We recently connected with Ashley Ram Gosnell, MEd and have shared our conversation below.
Ashley, appreciate you joining us today. Talk to us about building a team – did you hire quickly, how’d you recruit the first few team members? Any interesting lessons?
As my business grew from 1 to include others, I had to recruit, interview, and hire all on my own. This was before Indeed. Now I utilize Indeed for the majority of all my hires. Prior to Indeed, I recruited by reaching out to various colleges to find tutors for my tutoring business. I learned a lot using this type of recruiting system, and eventually my company evolved to exclude undergraduate students entirely.
During the second interview, I have the interviewee show me their tutoring skills more than tell me about them. Since I have a lot of applicants through Indeed, I only look closely at those with great experience, skillset, and background!
The most impactful lesson I have learned in the almost 12 years of hiring, you have to be willing to wait for the right hires. I wish I had learned this years before I had a big problem, but I AM glad I learned it! With my company, I offer room for growth in different areas of business assistance I need; management, administrative, and payroll. I knew this individual was not a good fit for the role she was fulfilling. But I needed the help desperately. I learned through a few situations that my initial gut was right, and this person was actually losing us business. So by placing a body in need rather than the RIGHT body, Not only did I lose money immediately, but my company also regressed during that time instead of continue to grow.
This is why I make sure to tell other business owners: truly listen to your gut and don’t just fill a need with a body!
Ashley, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?
How Tutor Revolution® started and how we got to where we are today.
After Ashley graduated from SMU in 2010 with her undergraduate degree, she looked for opportunities in education where she could work with students on an individual basis. At the same time, she started looking at various tutoring companies and was unhappy with the status quo. She was shocked at the low compensation, and that leadership had no background in education. She knew she loved education, and her passion was truly helping students however she could. She decided to keep tutoring on her own, since she has always had an entrepreneurial spirit.
A short time later, many families were asking her for help in subjects she does not specialize in, or asking her if she knew anyone that did. Since she was heavily invested in those children’s success, she knew she would be the best person to screen and coordinate potential new tutors for these families.
Fast-forward 10 years, Tutor Revolution now contracts anywhere from 10-15 tutors at any given time, we are an online nationwide tutoring company, and we have helped hundreds of students and families achieve academic success. Individually, Ashley returned to school and obtained her Master’s in Education in 2018.
About Tutor Revolution Tutors
While not all of our tutors are degreed or certified educators, all have a passion for helping others, enjoy mentoring, and are content masters. Ashley’s background is in Special Education, so she is always keeping an eye out for any issues that the student/family may not be aware of. The diverse group of tutors enables us to have specialties that broadly cover all subjects from K-12th & college. We are most utilized and known for our expertise in math, science, and ACT/SAT prep.
What sets us apart from other providers is that Tutor Revolution thrives on collaboration, and we constantly communicate with our tutors. Furthermore, we do not look for tutors after we have been contacted; we only place students with tutors we have already recruited and that have undergone at least two practice sessions, in addition to other hiring procedures. We keep the tutors’ pictures and biographies online so parents know more about the person coming to their home. Since tutoring has to be a good fit, we only hire engaging individuals.
The most important measure of success is our students’ achievements. Student success varies greatly. We feel very successful when we hear we have closed a gap of knowledge, a student has shown growth or a spark of interest, or is making better grades. We love motivating our students and modeling how to be a successful learner! Our aim is to show a student that learning, or a content area, can be enjoyable… perhaps even fun!
Social Entrepreneur
Each year Tutor Revolution sponsors an educator grant and awards two high school student scholarships in Ashley’s hometown and former hometown. Additionally, Ashley mentors weekly at an at-risk high school and provides free tutoring (for children, teens, and adults) to two non-profits in the Dallas-Fort Worth area.
How did you build your audience on social media?
I fought having all the social media for a while and quickly learned that was dumb! I quickly got my business on twitter, facebook, Instagram, yelp, google reviews, and now tik tok. Growing a social media audience is tough and takes a lot of time, work, and energy. Take an in-person class, watch youtubes, or read online the tips to hashtag/trends usage. I still do not have the following I would like, but I try to post something on most of the platforms daily.
At first, my perfectionism was really holding me back from posting as much as I need to. The things I obsessed over, no one cared about. And the things I didn’t think would be popular, are sometimes the more viewed/liked.
As an educator, I am under even more scrutiny than most. Even though the majority of my tutoring is in math, people will call me out on mistakes over harder grammar rules no one else would notice. But I remember that it is the PERFECT opportunity to show my students/nonstudents/adults that it is OKAY to make mistakes. We simply cannot be perfect, and we could always miss something!
Quick Tips:
— use a product like canva and pay for the upgraded features
— the facebook “mom” and “neighborhood” groups rule the world!! Get in those groups and have your clients respond to “asks” and tag you!!
— focus on getting google reviews– don’t worry about yelp– those reviews get hidden unnecessarily
How about pivoting – can you share the story of a time you’ve had to pivot?
I am thankful to COVID for a few things. Personally like many of us, it taught me that I really needed to evaluate my work-life balance.
Professionally, my business model changed drastically forever!! We were online before COVID, but we still offered in-person sessions in some cities across DFW. I was still offering in-person myself.
In March of 2020, I was ready to give up the business. As a business owner, you will go through “ups and downs, ” including wanting to quit. I was burnt out. I had just returned from my sister’s bachelorette party, and I was ready to plan a transition.
The shutdowns forced us all online. Then, almost suddenly, we had an influx of students from across the country. This sparked the thought that I should hire tutors from across the country!
And so the new generation of Tutor Revolution had arrived! Now we only offer online tutoring, and only from highly-qualified educators! And personally, I am MUCH happier with my work-life balance, and I am able to give back more time to my family, friends, and my community!!
Contact Info:
- Website: www.getmyAnow.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/tutorrevolution
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TutorRevolution/
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tutorrevolution/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/tutorrevolution
- Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/tutor-revolution-dallas-2
- Other: https://www.tiktok.com/@tutorrevolution