by George Fourie
Tune in as George Fourie from Martial Arts Media™ covers Marketing Tips and Strategies for Martial Arts Business and School Owners. Get modern ideas from the digital world for lead generation and retention. Guest interviews with successful industry experts.
Language
🇺🇲
Publishing Since
7/29/2016
Email Addresses
0 available
Phone Numbers
0 available
April 25, 2025
<p>How Australian Martial Arts Academy's head instructor turned chronic fatigue into a leadership edge - driving growth and retention at a top-tier school.</p><p><strong>IN THIS EPISODE:</strong></p><ul><li>The Belt-By-Belt Recovery Story That Changed Mark’s Life (And His Students')</li><li>Walking Away From Medicine To Pursue The Martial Path Full-Time</li><li>The Hidden Energy Technique That Helps You Show Up Big—Even When You’re Running On Empty</li><li>How Teaching On Crutches Inspired A Wave Of Black Belts To Keep Going</li><li>The Sales Strategy That Works As Well In A Kids Class As It Does On The Phone</li><li>And more</li></ul><br/><p>*Need help growing your martial arts school? <a href="https://martialartsmedia.com/application" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><strong>Apply Here</strong></a>.</p><p><strong>TRANSCRIPTION</strong></p><p><strong>George: </strong>Hey, it's George Fourie. Welcome to another episode of the Martial Arts Media™ Business Podcast. So, today I'm speaking with Mark Loughran from the Australian Martial Arts Academy.</p><p>So, episode 156—155—I’d been chatting to Hakan, Hakan Manav, and Mark’s name dropped in there quite a few times. So I thought I’d bring the man on himself to have a chat about 18 years in martial arts. </p><p>He’s also one of the head instructors at the Australian Martial Arts Academy, and one of our featured speakers at the Partners Intensive that’s coming up in June, depending on when you listen to this.</p><p>But with that said, welcome to the call, Mark.</p><p><strong>Mark:</strong> Thank you very much. Great to be here. </p><p><strong>George: </strong>Good stuff.</p><p>We've only just recently met as well. So I'm going to take this as a blank canvas and a conversation just to tap into your genius, the things that you do. So if we had to start from the beginning, who's Mark, how did you get into the industry? Let's go from there.</p><p><strong>Mark: </strong>Yeah, that's a really interesting story, actually. My journey into the martial arts industry started as a recovery piece. Flashback to 2005, I was graduating high school.</p><p>So, that makes me feel like I’m starting to get old now, everyone I’m teaching was born after that year. Flashback to that time, I graduated high school and got presented with a couple of opportunities.</p><p>One was from my parents. They said, “If you want to go further and study at university, you can do that,” because my dad worked as a Deputy Vice Chancellor at James Cook Uni. I grew up in Townsville, in Far North Queensland.</p><p>And they said, “If you want to go to university here, go for it. Stay at home, it’s free, all good.”</p><p>And they said, but if you want to go away, pay for it yourself. And that was the deal. My brother had the same deal.</p><p>He was a couple of years older than me. And he got himself a full scholarship to Melbourne uni. And he was like, Townsville was too hot.</p><p>I did the exact same thing, except I went to UNSW. So I've got a scholarship to study medicine at UNSW and went down there, started that journey and ended up getting really sick towards the end of my first year with glandular fever. </p><p>And there was a whole piece of trying to identify what was going on there, because I was really sick for quite a long time. I ended up with chronic fatigue syndrome, which I still have now, 19 years on.</p><p>And I still battle that every single day. My sort of path into martial arts started about a year after I got really sick with that. I ended up bed-bound for one to two years.</p><p>Part of my recovery, actually, I should backtrack a little bit. I was doing high-level athletics at a national level at that time as well. I used to play A-grade tennis and represented Queensland in different sports when I was in high school.</p><p>I was always an athletic person. And then, for someone to go from that to completely bed-bound, it was a big change and a big struggle. So part of my recovery...
