TargetTalk

What is a reasonable rate for the two day clinic "Perfect Single Shot Development™ Class”, slow fire ISSF (Olympic Pistol) program (AP & FP)?

Group rate?
Individual training rate?
What other benefits can be offered to the class besides:
Free pre-evaluation of existed performance
Three month Class support (by-email or phone calls)

I will appreciate any ideas or suggestions.
PM or E-mails are welcome too. :)
Thank you
Russ

P.S. The Perfect Single Shot Development™ Class is an essential element of the process to understand how to apply the 20/80 rule.

Some thoughts:

I think the Brian Zins clinic (which he gives with his old coach, Andy Moody) was $240 a head, but that covers two instructors. Sorry, but you don't have quite the name recognition of Zins, so you might not be able to charge as much.

The other issue is demand. There are a LOT more bullseye shooters around that have heard of Zins to fill up a clinic. Depending on where you are, you may have trouble filling a FP/AP class if you charge more than $100 a head (as a guess). A lot will depend on how much time & money you spend on advertising the course (and yourself) to convince folks it's worth it. The other factor is the time commitment. A lot of folks I know would part with $100 in a heart beat if it would help their shooting, but they CAN'T spare a full weekend due to other commitments.

You might want to consider something like a $60-$75 one-day clinic to get your feet wet & build up a reputation. You can pass out a survey to fine-tune the course, and ask folks about the level of interest in a 2-day clinic. You could also do a one-day intro class, and once you've got enough folks hooked, do a 1-day advanced class. That gives folks more scheduling flexibility.

Good luck, whatever you decide.

Name recognition is important. You also need to market something "new" if you can't relie on your name. Would suggest building a reputation at the OTC or USASC by coaching small clinics. Word would spread through the community. Also a few " white papers" published in USA Shooting would help establish some credibility to a wider audience . Then some advertising.

Look at what is in the marketplace now, which is very little. Build a good reputation and following. Work on your people skills.

Greg Derr wrote:Also a few " white papers" published in USA Shooting would help establish some credibility to a wider audience . Then some advertising.

Looking at any USAS magazine, you get coaching notes from JP Oconnor, and advertising from Sil Lyra. If I were to choose between them, I'd go for JP first every time. I KNOW what his style of coaching is, and that it "jives" with how I comprehend shooting.

Without that ability to decide if a particular person thinks and coaches in a way that I agree with, I'd be hesitant to spend much more than $20. That's my acceptable level of loss (barely). So I have to agree, before offering "classes", you (Russ) need to demonstrate your attitude/style of coaching to the people who would be most interested. While that may include some here, I suspect that your larger audience will be the Jr shooters in PPP and 4H programs. Not sure how to reach those kids, but in my eyes that is the largest untapped client base.

For class cost, depending on what was offered, $150~300 range per person. More for a smaller number of "students" per "teacher" (be that smaller class size, or multiple qualified coaches). More for having Multiple coaches too, so you can cover the different learning styles and attitudes. That's also if I were local, having to factor in travel expenses has a very large negative impact as I'd still only be willing to spend the same total dollar amount if you were around the corner or across the country. But I'm cheap/lack substantial income.

Thank you all who helped me to identify ways to improve my business and promote Olympic Style Target Shooting. I found your ideas useful and interesting. I believe anyone who will be interested to see the huge potential of this country to perform more successfully at the international level can contribute and share ideas and thoughts.

Thanks again,
Russ

I still have not decided how to price my unconventional method. I do not have any problem to charge someone less than $200.00 for an Olympic Pistol introduction class, but the reason why I’m offering my help is to speed up the approach in Olympic (ISSF) Pistol.

Any unconventional ideas or thoughts are welcome.

Has anyone spoken at the Olympic Pistol clinic about the 20/80 rule and offered months to achieve a respectful 565-570 in AP before me?

If not, how we can price this product, and what is the real value of it?

Thank you.
Russ

I would like to outline two possible avenues to the pricing.

The first one is based on costs and is the most common. You need to quantify you expenditure level that, beside obvious direct costs like shooting range rental, pistol and other equipment costs and their maintenance, will include you profit expectations that is related to your life style costs (brand new Lexus vs. second hand Hyundai etc.). After these adjustments you can calculate what you need to earn to support your business and lifestyle. Then, you need to figure how many students you can realistically expect to have and then is easy to come up with the pricing level per student. If ISSF pistol coaching is not your only income then simply deduce the income you make now from the desired one and the rest is sum you “need” to earn with the coaching.

However, from your last sentence I feel that the above described method is not the one you are looking for to establish the price but instead you want to estimate the “real” or more precisely, free market maximal pricing. Now, this would be more art then science but I can give you an interesting example from a different market that also try to price “desire” rather then costs. The University of Chicago has world class sociology department (many would say the best) which some ten years ago did a study on dynamic of prostitution pricing. To make the long story short, the research revealed that attractive looking prostitutes could not charge much more then average or below average looking one but instead attractive ladies had more customers in a unit of time then those of less appealing look.

Having in mind all this you can safely conclude that the “real” value of your coaching is now definitely less then of established coaches exactly because of the “unconventional” method and, I guess, low recognition within the shooter community. Latter on, with success at display (hopefully) you should be able to see more students but who will not be ready to pay significantly more then those who paid in the beginning of your professional coaching carrier.

Thank you antispar; it is informative.
The conventional way of coaching vs the problem solving method.

The conventional way is coaching. What I do is a problem solving method; this is consulting. Your way is the measuring coaching approach and I understand it.
I also understand in many cases how conventional coaching was established in the volunteering way. I do not have too much free time. :(
I also understand 575 in AP is not an ART!

Tell me please, how to measure consulting?

