Marketing isn't just about advertising. It's about the words you use every day, both with potential students and current students.
And so, learning to explain how our world works to non-musicians is a necessary skill.
For example...
Imagine you're talking with a potential new student about joining your piano studio. The student has zero music experience and wants to know how lessons work.
Compare these two explanations.
We'll meet once a week. I'll teach you some new concepts, and I'll show you how to practice at home between lessons. Then next lesson, we'll see how the week went, review what went wrong, and learn more new concepts to take with you the following week. Most of the progress you make will be in the practice time between lessons, and we'll keep trying to improve that process.
Versus...
It's like seeing a personal trainer, but for learning to play the piano.
The Analogy: Your New Superpower
Most of us use analogies all the time in our teaching. But have you tried using them to explain things like...
- ...how practicing music works?
- ...your philosophies of teaching?
- ...how your business is structured?
When you use an analogy to make your point, it's powerful for a couple reasons.
First, it saves you from a lengthy explanation. By relating your concept to something they're already familiar with, a number of blanks are automatically filled.
Second, when done well, an analogy will evoke an emotional response from the person you're communicating with.
For example, we know that recitals are good for students. But we've all had families who don't want to do more than one performance a year, tops. Any more than that, and it feels like too much for them.
In the past, I might have explained the importance of recitals something like this.
Performing for others makes the experience much more meaningful for both the performer and the audience. Plus, it's gives us goals to work towards in lessons. And we're developing an important life skill. So, it would be really great to have him perform at least a few times a year.
This was rarely effective.
But then, I tried explaining it like this...
Imagine if his soccer team had all those practices...but only one game a year.
No contest which explanation was more effective.
The Anatomy of an Effective Analogy
For an analogy to have the effect you want, it requires three components.
- It needs to be something the other person is very familiar with.
- There needs to be some overlap (similarities) with the point you're trying to make.
- It needs to elicit an emotional response.
The sports example fits all three criteria.
- Everyone knows how soccer practices and games work.
- Soccer involves routines and events similar to music. The practices, and then the games; the sports version of "performances."
- The idea of doing all that practice for only one game a year would make just about anyone's heart sink. It would make the idea of doing a sport boring and pointless.
Here are some more examples.
Example #1: Getting Parents of Young Children to Practice With Them
Sometimes, parents of young piano students don't understand the importance of practicing with them. They expect them to enjoy it and follow through on their own.
It's understandable. Most of their children's other activities are drop-off activities (physically or mentally), so why should this be any different?
A drawn-out explanation of the importance of helping their kids with piano just won't do.
But something like this will:
Remember how you read with your kids to help them learn language? Imagine how it would have gone if you'd just handed them some books and expected them to do it all on their own. Crazy, right? Well, it's the same thing with music.
Example #2: Your Makeup Policy
Music teachers struggle with this one all the time.
We explain the rationale for our policy - that we're protecting our income, we can't fill a random empty slot in our schedule when there's a cancellation, etc. - but they just don't quite get it.
But this explanation will make them understand.
It would be like if you went to work tomorrow, and at 2pm, the boss comes in. The boss says, "I don't have any work for you for the next hour, so I'm not going to pay you. But, I need you to be ready to go at 3pm. AND, I'd like you to come in an hour early tomorrow to do that hour of work when I have it for you. Thanks!
No one would ever keep a job like that, right? Well, that's why we have this makeup policy, so we can avoid that kind of circumstance.
I have yet to speak with a parent who argues about the importance of the makeup policy after explaining it like this.
Example #3: Music Learning Theory
I'm a huge fan of music learning theory. It really works. But, it's a very complex subject!
When explaining it to a parent thinking about where to take their kids for music lessons, it would be easy to go down the rabbit hole of explanations.
About how it's a school of teaching created by Edwin Gordon that uses movement, singing, rhythm patterns and tonal patterns. And how it places music reading in the proper sequence of learning, so not to expect a traditional experience.
An easier way to frame it to a prospective parent would be:
Your kids will get to learn to play and read music the same way they learned to speak and read English. A traditional reading-first approach to music would be like if you tried to teach them to read books when they were two.
The details of MLT can (and should) be fleshed out after the student signs up. But, the easiest way to explain MLT to a stranger is with one or two well-placed analogies.
Practice, Practice, Practice
The best way to get better at communicating with non-musicians through analogies is (surprise) practice!
Think of some concepts you've struggled to get across to your students, parents, or other non-professional-musicians you work with. Try coming up with an analogy that follows this process, and see if it makes a difference.
I'd love to hear some of your best ones in the comments below.
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