Sensei Attends a Martial Arts School Marketing Seminar (but Passes on Drinking the Kool-Aid)

Squibs and Blurbs

by Jerry Zimmerman

TEANECK New Jersey—(Weekly Hubris)—5/30/11—An overly excited, tall, skinny, bald-headed man in a suit stood at the front of the room, yelling loudly and doing frantic exercises, all the while smiling maniacally, his eyes beaming so brightly that they might possibly explode, desperately urging us all to do the same crazy movements he was doing.

After a couple of minutes of this, he abruptly stopped and started laughing as loud as he possibly could, louder than the craziest loon in the darkest insane asylum, again urging us to do the same—“LAUGH AS HARD AS YOU CAN, SHOW US THAT YOU’RE HAPPY, YOU CAN DO IT, HAAA HAAA HAAA HAAA HAAA HAAAAAA!!!!!”

About 40 of us were packed into a small shuttered meeting room at a chain hotel located near the Newark Airport in a neighborhood chillingly reminiscent of the brooding no-man’s land in “Blade Runner.”

The windows were blacked out with blinds, the light was fluorescent, the noise level was hyper-jet-engine, the air was thick, muggy soup, and the enthusiasm was totally fake and weird.

My first thought was, “So this is a Professional Martial Arts business seminar.”

My second thought came almost simultaneously: “How the hell do I get out of here?”

Let’s back up a bit.

For years, I’ve been bombarded with all kinds of advertising, mailers, magazines, e-mails, etc. from one particular consulting group for martial arts school owners (that would be me). I have been randomly disgusted by/disinterested in/curious about this avalanche of unsolicited information, depending on my mood, my sense of humor, or my student enrollment.

I’ve come to understand that I’m a very good Aikido teacher but I am basically a business novice. Like many other martial arts school owners, I was an avid student and an enthusiastic teacher who wanted my art to be a bigger and bigger part of my life and who thus ended up fulfilling my dream, and opening my own school.

This was the perfect paradox, a blessing and a curse: my avocation and my vocation became one but, suddenly, to make it all work, I had to become—a businessman as well!

Holy Organizational Systems, Batman! I needed to know how to make my school grow and thrive, lest it wither and die.

What to do? Give up all my wonky prejudices and just finally go to see the experts. Go to a seminar in Newark run by those same guys who have been hounding me like vampire wolves for, seemingly, the last century? They must know something!

And so there I was, seated at one of several long tables with other rather apprehensive neophyte Business Seminar Goers. What would happen? What amazing secrets would I learn to shoot my enrollment through the Dojo roof? How could I become the very best school owner/teacher that I could be?

OK, I admit that my first encounter with Mr. Unbelievably Enthusiastic Exercise Laughing Guy was extremely unsettling, to the point of my wanting to do a Superman leap from my seat straight through the glass window, directly into my car, with my foot just glued down on the accelerator as I screeched out of the parking lot onto Route 9, never to be seen in Newark again.

But I stayed in my seat. I had paid my $99 for this day, I was experimenting with trying to get out of my comfort zone, I was an adult, so let’s see what came next . . . .

Next was a grand announcement, fitting for the entrance of Mohammed Ali at Madison Square Garden, but actually touting the next speaker in this miniscule room in a Jersey hotel. The speaker was a famous Asian martial artist (though, as far as I actually knew, mostly famous for being an all-time crackerjack salesman for his many different business systems).

Our announcer could not get over how unbelievably amazing this guy was—we MUST give him the loudest and most enthusiastic applause ever to get him out to speak to us. Well, our measly crowd of 40 or so gave him a nice round of strong clapping but, guess what? It wasn’t good enough!

Mr. Superstar Martial Artist Salesman got on the microphone, behind the audience, and announced that he was mortified by such a timid reception. If we didn’t do much better, he would be insulted and simply go home! He was T-ed off—what was the matter with us?

Naturally, all of us, having come this far, and being so tantalizingly close to the Golden-Secrets-of-Martial-Arts-School-Marketing, roused ourselves into a hopefully acceptably noisy accolade of welcome, praying that our savior would deign to appear.

And appear he did, a short older gentleman, lithe and in good shape, in a track suit that looked like an 80s leisure ensemble and with a massive shock of dark hair. He bounded in front of us (thank God our applause was worthy!) and began his rant.

I wish I could tell you what he had to say. It seemed very, very important. I could tell it was, because he immediately told us, “This is very, very important! Listen very closely!”

He then launched into a very loud and long dissertation about the real secrets to success. Rather unfortunately, as he got excited and loud, his Korean accent took over and, though I was truly keen on learning these priceless secrets, all I heard was, “You murt ing difi themid doding bascocci and ookclloffurnke!”

I could not understand a single word he uttered. Not one.

I was certain this would be the high point of the day. However, after some “Full Lunch Included” sandwiches in Saran Wrap, the second half of this wondrous event began.

I was quite shell-shocked at this point, but I was certainly stirred by the opening exercise of us all standing in our places and yelling, hopefully in great belief, “I’m going to make a hundred grand this year! I’m going to make a hundred grand this year!”

Really.

Everyone seemed to be at least the age of consent, but I began to suspect that I was the only adult among us. Or maybe the only adult not on meds. Or, actually, the only adult originally from our particular planet.

To cap off a perfect marketing day, the final speaker was a very successful school owner and business consultant, a gentleman whose name I knew quite well from his relentless self-promotion (let’s give him his due) over the last decade. His affect was that of an aging frat boy and avuncular business partner. His message of seriously aggressive marketing ideas was ameliorated by his profession of not selling snake oil to his clients but, rather, of honestly giving them what they needed and wanted.

Sounded pretty good to me until I realized that one of the many forms we were asked to sign “for our information” contained a little phrase indicating that I would be happy for their company to charge my credit card $499 for the big bonus package and, also, by the way, would sign me up for an additional $499 per month for consulting. It didn’t indicate how long I would be signed up for, but I had a nice cuddly feeling that it was probably until the end of time, or perhaps a bit longer.

I admit to leaving my first, and most probably my last, Big Business Seminar a bit ashen and shaky in the knees. I had the giddy feeling, once in the safety of the parking lot, of having barely saved my butt from the dreaded NEARTMCC—the Nazi EST Asian Republican TV Marketers on Crack-Cocaine.

But, what the hell, I’ve already used some of their ideas at my school, and they’ve worked very well!