![\"Advertising](\"https:\/\/www.diaryofanadi.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/06\/ad_dummy.jpg\" "\\"Advertising")
know you\u2019re there, and that means advertising<\/strong>. This can be anything from a handwritten scrap of paper stuck in the window of the local newsagents to full-blown colour ads in local or national papers and magazines. You can deliver flyers door-to-door, hang out near schools and universities (that could get you arrested, so be careful), or any number of other things. One driving school in my area even pays for huge billboard advertisements in at least three locations. Obviously, the cost of advertising ranges from a few pennies a week up to thousands of pounds.<\/p>\nOh, and you don\u2019t just have to do it once. You have to keep on reminding people you\u2019re there somehow, so advertising can never really stop.<\/p>\n
Now it gets controversial. If your advertising campaigns are successfully informing people of your existence, you\u2019ve still got to give them something that stands out from everyone else\u2019s offers. It\u2019s like a fish nibbling at the bait on your hook – whether you catch it or not depends on the bait.<\/p>\n
In an ideal world – one not populated by idiots – all instructors would be charging similar prices, so prospective pupils would really only be looking for the best instructors (or the ones that said<\/strong> they were the best, anyway). Unfortunately, the real world contains a lot of morons with no business sense (many of whom aren\u2019t proven as good instructors yet, and many of whom are proven to be average instructors at best), and they\u2019ve started a trend whereby the bait involves stupidly low lesson prices and sometimes even stupider offers. Many of these cheapo instructors will be charging as little as half of what they could be, and the problem is worse in the more deprived areas.<\/p>\n In theory, as you gain more experience as an ADI (and more passes to your name), your reputation will grow and – if you believe some people – eager pupils will be queuing outside your house permanently waiting for the next available vacancy on your 2-year waiting list. By this time you\u2019ll only be working one or two hours a week anyway, in between your other work of saving whole countries from natural disasters and your tireless efforts on behalf of the pandas and other endangered species.<\/p>\n In reality, your reputation will get you some<\/strong> new pupils\u2026 sometimes. But it absolutely will not get you new pupils all<\/strong> the time. Periodically you\u2019ll have a good spell, where one pupil maybe creates a chain reaction which brings in a dozen more friends and family. But more often than not pupils are effectively dead ends – all their friends are already taking lessons or have passed, or they\u2019re older and don\u2019t k Remember that if you\u2019re a half-decent ADI, virtually every pupil you teach will think you\u2019re \u201cthe best\u201d – and those being taught by others will think exactly the same about their instructor. That is about as far as the reputation card goes.<\/p>\n There is an exception to this, and it is based on racial and cultural issues. For example, many Asian communities are very insular, and if you\u2019re an Asian instructor specialising in Asian pupils then your referrals are likely to be more numerous. A female Muslim instructor specialising in teaching Muslim females is also potentially on to a winner. And the same seems to be true (to a lesser extent) for Polish and other minority groups where language is a barrier. Polish-speaking instructors can easily clean up in areas with high Polish populations.<\/p>\n None of these examples mean that you<\/strong> could automatically do the same if you were Asian or Polish. If other people are already doing it, it isn\u2019t a new idea and it might end up being overworked – but if no one has caught on to the idea in your area\u2026 well. These examples just illustrate the importance of finding a relatively unique selling point (USP) or tapping a relatively untapped market. Cheapo lesson prices are no longer \u201crelatively\u201d anything, and they\u2019re certainly not unique.<\/p>\n Back to the subject of advertising, you can spend a lot of money on it and not get a penny in return. As I said, all the other ADIs are also doing it so you\u2019re just another drop in the ocean. This seems to prompt many desperate instructors to drop their prices even further, or to make ever more ridiculous offers, but the irony is that it isn\u2019t that people aren\u2019t interested in the previous offers – they just can\u2019t seen them through the glare of all the others! Cheapo offers have had their day – they\u2019re not unique enough to make you stand out anymore!