Solving Your Studio: How Studio Owners Can Finally Take A Break

You pour so much of yourself into your studio all year long—but what about you? As the holidays approach, it’s time to talk about the one thing every studio owner needs (but rarely feels they can have): a real break.

In this episode, Chantelle and Michelle share heartfelt insights and practical tips to help you step away from your studio without everything falling apart. From setting boundaries to streamlining your operations and preparing for enrolment season, this conversation is packed with strategies that give you the freedom to recharge while keeping your studio running like clockwork.

Hear from fellow studio owners as they share their real-life challenges and wins, and take away actionable advice to help you enjoy the holiday season without sacrificing your studio’s success.

It’s not just about surviving—it’s about thriving, even when you’re off the clock.

What You’ll Learn:

• How to prepare your studio for a smooth enrolment process while you’re away.
• The power of boundaries and how to set them effectively (without guilt!).
• Real-life stories from studio owners about finding balance during busy seasons.
• Practical tips to make taking time off feel doable—and enjoyable.

This is your permission slip to put yourself first, even as a studio owner. 🎁

Got a studio niggle right now? Leave us a voicemail, and we can help Solve Your Studio in one of our episodes. Chat to us here: https://www.speakpipe.com/LeaveEvolutionAVoicemail

Be sure to follow us for more content perfect for Studio Owners!

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YouTube: @thestudioevolution
Facebook: @TheStudioEvolution
Website: studioevolution.com/start

ALL our best!

Chapters

• 0:00 Intro
• 0:48 It's Beginning To Look A Lot Like Christmas
• 4:06 Tash is a lucky duck...
• 5:13 Balancing Business and Personal Life
• 10:40 Optimising Your Studio's Online Presence
• 17:39 Automating Lead Nurturing for Success
• 20:00 How Long Should A Shut Down Period Last?
• 25:08 Outro

Transcript

Michelle Hunter (00:48)

What's that? Christmas is coming?

I sing, I don't know why I always sing that.

are coming my gosh like every single like Christmas yeah that one every time it's like it's crunch time it's coming to the end of the year

Chantelle Bruinsma (00:55)

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas. That one?

In 12 days you turn 40.

Michelle Hunter (01:11)

Look I feel good. I feel a better this week

Chantelle Bruinsma (01:14)

About turning 40? yeah.

Michelle Hunter (01:16)

I'm not scared of getting old. I'm just tired. It's been a tiring.

Chantelle Bruinsma (01:23)

I love that quote. I think it's Hannah Gadsby. It's like, don't identify as anything, I just identify as tired.

Michelle Hunter (01:32)

I feel that in my bones. I feel that in my bones.

Chantelle Bruinsma (01:37)

a lot you've got three very young children and running a successful global company it's a lot it's a lot

Michelle Hunter (01:43)

It's a lot,

Chantelle Bruinsma (01:46)

what would feel like celebrating for you?

Michelle Hunter (01:49)

I can't even articulate it. can't even articulate it. Yeah, sleep the beach. Yeah. Yeah. And that would be good. But, you know, I think, and I also think because we did Bali this year, that felt like the celebration. So it's like, you know what mean? But I'm sure I'll get excited when it comes to the day.

Chantelle Bruinsma (01:54)

a nap that's where you're at i just like a nap 45 minutes

Michelle Hunter (02:11)

And then for your holidays you're heading to Hawaii.

Chantelle Bruinsma (02:14)

Hawaii, aloha, can't wait, our spiritual home.

Michelle Hunter (02:18)

Are you on...Main Island?

Chantelle Bruinsma (02:21)

We're going to the big island this time, the home of Pele, the volcano goddess. and the last time we were there, I was pregnant with Madeline actually, Trav and I were there and we're staying at the very same hotel, but it was funny cause we went on like the volcano tour and we kind of went up to the kind of crater. did the helicopter rides and on reflection, I'm thinking, what were we thinking? We went on a helicopter ride over a live volcano with a baby in our belly. Like, what was I doing? So I won't be doing that again. Won't be doing that again?

Michelle Hunter (02:23)

Mmm.

wow.

That's beautiful.

Okay. But you know, it's memory. It's a great memory and experience.

Chantelle Bruinsma (02:56)

Yeah and this is going to be very very special so Madeline's just learnt to snorkel and...

Michelle Hunter (03:00)

good, she can teach me.

Chantelle Bruinsma (03:05)

You can snorkel!

