Is owning a Tutorial Center a profitable business in Nigeria?
How lucrative is it?
These are questions begging for answers from Young minds and trained pedagogue.
A coaching center is one of the profitable business ideas in Nigeria you should consider and I will tell you why….
Education is one of the fastest-growing sectors in Nigeria and as such the demand for it is high.
All students and parents want success in different examinations they write. This is one of the reasons why a daycare center is also a lucrative business
Establishing a public tutorial center plays an important role to help the students prepare for the tests and ensure that these students pass with flying colors.
Many students also get enrolled in these coaching centers to crack the entrance tests and get admission to reputed institutions.
There is an ever-growing prestige and pride that many young Nigerians and Africans attach with being called undergraduates; and ultimately, in serving their fatherland.
To say the least, a good number of Nigerian youngsters want to be a university graduate in order to get a white-collar job.
But truth be told, you can’t secure a good one if you don’t have at least a university degree or a Higher National Diploma from a recognized polytechnic in Nigeria, and in some cases with vast years of experience.
Amidst the growing unemployment problem in Nigeria lies this great opportunity.
With having your own tutorial center, you will become an employer of labor and will have an inner craving and satisfaction as you add value to students while making at a profit.
There are various examination bodies saddled with the responsibility to test students’ ability to cope in a university or Polytechnic in Nigeria.
Among them is the Joint Admission and Matriculation Board (JAMB) and also the West African examinations Council (WAEC) with her counterpart, National Examination Council (NECO).
If you are an experienced tutor/instructor and have a passion for instilling needed values in promising youths, then you already have a vital quality needed to gain a lot especially in the big towns and cities all over Nigeria.
In this article, more attention will be given to how to set up tutorial classes with the aim of grooming and preparing young Nigerian youths for different exams.
Apart from offering tutorial classes with the aim of preparing students for various exams, the following are various types of tutorial business ideas you can get into in Nigeria.
- Foreign languages e.g. French, Spanish, etc.
- Music & Dance classes
- Professional examinations like your ICAN, CITN, ICPM, CCNA, etc.
- Computer appreciation/application classes. (Microsoft Packages, programming languages, etc.)
- Adult Education
- Cooking Classes
- Event Management training
In reality, you don’t need a crazy amount of money but you can start small and expand the business as time goes on. To begin, you need the following steps for the successful running of the coaching center.
Decide on Area of Concentration
You have to decide the purpose you want the tutoring center to accomplish.
Do you want to run it for regular school pupils, if that, would it be for primary or secondary school, still yet, would you be running it for their academic examination as some tutoring centers focus on preparing students for their externals like WASSCE, IJMB, First School Leaving Exams etc
Would you rather be interested in preparing adults for ICAN, GMAT and other professional and non-professional examinations?
These are questions you need to answer before any other step is taken. It will help if you can also decide the age group the center will carter for as this will impact on your choice for the area of concentration.
It is normally easier to teach kids in primary and secondary school but tutoring older people has a better payoff.
Have a Sound Business Plan
Drawing out a business plan is critical to the take-off and survival of your business.
Here you should carry out a feasibility study to determine the number of people to employ, how many people you want to carter for, how much money you need, how the subject or lesson module would fit into your objective.
Draw out a plan of how to attract and retain customers, so you can appraise the business from time to time.
Ensure that you properly understand your target clientele. Work out an estimate for your expected profit, bearing in mind that it is dependent on the number of students you have at any given time, which is also dependent on the subjects the center will carter for.
If you are running the center for professional courses, then it is solely dependent on the number of students as they will be required to attend all lesson modules, subjects or courses as the case may be.
You will need to plan for renovation and furniture because it may always arise, especially furniture, desks and chairs for the students.
Decide on Subjects to Be Taught
Before starting a tutorial center, you have to decide on the subjects that will be taught in the center.
The higher your educational qualification, the higher the level you will be able to teach, and also the more amount of money you can charge.
The best option is to do a little bit of research to find out what subjects are in demand in your locality.
Find subjects that are in great demand amongst the students but there is hardly any tutor available for it, those will be good subjects to include in your list.
You can hire an expert tutor who can offer quality education to the students and charges affordable rates.
Location
Decide on where to locate your business – in your house or a hired place. Get a good, publicly accessible location.
This could be School environments, popular bus stops, or bus terminals. Make sure that the center is located in any central place preferably a nice complex in the town or city.
Unlike music production in Nigeria where the business may be located in some cool areas, coaching centers needs to be readily accessible.
