You can find horseback riding almost anywhere that’s not an inner-city. And it’s easy to walk away from yet another similar option for a common service or product.
Say you’re a non-horsey parent.
“I want riding lessons!” Your kid tells you. So you look online for riding lessons and horse stables in your area. Twenty places show up. How do you pick a place for your kid to socialize and mount a 1500 pound animal?
Maybe it’s best to forego the lessons. Maybe your kid will ride out the horse-crazy phase in their imagination.
Perhaps they’ll hold it against you all their lives.
This is a good example of the true value of marketing, which is to remove uncertainty–fear–from prospective customers and create something positive.
You, a caring parent, have to be fearful. There shouldn’t be so little information readily available that you don’t know where to start.
Thankfully, riding instructors and stable owners hold the reins to correcting this problem.
Unique Selling Proposition for Horseback Riding Lessons
Now, you as a business owner, what makes your horseback riding services unique from your competition? What can you promise to your clients that’s worth their investment?
That’s your unique selling proposition or position, or USP.
Does a parent of a horse-crazy child need to research as much as a Ph.D. student to narrow their search? Sure, a few might make the effort to thoroughly check all their options, but most won’t.
Many will take their chances at the closest facility. The riding instructor might have a temper, and the undisciplined horses may be too much for a child. That bad experience might put them off horses entirely. Fear wins.
Yet, you can solve this problem. You’re unique. You have values and skills that will benefit the right people.
Let’s say you focus most on a positive bond between horse and rider. What do clients get out of this? Safety. Parents love safety. You also offer character development–kids learn patience, respect, and empathy. Positive experiences support happiness, and a happy kid takes some stress from Mom and Dad.
Essentially, you’re not selling riding lessons. You’re selling an avenue for productive life experiences. Call them dreams, if you like.
Using Facts Versus Emotions
These kinds of benefits strike people deep. They have emotional value. Facts are wonderful, but you have to grab and hold people’s attention with their emotions. Once you have the emotional motivation, then facts begin to have a flare. Alone, or even first, facts can be confusing for someone new to your industry, or lack importance. If you and your potential clientele align your values, facts come to life and are worth learning. They have context. Facts need subjective value to sink in.
Sell with values. Support with facts. Or in marketing terms, sell with benefits and support with features.
Some Household, Somewhere…
“I want riding lessons.” A child tells their parents.
After looking up riding lessons in their area, the parent studies a Google map with twenty markers. How will they know which one is best for their quiet, sensitive child? What about the other child, whose exuberance often lands them in trouble?
Say there’s one thing the parents refuse: to drive more than 45 minutes away…
Whew! A map zoomed in on eight stables helped so much…yet only so much.
Let’s say the kids just know they want to ride, so they haven’t educated their parents on Western versus English riding, what dressage is, and the parents certainly need to warm up to the whole “horse thing” before they can allow jumping.
So…how do they narrow it down? Does the jumping place do just jumping, or they include the basics? Is Western safe?
The thing is, many horse barns simply don’t market well. Parents either say no and hope the kid’s interests move on, or call every place and pick one based on their impression on the phone.
If they’re lucky, a friend has a horse-crazy kid or ride themselves. However, their recommendation may or may not be appropriate for one of the kid’s personalities. Not enough safety precautions and the energetic child may unnecessarily get hurt. Too much tartness and the sensitive child will wilt.
Ultimately, do you see the opportunity for marketing on a local level? Call it communication–that’s all it needs to be. Don’t be shy about who you are and what benefits your services offer. Your ideal client just needs help finding you, their ideal horseback riding instructor, and stable.