Businesses tend to hire consultants for jobs that are periodic and highly specialised. This is not like the outsourcing e.g. bookkeeping, cleaning of premises or security is, but something related to core activities and needed to do or recommend a fix for something that escapes the experience and knowledge that exist within the company. Erratic nature of “need for fix” determines the pricing i.e. it is erratic.

In your example, it would boil down to correct estimate how much a shooter wants to “fix” his/her shooting, but to learn this skill right would be probably too much. As Gwhite, Greg Derr and Brian M wrote, the best approach would be to build name reputation through free advices and articles in specialised magazines. Once you built it, the right pricing rate should emerge by itself through simple demand.

What I’m basically offering is not coaching, but an 8 hour long New product presentation and three months of free product support.

We are all grown-up people. It is nice for us to have the freedom to chose and be independent. I do not force anyone to use my product. I do not want to compete with the conventional coaching market; I have other things to do.
I’m offering a tool for leveraging and an opportunity to perform on a consistent basis of 570 in AP or over.
There are some conditions: participant must have the willingness to achieve their desired level of performance.
Do not only tell me about it, but actually do this.
I did it for 17 years. Few individuals did it under my supervision here in the US. It is a working model, and I’m very conservative about 570. The real potential is more attractive.
575 in AP is not an ART! ;)

How can my potential client use my product at best?
Are there any needs for it?

Russ
I get the feeling you are aiming at a customer base that is WAY too small. If it exists at all. You need to expand your offerings to what a larger group will buy into.

You need to expand your offerings to what a larger group will buy into

How?
Is the second question a reasonable point for me to do this in a conventional way by advertizing over a media industry?
I know there will be few, who really need this product. Why do I have to spend a fortune for advertisements?

OK.. I will bite with a reply..

What is your offering? 8 hours of personal face-to-face time or video or something else? Why would a potential customer, assuming there are 'non-hobby' shooters :) out there who are eager to get to 575 (say, to steal one of 2012 quota spots away, etc) risk his 8 hours (+overhead) potential training time and money on you? Is your product so unique/innovative that the eager shooter would not know it already or not find out by themselves from their coach or by reading a couple of books?

To complicate matters of course US is a big country so the cost for you/your customer for face-to-face may be more than what you are charging for your service only.

This is not a bite. It is a reasonable question. To answer it, I have to direct you to my website and make you compose your own decision, based on newly gathered information. If I will do it, then I will get real bites then. ;)

I suspect Russ is stumbling upon another linguistic glitch here with 'bite.' Russ; he means bite as in a trout swimming in a stream, sees a hook with some bait on it, and pauses wondering why it is just hanging there in his path in a way which no normal food would do. He thinks to himself 'I wonder if this will be worth my effort to bite it?' And then he makes his decision, and bites. mhkhung is simply saying that you have provided a 'bait' with your questions, your situation, and that he, as the trout, is willing to 'bite' by attempting to answer. Or perhaps you knew this and simply decided to be difficult about it?

As for your question on advertising, I would suggest avoiding it. In general for a very specialized service with a niche market, advertising expenses should be limited or non-existent. Since the service being offered is presumably of a very high standard in quality, word of mouth is the best possible source of new clients. By establishing yourself with a small number of clients and impressing them with your skills, thanks to their dramatically improved results, they will not only be willing to promote your services to others, they will do so proudly.

This is how my own business has grown. Ever phone call or email I receive from a new client for the past several years - and it is averaging about 2 new clients per week - begins with a phrase like "I heard about you from my teacher" or "I play in the symphony and really like what you did for so and so's instrument" or similar. I used to hand out business cards, sometimes even several to teachers. Haven't bothered printing any for more than 8 years. I find myself in the rather unfortunate position of having to turn down a lot of work these days owing to lack of time, but for a business this is a good thing. Those who really want my services will wait, getting in line.

I have no doubt that if your results are of high value as a trainer, your students will promote you to other potential clients. It is a slower way to build a client base, but much more meaningful and reliable than expensive, flashy advertising.

Thank you all.
I will think over this information.
I hope I can come up with a more appropriate way to present my product.

Gerard wrote:n, Or perhaps you knew this and simply decided to be difficult..

An observation for Russ: What have you provided to convince any reasonable person that you have the requisite skills or credentials to deliver anything remotely resembling what you offer for a fee? You mention a website but I dont see a link. Even a cursory review of your past posts suggests an arrogant and pompous individual whose only skill is being able to start a fight in an empty warehouse. The moderator of this forum gave you credit in a recent post for being less contentious then usual and wondered if you were turning over a new leaf. That says quite a bit.

So, what do you bring to the table Russ that would persuade anyone that for a price, you have the perfect way to get to 570-575? I'm all ears.

One additional observation....if you are serious about getting into a profession where clear and concise commnication is required, you have even more work to do.

To those of you offended by my remarks including our gracious host, I offer my sincere apologies in advance. This guy is about as irritating as an itch in a place you can't scratch.

Perhaps a slightly unusual coaching concept, but have you considered charging on a performance basis ? So for example you could say charge 200$ on the basis the shooters reached say for example 575. If they only acheived 560 then it drops to 100$. That way you're upfront putting your money where your mouth is and almost guaranteeing a desireable outcome / product 'or your money back'.

Rob.

RobStubbs wrote:That way you're upfront putting your money where your mouth is and almost guaranteeing a desireable outcome / product 'or your money back'.

That wouldn't work Rob. There is a big difference between receiving coaching/advice/mentoring/etc and being prepared to do the work to get the most benefit.

I think we have all seen courses where it is obvious that most of the participants will expect to see an improvement in their performance just because they have been there.

Russ, I'm afraid I cannot offer you any advice on how to proceed; the sport and distances involved in the US are so much different from those in the UK.