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<\/a>Circle for yourself<\/h2>\n\n\n
At the beginning of 2022, I was preparing to move to Canada, where I wanted to work in my specialty as a geophysicist and therefore put a lot of effort into learning English. I studied with tutors and in online schools, but I understood that I needed to practice the language in the field of geology and geophysics, which tutors and online schools could not offer. And then one day in March, Ksenia, a geologist friend of mine from an oil company, wrote to me. She suggested the idea of \u200b\u200bmeeting online, practicing geological English and improving vocabulary. I replied: \u201cLet\u2019s organize it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n
I organized a conversation club for 2-3 people, just as a hobby, created a chat in Telegram, prepared materials. Participation cost 200 rubles. Our first meeting took place in April. More people joined. There was no advertising because it was for a small group.<\/p>\n\n\n
Our circle worked from April to August. But these meetings gave an important result: I saw that there was a demand for such a club and that it was possible to launch an entire educational project and make money from it. I’ll tell you step by step how I did it.<\/p>\n\n\n
From a circle to a conversation club: my first project in the information business<\/h2>\n\n\n
I decided to approach it wisely and not offer the club to everyone, but to develop a strategy for its promotion. I already had copywriting skills and an understanding of marketing.<\/p>\n\n\n
In-depth interview<\/h3>\n\n\n
In August, I compiled questionnaires for an in-depth interview to better understand the audience, and asked the circle participants (Vika and Ksenia) to fill them out, then asked the rest of the chat participants to fill them out.<\/p>\n\n\n I made two target portraits. My potential students are, firstly, people who want to work in their specialty abroad, and they need English with a geological bias, which is not taught in online schools. Secondly, these are people who work in Russia or the CIS countries, but in foreign companies, and they need geological English to communicate with colleagues and career growth.<\/p>\n\n\n The character map is portraits of people who will come to the speaking club. Now we know who we are selling and what we are selling to. We build a product description based on the audience’s request.<\/p>\n\n\n The main pain of these two groups is that they need to \u201cuntie\u201d their tongues and practice communication.<\/p>\n\n\n Then I described my club. We meet online 2-3 times a week. I select materials (an article or video), ask questions about them and create a glossary, and students have a couple of days to prepare for the lesson. In addition, we will discuss in English how to write a resume, how to present yourself at an interview and how to answer the recruiter\u2019s questions. All homework is checked by the teacher, and also – and this is one of the main features of our club – we invite English-speaking colleagues to classes: geologists, geophysicists, mineralogists and other geospecialists. You can directly learn about moments from the professional lives of colleagues from other countries, other companies and related fields.<\/p>\n\n\n In the offer we describe the essence of our product. The offer looks like a landing page or a sales post – anything that will attract the attention of the target audience. I made two types of offers. In one she simply told about the club: what it is and how it works. In the second, she talked about the results: what classes in the English club for geologists will give you (an offer with results gave more responses).<\/p>\n\n\n I settled on the option of paying not for a one-time lesson, but for a subscription. Why a subscription? Because it is convenient: a student buys a monthly subscription, and I can plan what expenses this money will go towards – to pay the teacher, to advertise, to pay for Zoom, to pay the assistant. The cost of a monthly subscription was 2,000 rubles.<\/p>\n\n\n August. I got ready to see if they would buy this subscription. I wrote to the conversation club chat, there were 50-60 participants in it, and suggested that they purchase a subscription for September and try to study in this format. On the first day, two participants bought a subscription! I also provide for a refund: if a student doesn\u2019t like the club, then I return the money in the first week.<\/p>\n\n\n When people started buying season tickets, I realized that the business model was working and I could start actively advertising and selling the club. My assistant negotiated with public accounts on VKontakte and Telegram to place advertisements for the club. Our advertising budget was 5,000 rubles. After the first month of classes, advertising was already on track: we chose channels with geological topics and actively advertised in them. Some channels brought in applications well, others worse, but every month we received about 50 applications and formed a client base, which we then began sending mailings to.<\/p>\n\n\n By the way, when we agreed on advertising in one of the public pages on VK, I found Olga a teacher for the club. She was so excited about my idea that she wanted to teach the classes herself. So the advertisement brought not only students to the club, but also teachers.<\/p>\n\n\n I started receiving applications to participate in the club. Due to the small budget, we did not have a landing page, and I responded to applications on all those sites where we advertised: if the advertisement was on VK, it led to my page on VK, if in groups in Tg, then the advertisement led to personal messages in Tg. During the calls I was asked questions: how will we communicate if more than 10 people join the group? Why so expensive? Why so cheap? Is it suitable for my language level? Can I get my money back? During calls, I studied the target audience even more deeply, always asked for what purpose the person was learning English, and said whether our club was focused on solving their problem.