<\/p>\n A few years ago I tried various forms of advertising as an experiment. For \u00a3600 I had a small advert in Yellow Pages for 18 months. In all that time I had ONE enquiry, and I strongly suspect even that was from YP staff after I\u2019d told them I wasn\u2019t going to re-advertise because it hadn\u2019t worked. I also spent \u00a3120 on an ad in a free local newspaper over 3 months (guaranteed circulation of over 10,000 every month). I had no enquiries whatsoever from that. I\u2019ve tried various other methods which have not shown an acceptable return on investment (ROI), either. Of course, I accept that advertising can<\/strong> work (some forms have for me), and that others might<\/strong> have more success than I did with the examples I mentioned, but it can\u2019t possibly work for Once you\u2019re established – and if you don\u2019t get a bad<\/strong> reputation along the way – the work is definitely there (it is for me). I\u2019m effectively winning work away from all those newer instructors, and I often (and I mean very<\/strong> often) pick up pupils who have tried the cheaper option and found it wanting. That pushes things even further in my favour. Low prices might<\/strong> be the main thing that some learners look for, but an increasing number are quickly waking up to the realisation that they are being taken for a ride. That\u2019s when I get hold of them.<\/p>\n Of course, if you\u2019re happy not making a profit then you can<\/strong> specialise in teaching people who don\u2019t have enough money to pay for proper lessons. There\u2019s obviously a big market for such lessons, especially in these austere times, and if you can close your mind to the fact that if they pass they probably won\u2019t be able to afford insurance and road tax either, but will possibly still drive, you may get a full diary out of it. But with lack of money also comes unreliability. I know from experience that if someone is struggling to afford lessons then they are highly likely to cancel lessons at short notice or not take them regularly. And of course, you\u2019d need at least twice as many of these – so twice as much work on your part – to achieve the same income that an ADI charging normal prices would. You\u2019ve got to be desperate or stupid to deliberately<\/strong> go down this route.<\/p>\n Before you start training to become an ADI – before you start trading, anyway – you need to do some serious calculating and work out just what it is you want to be. Do you want a new car or a banger? Will it be professionally sign-written or will it just have L plates on it and nothing else? Do you want to work full time or are you only going to cover nine to five weekdays (avoiding school runs and school holidays)? Are you aiming high or low? Is it going to be your main wage, of are you doing it for some pocket-money? Is it to show that you are independent or not stuck at home with the kids, so there will always be someone to support you with their huge main household wage?<\/p>\n And if you\u2019re newly-qualified, the biggest question of all, and the one a huge number of people ignore or get wrong\u2026<\/p>\n The vast majority of those thinking of becoming ADIs see one thing, and one thing only: an hourly income of \u00a320-\u00a325!<\/strong> They think \u201c40 hours at \u00a325 an hour?\u00a0 That\u2019s \u00a31,000 a week???\u201d and they long for the day when they pass Part 3 and start packing that kind of money into their pockets. It\u2019s also worth pointing out that many, if not most, people become ADIs because they need<\/strong> a job, and aren\u2019t just doing this for a bit of fun. They consider the franchise option and conclude (often as a result of biased and misleading advice from \u201cexperts\u201d on the web) that if they go solo all that money will be theirs. This is utter rubbish!<\/p>\n The reality is often exactly what the person I mentioned above has found. Three months in, and no work whatsoever. By going solo and dreaming of packing away \u00a31,000 a week, they may as well plan to win the lottery or strike gold in their suburban gardens as business models instead. They\u2019re all just as attainable.<\/p>\n It costs money just to be an ADI, even with no work. It is likely to be costing \u00a3100 or more a week just for the car. Fuel is extra (I spend \u00a3250 a week on fuel sometimes). The aforementioned advertising could easily set you back several hundred pounds in the short-term. And on top of that, you\u2019ve got the cost of all your training and business set up to factor in. If you remain non-working for long you are quickly going to go out of business unless the main wage earner in the house is bankrolling you behind the scenes, and most people won\u2019t have that luxury. The simple fact is that trying to get up-and-running on your own, with no financial backup, and a one-chance-only shot at avoiding bankruptcy is an absolutely stupid way forward for most new ADIs. Unfortunately, greed easily overwhelms common sense, and that \u00a31,000 a week remains the Holy Grail.