promise that the materials will remain available to you. And MartialArtsMedia.com is entitled to terminate all or any part of any of its Web site without notice to you.

Jurisdiction and Other Points to Consider

If you use our site from locations outside of Australia, you are responsible for compliance with any applicable local laws.

These Terms of Use shall be governed by, construed and enforced in accordance with the laws of the the State of Western Australia, Australia as it is applied to agreements entered into and to be performed entirely within such jurisdiction.

To the extent you have in any manner violated or threatened to violate MartialArtsMedia.com and/or its affiliates’ intellectual property rights, MartialArtsMedia.com and/or its affiliates may seek injunctive or other appropriate relief in any state or federal court in the State of Western Australia, Australia, and you consent to exclusive jurisdiction and venue in such courts.

Any other disputes will be resolved as follows:

If a dispute arises under this agreement, we agree to first try to resolve it with the help of a mutually agreed-upon mediator in the following location: Perth. Any costs and fees other than attorney fees associated with the mediation will be shared equally by each of us.

If it proves impossible to arrive at a mutually satisfactory solution through mediation, we agree to submit the dispute to binding arbitration at the following location: Perth . Judgment upon the award rendered by the arbitration may be entered in any court with jurisdiction to do so.

MartialArtsMedia.com may modify these Terms of Use, and the agreement they create, at any time, simply by updating this posting and without notice to you. This is the ENTIRE agreement regarding all the matters that have been discussed.

The application of the United Nations Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods, as amended, is expressly excluded.

Privacy Policy

Your privacy is very important to us. Accordingly, we have developed this policy in order for you to understand how we collect, use, communicate and make use of personal information. The following outlines our privacy policy. When accessing the https://martialartsmedia.com website, will learn certain information about you during your visit. Similar to other commercial websites, our website utilizes a standard technology called “cookies” (see explanation below) and server logs to collect information about how our site is used. Information gathered through cookies and server logs may include the date and time of visits, the pages viewed, time spent at our site, and the websites visited just before and just after our own, as well as your IP address.

Use of Cookies

A cookie is a very small text document, which often includes an anonymous unique identifier. When you visit a website, that site”s computer asks your computer for permission to store this file in a part of your hard drive specifically designated for cookies. Each website can send its own cookie to your browser if your browser”s preferences allow it, but (to protect your privacy) your browser only permits a website to access the cookies it has already sent to you, not the cookies sent to you by other sites.

IP Addresses

IP addresses are used by your computer every time you are connected to the Internet. Your IP address is a number that is used by computers on the network to identify your computer. IP addresses are automatically collected by our web server as part of demographic and profile data known as “traffic data” so that data (such as the Web pages you request) can be sent to you.

Email Information

If you choose to correspond with us through email, we may retain the content of your email messages together with your email address and our responses. We provide the same protections for these electronic communications that we employ in the maintenance of information received online, mail and telephone. This also applies when you register for our website, sign up through any of our forms using your email address or make a purchase on this site. For further information see the email policies below.

How Do We Use the Information That You Provide to Us?

Broadly speaking, we use personal information for purposes of administering our business activities, providing customer service and making available other items and services to our customers and prospective customers.

will not obtain personally-identifying information about you when you visit our site, unless you choose to provide such information to us, nor will such information be sold or otherwise transferred to unaffiliated third parties without the approval of the user at the time of collection.

We may disclose information when legally compelled to do so, in other words, when we, in good faith, believe that the law requires it or for the protection of our legal rights.

Email Policies

We are committed to keeping your e-mail address confidential. We do not sell, rent, or lease our subscription lists to third parties, and we will not provide your personal information to any third party individual, government agency, or company at any time unless strictly compelled to do so by law.

We will use your e-mail address solely to provide timely information about .

We will maintain the information you send via e-mail in accordance with applicable federal law.

CAN-SPAM Compliance

Our site provides users the opportunity to opt-out of receiving communications from us and our partners by reading the unsubscribe instructions located at the bottom of any e-mail they receive from us at anytime.

Users who no longer wish to receive our newsletter or promotional materials may opt-out of receiving these communications by clicking on the unsubscribe link in the e-mail.