<\/p>\n\n\n On September 15 we launched our club. It brought together 36 participants. The lesson began with a greeting, followed by a small talk. If more than 7 people came to the lesson, we were divided into mini-groups of 3-4 participants. In mini-groups there was always a moderator: he made sure that everyone participated in the conversation, so that they did not stray too far from the topic. Although sometimes we could talk about different topics, there was still a certain outline. We conducted interactive activities, tests, and practiced spontaneous speech. After each lesson, I asked them to fill out a feedback form.<\/p>\n\n\n We selected complex material, so participants were required to be able to read non-adapted articles in English. But they weren\u2019t overly complicated either, because people work and don\u2019t have time to study voluminous material. In advertising, I always said that you need a pre-intermediate level and higher.<\/p>\n\n\n Since specialists from different fields came to us – hydrogeologists, ecologists, geophysicists – we selected the material not entirely narrow, but so that there was something common, understandable to everyone. We focused on geology, geological exploration, discussed oil fields, drilling.<\/p>\n\n\n The most important thing in our classes is to speak. I have always emphasized that we do not correct mistakes. At the end of the lesson, the teacher could point out some mistakes, but the main goal of the club was to communicate.<\/p>\n\n\n Price<\/strong>. Such a club should cost more than 2,000 rubles. Even the students were surprised at the low price (although it is probably not low for students). Due to the low price, it was not possible to allocate 10\u201320% for advertising, especially at the initial stage. And without advertising there is no product development: maintaining social networks, creating a website where you can talk more about the club, cooperation with enterprises and educational organizations. It would be very cool to cooperate with universities if they were willing to support this club (after all, many undergraduate and graduate students came to the classes).<\/p>\n\n\n Website<\/strong>. Processing requests from clients on calls is very tiring. In b2c, it is better to automate this process: create a website, connect payments and create a section with answers to frequently asked questions.<\/p>\n\n\n The club operated for eight months: from September to June. Meetings took place weekly. We spent holidays together, sent each other postcards from different cities and countries. We awarded students points for participation in classes and sent gifts to the most active ones, for example the book \u201cThe Difference of Cultures.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n From my own experience, I\u2019ll say: I\u2019ve been practicing vocabulary on geological and geophysical topics every week for a whole year for a whole year, and now it\u2019s very easy for me to talk about my work, because these terms are already jumping off my teeth.<\/p>\n\n\n It was a great commercial experience. I learned how to launch an educational product, I learned how to hire people – assistants, teachers – I learned how to sell. Now for me selling is easy.<\/p>\n\n\n Even now I receive requests from time to time. People find old advertisements and respond to them. There is definitely a demand for this club.<\/p>\n\n\n Community is something that is missing in our industry, because everyone works on their own, and far away, and in the club people from different fields meet: here is a mineralogist, here is a geological prospector, here is a geologist, here is a driller, and they all communicate, get to know each other, and they are all from different companies, regions and countries. They can create their own projects, meet in person, and even share career opportunities. And the coolest thing is that both line workers, chief geologists and even the general director attended the club. Yes, in this club you could meet the top people, just sit and talk together.<\/p>\n\n\n People from Russia, Kazakhstan, Italy, Canada, and the USA connected to us. For example, a student from Italy who studied at the Faculty of Geology and talked about her studies. There was also a chief geologist from Polymetal. We were joined by a guide from the Volcano Museum in Kamchatka. She knew English well, conducted excursions in it, but wanted to better understand geology. Many students came, although I thought that such a club was not relevant to them yet, but now students are thinking about the future and investing in additional education. People came who work in foreign companies or are planning to work there. For example, one participant was about to have an interview at Schlumberger, so our club was right at his request.<\/p>\n\n\n Now the activity of the tg channel has subsided, but it can always be resumed. We even met once in a bar to chat in English. People are very happy to meet online, they send postcards to each other, that is, there is communication.<\/p>\n\n\n The gold mining company Polyus liked our club, and we even talked with its educational department, but we were at a dead end: we need money, we need an educational license, we need to participate in a tender, we need to register the club legally (not to be self-employed).<\/p>\n\n\n There was another attempt to combine the club with an educational project. That time with the English language school. We wanted to create an English school with a focus on geological topics, we even went to Minex in Astana and received applications for corporate training, since, as experience has shown, there is a demand for such a club.