What you should know before transitioning from school teaching to full-time tutoring
Schools are convenient, but they eat up 70% of your income. Full-time tutoring is more profitable, but you have to start and manage a business from scratch. Learn how Tutor.id can help you succeed.
Hello, tutors!
I used to be a school teacher when I decided to take the risk of leaving my job to start full-time tutoring without any previous experience.
I have failed many times, and thanks to persistence and passion for teaching, I realized it was a risk worth taking.
Tutoring gave me the opportunity of earning 10 times more than in my previous job at a school.
It was a dream to see my business flourishing and having my vision slowly materializing into confident, relaxed tutees thanks to the style of teaching I envisioned.
Inspired by many questions I have gotten from tutors, or people interested in starting tutoring, I have put together a list of points you should take into consideration before jumping into full-time tutoring with no regrets.
I have learned my lessons most painfully until I reached the point of balance in my business, so I wish I knew all of this before starting. Enjoy!
1. Know yourself
“Knowing yourself is the beginning of all wisdom” — Aristotle
Take a few minutes to ask yourself what kind of teacher are you?
Are you a 9–5 teacher and comfortable with your financial stability? Or are you going the extra mile at your current job and feeling frustrated things do not happen as fast or as efficient as it should be?
If you fit the second description, it means you have an entrepreneurial mindset, and teaching at schools will just build up your frustration. You need to build your own business instead of changing someone else’s.
Starting a new business is mostly always challenging, and if you want to earn more as a tutor-preneur, make sure entrepreneurship is aligned with your needs and expectations.
If starting a new business seems too scary for you, don’t worry.
Tutor.id is creating tools that will encourage you to start tutoring a few hours per week, without needing to leave your current job right away.
There is absolutely nothing wrong with wanting to teach at schools and privately. Self-awareness will guide you to the next steps in your career.
2. Have a vision
Every business has a vision, which is how you want your business to be in the future. An idea is a foundation you will build your tutoring business on, which consists of how you will be teaching: your style and how much your tutees will accomplish by learning with you.
Bear in mind it is imperative to mentally define that before you start.
Would you like to teach children using only stories?
Would you like to be known as the teacher who incorporates music at every session?
Be original and do what motivates you to teach. You will bring a natural joy in the way you work, and that will reflect on your tutees’ learning, too.
Also, keep in mind what kind of audience you will be targeting. It will help you shape your vision with greater accuracy.
Dream high, set your goals, and figure out how to get there.
3. Know your risks & rewards
It is not easy to start a new business. Many risks come with it. One of them is income instability. Your earnings are irregular, however, one hour of your work if the equivalent of at least 5 hours working at a school.
Basically, you can work less earning the same, or work the same and make much more.
Ready to make the jump?
We are right here to catch you. Tutor.id has a tool that can help you set up your business in only a few minutes, which can provide you with your own professional homepage, pricing, self-scheduling for your tutees, and online payments connected with your chosen cancellation policy.
Time is money: for private tutors, considerably more in comparison to school teachers.
4. Define your audience
Even though there are many tips online, it is still challenging to execute everything with mastery from scratch.
Set the target audience and ask yourself:
- What kind of tutees are you looking for?
- Where do they go?
- Where should you advertise yourself?
There is a simple, simple rule: know your audience and be where your potential tutees are.
Choose your methodology and spice up with your own lesson plans. Be original and use elements of the current news to keep your tutees interested.
Visit places with a group of tutees, or have once a month some different, interactive lessons. Adapting your lessons to our current reality is vital.
Is your target University tutees? So Uni is where you should be. There’s a lot more options to finding new tutees, we have listed some to help you get started.
5. Don’t do sales and billing
One person companies usually do not have sales & billing departments separately. Entrepreneurship is doing a million things at the same time, and that includes doing the sales and billing.
The result of doing both can be catastrophic, especially with tutees who pay later than the due date. Besides, it is annoying to do both the bookkeeping and keep track of payments.
Tutor.id can do the billing for you, so you don’t need to have the awkward money talks.
We also help you to keep track of your income automatically, so you can have a clear picture of your income.
Switching postures when selling and gathering payments is not only tricky but emotionally draining.
6. Manage your time
Time management is critical when it comes to working on your own. Scheduling can be a real hassle as the number of tutees grows.
Tutor.id helps you to publish your availability so students can self-schedule a lesson with you. Matching agendas will no longer be a problem, and we are very proud of that.
Bear in mind to establish boundaries to your tutees so you can focus on what you should be focusing on: teaching.
When you are a full-time tutor, the relationship tends to get way more personal with your tutees, and constant chatting on social media or free consultations are very common.
Manage your time with Tutor.id and experience stress-free tutoring. Bookings are accepted with only a single click!
7. Get your focus straight
That’s right.
Teaching is what you should focus on. It may seem an obvious statement, but many tutors end up spending way more time in management than preparing their own lessons.
The problem is that many tutors are not necessarily interested in management or finances, and it can be time-consuming and stressful is to perform tasks that, although vital, is not essential for your business to prosper.
Remember that your best marketing is the quality of your work, how good you are at teaching.
If you focus your time on becoming a better tutor, it will be your best marketing. Tutees will always recommend the tutor they learn, not the one who has a flawless business execution, efficient booking, or fast reply.
What matters the most for tutees is to learn. It is as simple as it sounds.
Spend your time becoming a better tutor and making better lesson plans. There is no secret to your success, but we can help you get started on your dream job.
Tutor.id is the materialization of a dream to help tutors all over the world to start healthy, profitable businesses. Try our management platform at Tutor.id and experience optimized, stress-free tutoring.
Originally published at https://blog.tutor.id on October 3, 2019.
