Transcript: Snapshot 035 – Clinton Pratt
Transcript for Snapshot 035 – Clinton Pratt
Andrea: [00:00:00] Hey, it’s Andrea with Music Studio Startup, the podcast about the business of teaching music. Learn from the startup stories of music teachers who are doing incredible things with their studios. Be inspired by creative musicians who are branching out and thriving as entrepreneurs. Be empowered by the insights of experts who will help you grow your own studio.
Let’s get started.
Welcome back. We are doing a special series on the podcast this summer called Studio Snapshots. Rather than the in-depth process oriented interviews, you’re used to hearing these rapid fire interviews, give us a glimpse into a guest’s studio at a moment in time. They’re part reflection, part anticipation of the future, and fully a celebration of where these teachers are today.
Today I’m talking to Clinton Pratt. Here’s Clinton’s snapshot. [00:01:00] Hi Clinton. Welcome to the podcast. Can you introduce yourself and tell us briefly about your studio?
Clinton Pratt: Yeah, thanks for having me. I’m Clinton Pratt. My studio is in Cincinnati, Ohio. It’s called Piano Sensei. I’ve been teaching for about 23 years. My studio has six instructors, including myself, so I own and manage it as well as I have my own students.
Andrea: Excellent. And today we’re doing a quick rapid fire interview that’s just talking about where your studio is right now. There’s so much more we can get into. I have to refrain myself when I do these interviews.
So let’s jump right in. What are you celebrating from the last school year?
Clinton Pratt: One thing I’m celebrating is that we hit a new monthly revenue record. So I’m not sure if I am comfortable saying the amount, but you know, once we get to like bringing in a certain amount a month. I was super excited for that.
And then related to that is that we broke the 70 student threshold, so I don’t know why, but it was [00:02:00] kind of hovering, like right under 70. We had 70 students, like 65, 68, 69, 67, you know, and then finally over 70, so yay.
Andrea: Excellent. Yeah. There are those thresholds. It’s interesting how they seem to be consistent across studios.
How are you challenged in the last school year?
Clinton Pratt: We had a few students quit after just a few lessons. And I know it happens, but I kind of take it personally, even if I’m not the actual instructor. You know, they’re at the studio and I guess since I’m proud of our instructors and our programs and our facility and everything, it’s hard when people aren’t satisfied and quit for whatever reason.
So I kind of learned to just let it go and not affect me negatively. Of course, if there’s some kind of feedback they gave that would be helpful. That’s fine. I also, since we do trial lessons, um, sometimes I can tell ’cause I meet everybody first. I can tell that they might not be ready to commit or they’re not interested, but I still let them enroll.[00:03:00]
So I’m learning to just trust my judgment and don’t go forward just to have the new enrollment.
Andrea: Yeah. Yeah. Did you take any risks or go outside your comfort zone in the last year?
Clinton Pratt: I did hire an instructor in February knowing that they would probably move away in the summer, and usually I wanna hire people who I know are gonna stay in the area for like at least two years.
So, I. That was kind of a risk because I really liked the instructor and, you know, wasn’t sure what was gonna happen, but turns out they’re gonna stay for at least another year.
Andrea: Oh, fantastic.
Clinton Pratt: Yeah, I learned, okay, well maybe trust my instincts and, um, instead of just having some unspoken rule for myself that, you know, I have to follow, like, oh, don’t hire anybody if they say they might not stay.
Andrea: Mm-h What are you taking forward from that experience that you’ll use for future hiring?
Clinton Pratt: I guess I just, like I said, trust my instincts and if I think they’re a good fit, you know, just go ahead with it instead of worrying about what might happen in the future if they’re [00:04:00] gonna move away or something.
Andrea: What do summers look like in your studio, both for you and for your students?
Clinton Pratt: Yeah, so in my studio, students get six lessons over the course of June, July, and most of August. So this allows for vacations and time off for students and for teachers. And we also offer a pano camp, which is two hours a day for four days with two instructors.