<\/p>\n Much of the \u201cexpert advice\u201d to go solo right from the start comes from people who themselves started on a franchise and only went independent sometime later after they\u2019d established themselves. They seem completely unable to link facts and real outcomes without adding their own prejudices into the equation and end up providing dangerously misleading \u201cadvice\u201d. In other cases, these \u201cexperts\u201d began their ADI careers in a galaxy far, far away\u2026 in a time and place far removed from the 2011\/2012 recession. If nothing else, there are gazillions more ADIs around now than there were when they<\/strong> started, that\u2019s for sure. Their \u201cadvice\u201d is bound to be flawed if it doesn\u2019t take into account the current situation, and unless you understand that situation you can\u2019t advise on it!<\/p>\n The usual argument goes that a franchiser charging \u00a3100-\u00a3200 a week for a car and a supply of pupils is a crime akin to murder or arson! The people who spout this nonsense would happily advise you to go bankrupt\u2026 sorry, I mean go solo and not have any pupils to teach\u2026 rather than pay a franchise company a penny. Their hatred is usually aimed at Red, the AA, or BSM, but this is rarely stated directly and anyone looking in is left with the \u201cadvice\u201d that all franchises are bad and should be avoided.<\/p>\n But the logic is simple. Do you want to be solo, with the very real risk of no work, no prospect of work (or impossibly slow growth), and mounting bills for failed advertising and car leases? Or do you want some help to get started?<\/p>\n You\u2019ll already paying at least \u00a3100 for the car if you go solo, so an extra \u00a350-\u00a3100 for a deal with a car and<\/strong> pupils is not that much more. Even if the franchise only gets you a handful of pupils, that\u2019s a hell of a lot better than no work at all. It is enough to pay some bills, and it sets you on the road to growing your business and reputation. You need your head examining if you think that staying solo and totally redundant is the better option, just because someone who doesn\u2019t like franchises told you it was. And this is even more true if you\u2019re one of the growing number of people who simply don\u2019t have a clue about\u00a0 any<\/strong> business matters, let alone those pertaining to being an ADI.<\/p>\n Choose one which doesn\u2019t have a minimum term contract, notice period, or stupid clause about not working within a 50 mile radius if you leave them.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I\u2019ve had a few hits over the last few days on the search term \u201cadi how to attract pupil\u201d (sic) and \u201clack of work for adis\u201d (or similar phrases). I also noticed a topic on a forum where a newly qualified ADI was asking how to get pupils – after 3 months of being an […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[80,82],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9170","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-adi-related","category-training"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/diaryofanadi.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9170","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/diaryofanadi.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/diaryofanadi.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diaryofanadi.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diaryofanadi.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9170"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/diaryofanadi.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9170\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/diaryofanadi.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9170"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diaryofanadi.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9170"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diaryofanadi.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9170"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Money](\"https:\/\/www.diaryofanadi.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/06\/money_drain.jpg\" "\\"Money")
now anyone who wants to learn. No matter what some people claim, that\u2019s how it will be for the vast majority of ADIs, especially newer ones.<\/p>\n![\"Inner](\"https:\/\/www.diaryofanadi.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/06\/inner_city.jpg\" "\\"Inner")
everyone and especially not these days with so many ADIs all vying for work in the middle of a recession. Common sense tells you that.<\/p>\n ARE YOU GOING SOLO OR WITH A FRANCHISE? <\/h5>\n
If you are struggling for work, consider a franchise. <\/h5>\n