<\/p>\n\n\n I now have an English product for geologists: a lesson plan, strategy, how to promote and sell, how to conduct classes and collect feedback, there is a base of 400+ people who responded to the advertisement. I see three options for the development of the club:<\/p>\n\n\n ***<\/p>\n\n\n Geology is a large group of specialists who need to communicate and be integrated into global geological exploration. But not a single online school will hire teachers focused on geological English, but will prefer to teach English with an emphasis on marketing, finance, and IT, because these areas are more in demand.<\/p>\n\n\n I already have a system that just needs to be launched. It is clear how to advertise, sell and conduct classes. I would really like the club to continue operating. I publish all the news about the club in my <\/em>tg channel<\/em><\/a>. Subscribe and stay up to date with the English club for geologists!<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n My name is Masha, I am a geophysicist. When I got ready to work in Canada, I was faced with the question of how to improve my geological English. I opened my own speaking club. I’ll tell you about it in this article.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":3569,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"8","_seopress_titles_title":"How a Geophysicist and a Geologist Practiced English Together and What Came of It","_seopress_titles_desc":"My name is Masha, I am a geophysicist. In this article I\u2019ll tell you how my colleague and I trained English and how it all resulted in a speaking club.","_seopress_robots_index":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[555,586],"tags":[],"tag-cat":[597],"class_list":{"0":"post-57711","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-career","8":"category-geomarketing","9":"tag-cat-business-and-career"},"acf":[],"pbg_featured_image_src":{"full":["https:\/\/geoconversation.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/06\/geoconversation.org-oblozhka.webp",1280,1280,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/geoconversation.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/06\/geoconversation.org-oblozhka-150x150.webp",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/geoconversation.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/06\/geoconversation.org-oblozhka-300x300.webp",300,300,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/geoconversation.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/06\/geoconversation.org-oblozhka-768x768.webp",768,768,true],"large":["https:\/\/geoconversation.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/06\/geoconversation.org-oblozhka-1024x1024.webp",1024,1024,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/geoconversation.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/06\/geoconversation.org-oblozhka.webp",1280,1280,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/geoconversation.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/06\/geoconversation.org-oblozhka.webp",1280,1280,false],"bricks_large_16x9":["https:\/\/geoconversation.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/06\/geoconversation.org-oblozhka-1200x675.webp",1200,675,true],"bricks_large":["https:\/\/geoconversation.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/06\/geoconversation.org-oblozhka-1200x1200.webp",1200,1200,true],"bricks_large_square":["https:\/\/geoconversation.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/06\/geoconversation.org-oblozhka-1200x1200.webp",1200,1200,true],"bricks_medium":["https:\/\/geoconversation.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/06\/geoconversation.org-oblozhka-600x600.webp",600,600,true],"bricks_medium_square":["https:\/\/geoconversation.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/06\/geoconversation.org-oblozhka-600x600.webp",600,600,true]},"pbg_author_info":{"display_name":"Elizaveta Akimova","author_link":"https:\/\/geoconversation.org\/en\/author\/elizaveta\/","author_img":false},"pbg_comment_info":" No Comments","pbg_excerpt":"My name is Masha, I am a geophysicist. When I got ready to work in Canada, I was faced with the question of how to improve my geological English. I opened my own speaking club. I'll tell you about it in this article.","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/geoconversation.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57711","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/geoconversation.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/geoconversation.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/geoconversation.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/geoconversation.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=57711"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/geoconversation.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57711\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/geoconversation.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3569"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/geoconversation.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=57711"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/geoconversation.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=57711"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/geoconversation.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=57711"},{"taxonomy":"tag-cat","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/geoconversation.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tag-cat?post=57711"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\nCharacter Map and Product Description<\/h3>\n\n\n
<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\nWe are writing an offer<\/h3>\n\n\n
<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\nQuestion of price<\/h3>\n\n\n
Advertising<\/h3>\n\n\n
Processing applications<\/h3>\n\n\n
<\/a>Launched a club<\/h3>\n\n\n
<\/a>What did this experience teach me?<\/h2>\n\n\n
Club results<\/h2>\n\n\n
<\/a>Gathered a community<\/h3>\n\n\n
<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n<\/a><\/a>Almost merged with the school<\/h3>\n\n\n
What’s next<\/h2>\n\n\n
\n
<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n