So it’s kind of just like a intensive thing. And students can add that on in addition to their sixth lessons, or they can trade in three lessons for the camp. So they’ll have three lessons in the camp. And adult students, they have something similar. They have like some workshops they can choose. But the nice thing is since we have a flat rate tuition all year round, our income doesn’t decrease over the summer, even though we’re teaching and working less.
And in fact, we usually make more because people are adding on the camp or workshops. So it’s really nice to still have vacations and breaks and it’s not as [00:05:00] stressful, but we’re earning the same or even more than in the school year.
Andrea: Yeah, for sure. I’m sure your teachers enjoy that too. What are you doing this summer to prep for next school year?
Clinton Pratt: Basically, it’s not too much just planning the calendar for the next year when we’ll have events and group classes and such. Also, I need to decide if there’s gonna be a tuition increase, and then we’ll also have a team meeting with the instructors to brainstorm ideas for events and activities and things.
Andrea: What app or tool has made the biggest impact in your studio or life management this year?
Clinton Pratt: So I really love Teacher Zone. It’s a studio management platform. I’ve been using it for six years, but yeah, I’m just noticing that it’s so good because it basically handles so many things and it’s very efficient because all of the payments are in there, the schedule, student assignments, we can track everything.
There’s an app for students, so you know, they can never say, oh, I didn’t know there was a lesson, or I didn’t know what to practice ’cause everything is in there. [00:06:00] There’s also like a leaderboard if you want to have competitions and different kinds of challenges. And there’s embedded videos as well. So in their assignments you can just link a YouTube video, and it doesn’t even go to YouTube. It just plays right in the app, right where their assignment is. So you can say, you know, watch this video and tell me what you think, or practice it like this, or whatever you want.
Andrea: So a tried and true app for you that’s still making a difference in your life, it sounds like.
Clinton Pratt: Absolutely. Yeah.
Andrea: What’s one area of your business where you tend to get carried away or go overboard? So this could be something like that you just nerd out about because you enjoy it and it maybe doesn’t have the financial return on your time, but you do it anyway.
Clinton Pratt: Spreadsheets. So I love spreadsheets.
I like to make charts and tables for all kinds of things, even if it might not be that like useful, it’s just interesting to me, you know. Like metrics and students participating in events and who participated in what, and I like to sort by age and all these things just to like look at all the [00:07:00] statistics.
Andrea: I can relate to that, maybe. We have a joke on the music studio startup team now because we had too many meetings that started. So I started a new spreadsheet and it’s not just me, it’s the whole team. We all support each other in that. Endeavor. What’s your favorite spreadsheet from this year?
Clinton Pratt: Uh, it’s probably the one I just did for the summer. So it’s all of the students and what they signed up for, if they’re doing the camp or not.
And that actually is helpful. It’s not just like I’m doing busy work for nothing but I make it look nice, which isn’t, it doesn’t need to be, you know, I like color code, the columns and sort it and just ’cause it’s fun to look at.
Andrea: Alright, and where can listeners get in touch with you?
Clinton Pratt: So you can go to the pianosenseiway.com.
That’s kind of my website for teachers, has my podcast and everything, which is called the Piano Sensei Way. Also [00:08:00] on YouTube it is also @thepianosenseiway.
Andrea: Alright, Clinton, thank you so much for being here.
Clinton Pratt: Thank you for having me.
Andrea: Thank you for taking the time to be with us Clinton. We’ll include a transcript and all the links mentioned in this episode at musicstudiostartup.com/snapshot035. The Music Studio Startup website is also filled with lots of other resources for music teachers just like you who wanna set up their studios for success this summer, including our very popular self-paced Business Building 101 course, and our hub and mastermind for studio owners who wanna be supported and challenged to grow as entrepreneurs.
If you are ready to dive in the live summer cohort of Business Building 101 is underway. Teachers are actively working on setting up and revamping their studios and it’s not too late to join in. Visit musicstudiostartup.com/businessbuilding101 to enroll. That’s all for today. Thanks for listening.
I’ll be back next [00:09:00] week.