Martial Arts Business: 10 Ideas for Martial Arts School Owners from Tom Callos

• 10 innovative ideas for martial arts training and community involvement
• Importance of project-based leadership training
• Creating a blog to engage community and share experiences
• Building a website for black belt testing
• Opportunities to learn from peace activist Thich Nhat Hanh
• Artistic approach to black belt certificates

Hi, this is Tom Kalos. Welcome to MartallInfo.com. Today I'm going to give you 10 ideas and there's no time to waste. So let's get to work.

Alright, here's your first idea. It's called project-based leadership training. Project-based leadership training, in a nutshell, means that at every belt level, give or take a couple age groups, your students will do a community-based project as a part of their belt test.

And they get to choose what the project is. So whether they're interested in art, architecture, animal rights, environmental issues, senior citizens, bike riding, whatever it is, they do something in the community where they have to organize a couple other people that's practicing leadership and that becomes a part of their belt test.

They get to choose it, they get to organize it, they get to document it, and that becomes their project. So when they come to their test, they do their forms, they do their self-defense, they do their sparring, and then the instructor says, "Well, what was your project?".

In the future, we'll sell our lessons like this. Mr. Johnson, what I do for a living is I teach people to manifest the philosophy of the martial arts in their lives. The courtesy, the focus, the concentration, the courage, all those things we practice so diligently on the mat.

I teach them to manifest those things in their lives outside of the dojo and outside of the realm of anything that has to do with a kick or punch.

Now let me give you some examples. Those examples are kept in what's called a project portfolio. And that portfolio, probably kept online through a blog, which is free, is the proof, the evidence that you are affecting your students' lives outside of the school and that you are affecting your community in a positive way.

By the way, that is advertising project-based leadership training. If you want to know more, you can write me at tomomalos.com.

Now for the next idea. Get a blog, go to www.blogger.com and start a blog. Learn how to use that thing. Basically, what you're doing is posting on the Internet or on the web, a beautiful document that you don't need a graphics person to build for you. There's a variety of colors and layouts.

You can insert photographs and video. What if you had your black belt team that's getting ready for the next test? Blogging. And what if that meant that their parents, their grandparents, their friends, their classmates at school, their workmates could read that blog and somehow be involved with this process of black belt testing?

The process of black belt testing is as important, if not more important than the actual black belt test itself, isn't it? Isn't that where the student grows in that journey? Go to blogger.com and start a blog.

And to see my blog go to tomkallow.blogspot.com.

This idea goes back to the first idea and it is get this book, the Kids Guide to Service Projects. Over 500 service ideas for young people who want to make a difference. Community activism is the new paradigm for martial arts school promotion.

Don't set a guy out in the corner, wave a sign, go out and make a difference in your community. That's what draws in students.

Okay, the next idea. Build a website for your next black belt test. That's right, you don't just put up signs, you don't talk about it in your school. You put up a website with details, with journal entries from the participants, with plans, with accomplishments, with directions to the test, and with everything that the general public might want to know about how you produce your finest products.

A website can be built very easily. In fact, right here at marshallinfo.com, they build custom websites that you can administer. Change your own information, add your own photographs. It's very easy.

Don't come and visit this website all the time without checking it out. Build a website for your next black belt test and do it six months to a year in advance so that friends and people in the community and the media can get a handle on how you train your black belts, how phenomenal the process is, and drive students to your school through the black belt testing process.

Now here's an idea that's way out of the box. Meet Thich Nhat Hanh. You know who Thich Nhat Hanh is? He's the most prominent peace activist in the world. He's the actual monk they depicted on the TV show Kung Fu.

This is the most important peace activist in the martial arts community in the world. This is the person we should have known that should have been one of our teachers that is available for a week-long seminar from August 21st to the 26th in Estes Park, Colorado.

Thich Nhat Hanh was nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize by Martin Luther King in 1968. The preeminent spokesman for peace and peace education. Why peace? If you look at the yin and yang, you know we know the violence end really well in the martial arts.

We need to know exactly the opposite of that. If we can promote 20 ways to disarm somebody by force, we should know 20 ways to use peace to disarm them as well. Thich Nhat Hanh is coming to the United States August 21st through the 26th.

To find more information, go to ultimateblackbelttest.com, and when you get to that website, go to test requirements. From test requirements, go to special events. There you'll see a picture depicting Thich Nhat Hanh and a lot of information about this seminar.

And you can call me for more information at 530-903-0286 Pacific Standard Time. There are 30 or 40 other martial arts master teachers and instructors going to the seminar.

This is an unprecedented opportunity to study with someone who is as much a master of peace as Bruce Lee was to martial arts. And it's so important for a martial arts education to embrace peace with an equal proportion to embracing the technical aspects of martial arts.

I told you it was out of the box. Thich Nhat Hanh coming in August. Give me a call for more information.

Here's an idea that's a little ahead of its time. Black Belt certificates as art. Check this first one out. That one was designed by a famous poster artist who does, you know, rock and roll concert posters, and I commissioned that for the first team and the fire was part of our test because we did a fire walk.

The second one, we are building a house in Alabama with the Rural Studio, which we did as a part of the ultimate black belt test. This third one was done by the wife of somebody in the ultimate black belt test.

Her name is Kim Christian and it depicts our trip to Hawaii. We did rock sculpture on the beach at Waipio Valley on the Big Island and that's the same trip where we moved six tons of rock on Jason Scott Lee's farm and trained with my old student BJ Penn.

These are black belt certificates as art and these are all from the ultimate Black Belt test which you can see at ultimateblackbelttest.com. If you want more information about this idea, just email me at tomkos.com.

Hey, was that 10 ideas yet? I think I passed the mark a little bit. But for more ideas, go to marshallinfo.com and look at the super show photos and videos that webmaster Fairbr Jacques just brought back from the Martial Arts Industry Association super show in Las Vegas.

Listen until next week’s show and come back every week; we will have something new. Stay strong, train hard, stay out of trouble, stay healthy.

And I look forward to seeing you here and then someday on the mat, too. My name is Tom Callison. Thank you for watching.