The reason for choosing the central location is that students from all corners of the city can reach the place easily by different means of transportation available.
Proper Infrastructure
The coaching Center must have proper infrastructure and enough space.
The infrastructure can also be in the form of study materials like books and copies.
The seating arrangements also fall under proper infrastructure. The facilities to the students must be provided adequately.
Approval
Get necessary permit from concerned homes, government or controlling trade unions.
If you will be using a school premises it is important to get permit from the concerned institutions where you want to locate your business.
Do not forget to reach an agreement with the school management on the usage of their premises and infrastructures.
Resources
You have to get hold of the right curriculum, test papers of previous papers along with other materials such textbooks, study guides, lesson/ lecture notes, writing board, calculators, papers, and pens.
Buying second-hand books will be cheaper than buying new books or study materials. Get hold of fixed asset equipment like Computer systems, Generator, Furniture, etc.
Others are your working capital and consumables like chalks or whiteboard writing.
Besides usual markers or whiteboards, you can use other innovative tools for teaching.
These include charts, working models, online help or support from other experts of the same industry, and so on. Ensure that the classes you arrange for students would be interesting as well as effective.
Hire Competent Staff
You also have to be careful before you hire tutors for your center.
In selecting your tutors please focus on abilities and not only mere certificates.
It is noticed that some graduates with good certificates will not have the ability or passion to teach and as such cannot deliver as you want.
Competent staff is one of the vital things that you have to consider for the successful functioning of the business.
A competent tutor means hiring someone who is proficient in the subjects and also meet the requirements of students.
Qualities like good teamwork, patience, enthusiasm, humility and self-restraint, reliability, and availability are important.
MARKETING
Advertise your services in places where parents or clients frequent – primary school kids at school gates and seek for school administrators collaborations.
Just like your laundry service business marketing, your marketing techniques must be very strong. When you are opening a coaching center, you must make sure that you do the marketing of the coaching center properly.
Marketing helps in bringing more and more customers to the new coaching center. Therefore, the marketing strategy of the coaching center must be eye-catchy.
You can promote your website or profile of coaching center through banner advertisement option.
Featured listing helps your profile being displayed with mobile numbers, addresses, etc. prominently for better visibility and brand value.
Tuition Fee
With multiple coaching centers available in the city, gaining a strong footing in the industry is indeed a challenging issue.
It is very important that you keep low tuition fees, in the beginning, to attract more and more students to your center.
In the future, when your centers gain more popularity you can think of increasing th
Other Strategies
Put the following essential objectives into consideration so as to manage your tutorial center in a successful way.
They will form reasons why your tutorial center should be chosen over other competitors
Excellent, comprehensive, and high quality tutorials
Friendly well-trained staff
Convenient and conducive teaching environments
Excellent Home tutorials
Students/parents satisfaction
Low cost tutorials
Excellent teaching methods
Collaboration with Universities and other high institutions for our students’ admissions.
Few teachers want to grab money but in return, they fail to deliver quality education that students want.
Under any circumstances, you should not compromise with quality. Make sure that the students who have enrolled in your coaching center receive a quality education and superb teaching ambiance.
And for that, you and your fellow tutor need to be updated and constantly upgrade their knowledge of the subjects concerned.
The Internet is a vast resource of information and you can make use of it.
Else, you can talk to experienced teachers or other experts who are closely associated with coaching business and take their suggestions from time to time.
Another strategy is having morning and evening classes and charging separately.
For Example, morning classes could start by 9 am and end by noon running from Mondays to Fridays.
On Saturdays, it can start from 10 am till noon. The evening classes could run from 4 pm till 7 pm on Mondays to Fridays and 4 pm till 6 pm on Saturdays.
With this method, other students who are not usually available in the morning will have the opportunity to choose evening classes.
CONCLUDING NOTES
Tutorial classes are very profitable. In some cases, prospective JAMB candidates can pay N5000 or more per month to prepare for 4 subjects.
If you can have 40 students in your tutorial center in a month, which would result in an aggregate of N200, 000 to say the least.
If you add the fee of students preparing for O’ levels examinations and IJMB, there wouldn’t be a month you will not be receiving profit after paying your staff.
Tutorial coaching businesses can be targeted to students of all ages and any subject matter.
Starting a tutorial business may be right for you if you excel at helping others understand subjects easier.
Sometimes students have a hard time with coursework because of a disability or communication gap with their instructor.
So make learning enjoyable and conducive for your clients.
If you are passionate about education and want to do something for yourself and others in the education world, then consider establishing a tutorial center
