Getting started with tutoring is no easy task. Apart from the expected difficulties of lesson-planning and finding teaching materials, you’ll find that you also need to figure out a way to stand out from the crowd in what often feels like an ocean of qualified tutors. This is why it is so crucial to have a niche — specializing in one area can not only help you structure your lessons and make them more focused, but will also help your students find and identify you.

Narrowing it down

When choosing a niche, there are several things you’ll need to consider. Firstly and most importantly, what do you enjoy teaching? What topics do you love discussing and will be interesting for your students? A good way to think about this question is to consider what you spend a lot of your free time doing/ reading/ thinking about. For example, maybe you have experience working in the corporate world, or perhaps you like working with kids. Maybe you’re passionate about travel, or love talking about food preparation — whatever it is, you’ll find that there are people out there whose study goals are as unique (or as crazy) as your interests. It is your job to market yourself in a way that will help these people locate and reach out to you.

While covering a broad range of topics is not necessarily a poor tutoring strategy, in the long-run it would be helpful to focus on a more specific area — that way, you’ll be able to brand yourself as an expert in that specific area and retain more relevant customers. Of course, you can’t afford to be picky when you’re just starting out — you’ll have a variety of students with differing needs, and you’ll want to do your best to cater to each individual’s needs. Over time, you’ll know what you’re most passionate about teaching, and what sort of teaching style suits you best. This will make focusing on a narrower range of topics much easier, and you’ll find that students who appreciate this style will be the ones that stay with you longest.

Choose your teaching style

Think about what resources you want to use in your lessons. PPTs are great because they allow you to present your student with a clear, step-by-step lesson structure. Some tutors prefer using a word doc where they can type up examples and give feedback spontaneously during the lesson. Still others find that simply sharing materials and exercises with their students is sufficient. Whatever you choose, make sure you have an approach that fits well with your chosen niche. For instance, if your lessons are mostly travel focused, you might want to incorporate more oral exercises into the classroom so that your adventurous students get a good dose of speaking practice. On the other hand, if your chosen niche is test prep, having your students complete the required language proficiency test exercises will suffice. If most of your students tend to be younger, you may consider including more pictures and discussions in your lessons to retain their interest. Whatever you choose to do, make sure it makes sense and is logical.

Marketing yourself on the tutoring platform

Do you specialize in teaching Business English? TOEFL prep? Literature? Make sure you advertise this in your platform bio and introduction video. After all, having a niche is pointless if nobody knows about it! Creating a clear and concise video introduction will be instrumental to uniting with your ideal students. It also serves as an effective filter against the types of teaching experiences you might want to avoid (IELTS learners who insist on struggling through data analysis exercises – I’m talking to you).

Once you’ve chosen a niche and set up your profile and teaching description – you’re good to go. The best part? No matter what you choose to specialize in, you’ll never run out of teaching materials, thanks to PrepYourLesson’s materials database. Browse now to find the resources you need to get started.