Choice/Opt-Out

Our site provides users the opportunity to opt-out of receiving communications from us and our partners by reading the unsubscribe instructions located at the bottom of any e-mail they receive from us at anytime. Users who no longer wish to receive our newsletter or promotional materials may opt-out of receiving these communications by clicking on the unsubscribe link in the e-mail.

Use of External Links

All copyrights, trademarks, patents and other intellectual property rights in and on our website and all content and software located on the site shall remain the sole property of or its licensors. The use of our trademarks, content and intellectual property is forbidden without the express written consent from .

You must not:

Acceptable Use

You agree to use our website only for lawful purposes, and in a way that does not infringe the rights of, restrict or inhibit anyone else”s use and enjoyment of the website. Prohibited behavior includes harassing or causing distress or inconvenience to any other user, transmitting obscene or offensive content or disrupting the normal flow of dialogue within our website.

You must not use our website to send unsolicited commercial communications. You must not use the content on our website for any marketing related purpose without our express written consent.

Restricted Access

We may in the future need to restrict access to parts (or all) of our website and reserve full rights to do so. If, at any point, we provide you with a username and password for you to access restricted areas of our website, you must ensure that both your username and password are kept confidential.

Use of Testimonials

In accordance to with the FTC guidelines concerning the use of endorsements and testimonials in advertising, please be aware of the following:

Testimonials that appear on this site are actually received via text, audio or video submission. They are individual experiences, reflecting real life experiences of those who have used our products and/or services in some way. They are individual results and results do vary. We do not claim that they are typical results. The testimonials are not necessarily representative of all of those who will use our products and/or services.

The testimonials displayed in any form on this site (text, audio, video or other) are reproduced verbatim, except for correction of grammatical or typing errors. Some may have been shortened. In other words, not the whole message received by the testimonial writer is displayed when it seems too lengthy or not the whole statement seems relevant for the general public.

is not responsible for any of the opinions or comments posted on https://martialartsmedia.com. is not a forum for testimonials, however provides testimonials as a means for customers to share their experiences with one another. To protect against abuse, all testimonials appear after they have been reviewed by management of . doe not share the opinions, views or commentary of any testimonials on https://martialartsmedia.com – the opinions are strictly the views of the testimonial source.

The testimonials are never intended to make claims that our products and/or services can be used to diagnose, treat, cure, mitigate or prevent any disease. Any such claims, implicit or explicit, in any shape or form, have not been clinically tested or evaluated.

How Do We Protect Your Information and Secure Information Transmissions?

Email is not recognized as a secure medium of communication. For this reason, we request that you do not send private information to us by email. However, doing so is allowed, but at your own risk. Some of the information you may enter on our website may be transmitted securely via a secure medium known as Secure Sockets Layer, or SSL. Credit Card information and other sensitive information is never transmitted via email.

may use software programs to create summary statistics, which are used for such purposes as assessing the number of visitors to the different sections of our site, what information is of most and least interest, determining technical design specifications, and identifying system performance or problem areas.

For site security purposes and to ensure that this service remains available to all users, uses software programs to monitor network traffic to identify unauthorized attempts to upload or change information, or otherwise cause damage.

Disclaimer and Limitation of Liability

makes no representations, warranties, or assurances as to the accuracy, currency or completeness of the content contain on this website or any sites linked to this site.

All the materials on this site are provided “as is” without any express or implied warranty of any kind, including warranties of merchantability, noninfringement of intellectual property or fitness for any particular purpose. In no event shall or its agents or associates be liable for any damages whatsoever (including, without limitation, damages for loss of profits, business interruption, loss of information, injury or death) arising out of the use of or inability to use the materials, even if has been advised of the possibility of such loss or damages.

Policy Changes

We reserve the right to amend this privacy policy at any time with or without notice. However, please be assured that if the privacy policy changes in the future, we will not use the personal information you have submitted to us under this privacy policy in a manner that is materially inconsistent with this privacy policy, without your prior consent.

We are committed to conducting our business in accordance with these principles in order to ensure that the confidentiality of personal information is protected and maintained.

Contact

If you have any questions regarding this policy, or your dealings with our website, please contact us here:

Martial Arts Media™
Suite 218
5/115 Grand Boulevard
Joondalup WA
6027
Australia

Email: team (at) martialartsmedia dot com

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