Green Bay Karate is one of the most successful martial arts studios in Wisconsin. It offers black belt training for students from the age of five through adulthood. Identifying as a “House of Discipline,” Green Bay Karate’s practice of courtesy and respect informs its orderly classrooms.
Founder Craig Johnson struggled to keep up with the demands of running a martial arts studio during the evenings and weekends. He is college professor by day and a school owner by night. He needed a martial arts software platform that kept up with his busy schedule.
With having to assist students and grade papers for his day job, Mr. Johnson was falling behind on managing and manually tracking the day-to-day paperwork generated
by approximately 150 karate students - every email, every invoice, every attendance sheet.
Mr. Johnson wanted a solution to cut down the time spent on administrative burdens required to manage a successful martial arts school, and give students more attention in the learning process at the same time.
The solution to juggling a full-time day job and keep his school running came in the form of Kicksite, acting like a virtual administrative assistant.
As a prospective client, Mr. Johnson learned Kicksite's proprietary M.V.P. Process, which is all about understanding goals and needs. Through mutual assessment, visionary consulting and private lessons, clients can develop holistic goals for their martial arts studio and help shape their future business goals. This process is seamless, as it walks clients through every step of the way and makes integration of a new system a breeze. Here's how it worked for Mr. Johnson:
Through learning about Mr. Johnson's pain points and goals, specifically the huge amount of time it took to input administrative items while struggling to maintain another job, Kicksite helped him determine quickly if it was the platform he needed to address these challenges.
"All it took was one conversation, and I was like, ‘Yes that's what I need,'" said Mr. Johnson.
After a discussion with Kicksite staff to understand Mr. Johnson's goals and vision for his business, the Kicksite team worked to customize his account precisely to his needs – now and in the future.
During the setup process, Kicksite listened to Mr. Johnson's desire to provide students with visual aids like videos, and assisted him with uploading these necessary materials into a private "Student Access" portal. This new tool allowed Mr. Johnson to provide essential materials online and avoid the burden of having to continuously send them through email, YouTube, Facebook, etc.
Step 3 of the MVP Process provided Mr. Johnson with personalized instruction from one of Kicksite's experts, allowing him to implement, enjoy and benefit from an intuitive martial arts platform.
As a result, this helped him take manual work off his plate so that he could focus on what mattered most: his students. This phase of the process also demonstrated for Mr. Johnson how to navigate the dashboard as well as track birthdays, class schedules and various programs, among other items.
Kicksite's innovative three-step process allowed Mr. Johnson to implement, enjoy and benefit from a system that he initially didn't think he had time for. It's also worth noting that this was accomplished during the last month of school
for him which is typically the busiest for any college professor.
Managing two jobs can be a time-consuming endeavor, but with Kicksite, Mr. Johnson was able to enjoy success with both roles.
With Kicksite's expert support, Mr. Johnson fully integrated the solution into the Green Bay Karate's administrative processes and continues to find new features to streamline tasks he previously performed manually.
Green Bay Karate retired its card system for announcing ranks and results. With the Kicksite platform, this information is sent directly to students' online accounts. The system was designed for him and has allowed him to avoid manual labor, freeing up more time to spend with his students.
Tracking is challenging and ripe for error without the benefit of a tracking system like Kicksite to monitor absent students, expired memberships and students eligible for promotions.
Kicksite also helps Green Bay Karate become a more prominent and wellknown part of the community. This includes assisting in the scheduling and dispersion of promotional materials as well as event notices.
Kicksite supports Mr. Johnson's goal of increasing student ownership over their practice. With Kicksite platform, students at Green Bay Karate can access their accounts to view videos of themselves in private. Younger students also now receive printable materials and projects on their accounts, reducing Green Bay Karate's paper footprint.
Keeping up with communication is time-consuming, but with Kicksite it's automated so absent students are contacted, Facebook posts are easy, and past due memberships are alerted.
In conclusion, Kicksite proved to be a beneficial solution for Mr. Johnson's business needs, and will likely continue to help him to find ways to impact his students at Green Bay Karate in a positive way. An investment in Kicksite helps build efficiency, essential tracking that is easy to miss, and keeps communication at an all-time high.
"I'm in the ‘wow' phase," explained Mr. Johnson. "I'm already recommending it to my friends."