My Successful Japanese Company
“Let’s Study English” was the name that I used to create a successful business in Tokyo Japan. It helps to meet people who are business minded, and successful, like ourselves. Which put me in a touch with different combinations of jobs, schools, areas, until I got the right combination. A Danshi (the Japanese projects), area of tall housing buildings. Maybe like the projects, where there are tall buildings, lots of people in a square mile. They have their own newspaper. This newspaper was the best advertising I have ever done, great target demographic, teaching and location. I taught everybody.
The Red Number 1 – Number 2. I moved my home closer to the danshi. Notice the blue line, this is a major avenue, Meji Odori, students do not like to cross these major roads. None of my students needed to cross a major street to reach me. Very important with younger students. The large outer green circle, I could ride my bicycle in approximately 10 minutes to get to a class, from Position #2. The inter green circle, has a very high density of people, 30,000 ~ 45,000 people. The danshi, high rise, tenant housing. This is the area I targeted with my advertising.
“Let’s Study English” advertisement was basically the same, in the newspaper print, and in the insert flyer. We used both (insert & print) in the beginning which quickly filled up my teaching hours. Please notice the newspaper’s graphic artist, enriched my flyer due to his knowledge of Adobe Illustrator, was a little better than mine. We both had similar mac towers, and he kept having an extension error come up, which I was able to fix with him. He didn’t say thank you! But his look said it all, “how in world did I know how to do that? Especially in an all-Japanese operating system?” That look was thanks enough! We went deep into the system.
Monday through Friday I was booked solid until the vacations. Mornings from 7:00 am until 2:30 pm, teaching at two Junior high Schools. Evenings, 3:00 PM ~ 6:00pm were child classes. 7:00 pm until 10:00 pm were adult and company classes. Friday night until Sunday was free time. The pricing mechanism was basically children were grouped together in six, which gave a lower cost per child. Adults were usually in pairs. A couple of the days I would teach in the Danshi, at Japanese homes, so I needed to schedule classes accordingly. Sometimes 5 to 10 minutes between classes. I have been in hundreds of Japanese homes. I had two bicycles in case I got a flat. I did have a car, for a couple of years, (see gold driver’s license). I favored a bicycle simply because of travel speed and urgency. At times I wore a waterproof suit. approximately 780 JHS students I taught each month, and 100~120 private students. I also taught at companies who did business in English.
Advertising costs varied due to inserts, and paper subscriptions the newspaper had.
