Re: Aikido Dojo Recruitment...????
I think Stephen and Daniel have the right idea. The key to attracting new students and retaining existing ones (even for just a second class) lies in understanding why they came in the door and what they were looking for. Are a lot of those reasons and goals silly? Sure, but that's only because they don't know what aikido is about. What you can do is look for the underlying reasons, the essence behind it. I think that people who stay, stay because the dojo serves that underlying reason, which is the real reason they came in the first place. It just doesn't do so in the way that they anticipated. So you need to understand their real reasons, and more importantly, get them to understand them (and how the dojo meets them).