March 4, 2025
<p>Following up on Episode 155, Hakan Manav shares martial arts staff development strategies to build a high-performing team - giving you the freedom to scale and grow.</p><p>IN THIS EPISODE:</p><p>• How to transition from solo instructor to building a scalable team</p><p>• The first hire that can make or break your martial arts school's growth</p><p>• Why letting go is essential for business expansion and instructor success</p><p>• A proven framework for training and promoting instructors from within</p><p>• How to turn parents and adult students into valuable team members</p><p class="ql-align-justify">• And more </p><p><strong>INVITATION:</strong> If you’d like more info about working with me in and Hakan in Partners Mentor, Just message me ‘Mentor’ on Facebook and I’ll send the details over in a doc (no sales call required)<strong> </strong><a href="https://urlgeni.us/facebook/georgeprofile" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><strong>Send Message On Personal Profile ></strong></a></p><p><strong>TRANSCRIPTION</strong></p><p class="ql-align-justify"><strong>George: </strong>Hey there, it's George Fourie. Welcome to another Martial Arts Media™ Business Podcast. So, this week I've got Hakan back on the call. Good day Hakan.</p><p class="ql-align-justify"><strong>Hakan:</strong> Hey George.</p><p class="ql-align-justify"><strong>George: </strong>In the previous episode 155 and you can check that out if you haven't, martialartsmedia.com/155. We spoke about the four obstacles that Hakan and his family overcame over the last 43 years to build their 1800 student strong academy.</p><p class="ql-align-justify">And so this week we thought we would dive deeper into these obstacles. Thanks for jumping on again, Hakan.</p><p class="ql-align-justify"><strong>Hakan: </strong>Pleasure to be here. Thank you</p><p class="ql-align-justify"><strong>George:</strong> We spoke a little bit about the product. We spoke about staff development, personal leadership. Let's loop into staff development for this call. Let's just dive a bit deeper and look at the things to watch out for. </p><p class="ql-align-justify">Why should we even be doing it? Which direction to take when scaling your school? </p><p class="ql-align-justify"><strong>Hakan: </strong>Absolutely. Once the product is nailed and you've got a great thing people are coming back for in terms of the actual martial art that you're teaching. The next step we want to think about is how we can deliver this at scale. For a number of reasons? </p><p class="ql-align-justify">First of all, we love what we do. But there are days that we might feel ill or we might want to go on holiday, or we're going to be away for various reasons. So you need the classes to be running at the same acceptable standard.</p><p class="ql-align-justify">So we've got those obvious reasons, but I want to touch on a personal experience that we went through as an academy. I'm going to say about 25 years ago now.</p><p class="ql-align-justify"><br></p>
February 24, 2025
<p>Hakan Manav reveals how they solved 4 growth obstacles martial arts school owners face and built a thriving, full‑time operation with 4 locations, a 30 staff, and 1,800 students.</p><p>IN THIS EPISODE:</p><p>• Explore the hidden product tweak that keeps students smiling and sparks unstoppable growth</p><p>• Uncover a fresh staff-training approach that secretly sculpts high-performing instructors</p><p>• Follow a surprising systems shortcut that quietly streamlines every corner of the academy</p><p>• Experience the leadership shift that frees you from day-to-day tasks and ignites team synergy</p><p>• A glimpse into the Manav’s families path to a 1,800-student academy by overcoming 4 key obstacles</p><p>• And more </p><p>FREE: Swipe the exact plan I use to fill martial arts schools with 200+ students within 7 months (And make sure your students are an incredible fit > Learn More</p><p>TRANSCRIPTION</p><p>GEORGE: Hey there, it's George Fourie. Welcome to another Martial Arts Media™ Business Podcast episode. Today I've got a guest with me and I was just looking through, I actually googled it, when the last time he was on the podcast and it goes back to episode 14, November the 1st, 2016.Nine years ago. Cool, welcome back Hakan. </p><p>HAKAN: Thank you George, happy to be here.</p><p>GEORGE: Awesome. So I'm trying to think when we had that podcast, I was probably, I saw you do a demonstration at Weimar and that's probably a couple of years before that. And you already had your DVDs. I think we still got your DVD box of your program. </p><p>HAKAN: We're telling our age, aren't we? </p><p>GEORGE: And I guess it's funny how like our journey together, work together. I also looked into Stripe and you've also the longest standing client that I've worked with in regards to marketing and Facebook ads.</p><p>And just the other day we got talking about helping more school owners and we decided to do a joint venture together in what we call Partners Mentor. And we'll probably talk a little bit about that, but there's a few things that we want to discuss in the industry, particularly where people are getting stuck, things that we are seeing. </p><p>There's a lot of our conversations on messenger back and forth and planning and doing some marketing and me getting feedback from what you're seeing on the mats, hands-on, me looking at what am I seeing around the industry, what's coming from different school owners around the globe, what people are facing.</p><p>And I think a good thing for us to be in this episode, one of a few, would be to, yeah, just have a bird's eye overview of looking where things are at in the industry, what are you seeing, where people are getting stuck, what's coming up and so forth. But before we get into that for those listening and they haven't met you, just give us a bit of a roundup. </p>
Allie Alberigo & Duane Brumitt
Matthew Brenner
Chris Jones
Way of the Fist
Adam Kifer
whistlekick Martial Arts Radio
Alexander Richter
Alex Hormozi
Gary Vaynerchuk
Dr. Jordan B. Peterson
Joe Rogan
Joe Polish of Genius Network and Dan Sullivan of Strategic Coach
Nick James
Pod Engine is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or officially connected with any of the podcasts displayed on this platform. We operate independently as a podcast discovery and analytics service.
All podcast artwork, thumbnails, and content displayed on this page are the property of their respective owners and are protected by applicable copyright laws. This includes, but is not limited to, podcast cover art, episode artwork, show descriptions, episode titles, transcripts, audio snippets, and any other content originating from the podcast creators or their licensors.
We display this content under fair use principles and/or implied license for the purpose of podcast discovery, information, and commentary. We make no claim of ownership over any podcast content, artwork, or related materials shown on this platform. All trademarks, service marks, and trade names are the property of their respective owners.
While we strive to ensure all content usage is properly authorized, if you are a rights holder and believe your content is being used inappropriately or without proper authorization, please contact us immediately at [email protected] for prompt review and appropriate action, which may include content removal or proper attribution.
By accessing and using this platform, you acknowledge and agree to respect all applicable copyright laws and intellectual property rights of content owners. Any unauthorized reproduction, distribution, or commercial use of the content displayed on this platform is strictly prohibited.