Michelle Hunter (03:06)

I think I was still swallowing at least a cup of water every minute as we were snorkeling. The shark went, yeah, those are awesome. Okay, great.

Chantelle Bruinsma (03:13)

We bought those the whole face snorkels. So great. So she put them on and like she's in the pool she's off and running and so the hotel we're staying at has this saltwater lagoon so it's kind of it's kind of like it's safe in the whole kind of in the grounds and there's turtles and tropical fish that she can in in the kind of every day she's just going to be snorkeling can't wait so we bought one Trav and I have got one to share and she's got one as well so yeah it's going to be

Michelle Hunter (03:21)

Ugh.

my gosh, amazing.

You're gonna be out there every day. Every day. That's what you're be.

Chantelle Bruinsma (03:41)

Very special in the Canadian family you're flying out so we're looking forward to it.

Michelle Hunter (03:43)

it's the best! How good are holidays?

Chantelle Bruinsma (03:47)

The best, the best. Well, speaking of that, we haven't even said hello. Hello, welcome to the Your Studio Podcast. We are Chantelle and Michelle here. We're so happy to be here. And we have a great voicemail from one of our listeners named Tash. Now Tash is a lucky duck. Here's why, have a listen.

Michelle Hunter (03:53)

Hi, should I tell Michelle here?

Chantelle Bruinsma (04:43)

to be gallivanting across Europe, Tash.

Michelle Hunter (04:47)

European holiday. What's it called? European escapade. That was the one that we went on...

Chantelle Bruinsma (04:54)

So Michelle, fun fact, so Michelle and I both did Contiki, which is this kind of like tour at the same age pretty much. We didn't go on the same tour together, but we were were gallivanting across the Europe at the same time, but just running different lives. And so Tash, we are sending you all the fun.

Michelle Hunter (05:04)

Yep, running different lives. We cannot wait. We cannot wait to hear the stories.

Chantelle Bruinsma (05:13)

But it's unfortunate because it's like you get, particularly over the summer for everyone, we're about to step into summer here. Actually we're thoroughly in summer right now. And even for the Northern Hemisphere members, like it's unfortunate that the time when we do have spaciousness to be able to relax, that's when you need to be fully available and plugged into the business to get the growth and the enrollments happening right. And so you can't ever quite turn off. So the topic of this episode is how to actually have a break as a studio owner.

Michelle Hunter (05:14)

Yeah, it's.

Summer, yeah.

Yep.

Yeah. Yeah. And look, we, are very big on boundaries and, you know, and communication of when time is off and, you know, respectfully, you know, it's recital time, hopefully a lot, you know, recitals are finished and you need to have that downtime. And there's very, you know, important holidays and family time when we're totally off for the Christmas and New Year period. But Chantelle, you know, my philosophy on this.

Chantelle Bruinsma (05:42)

is the kind of tagline.

I do know your philosophy on this. so like Michelle, lay it straight for us, like what you believe when it comes to taking time off.

Michelle Hunter (06:14)

And not a, yeah. When it is the peak enrolment or intake season for your business, that is the time to lean in. I'm a big believer that there is a window where you can really transform the results of your studio and your business. And that's a really big time to lean in. And even for us, when we work around those kinds of periods of our business, it's not like.

Everyone has to be on. No, no, no, I'm not saying that. And, but there needs to be some form of cover or monitoring through that period. So when leads come in, they're not dead. They're not lost because you, you know, this is a two-fold conversation and we're to go into it. You can really have the automation set up. That's going to allow your system to thrive. But when it is an in peak enrolment period, there is a level of conversational sales and a personal, personal touch that's going to bring, you know, a lot of those leads over the line.

Chantelle Bruinsma (07:10)

And we're not saying you have to do it.

Michelle Hunter (07:12)

Yeah, no, not at all, not at all.

Chantelle Bruinsma (07:14)

This is that old question of like who not how, right Michelle? It's like, how do I kind of set this up to be kind of covered? It's like, well, or who could support you in ensuring this is done while you're gallivanting?

Michelle Hunter (07:16)

I

Yeah, while you're gallivanting around. And this, this can be twofold. And Chantelle maybe you can take us through, you know, some of the systems to make sure you can set up a lot to ensure that you're not doing it all in this peak enrolment period. Is that right?

Chantelle Bruinsma (07:35)

Yeah. mean, again, like if we step back and like, what's the larger thing that we could set up that would actually resolve a lot of this situation. So in The Leap, which is our six week online course, one of the major things that I teach and walk through the entire strategy of is how can we design the studio business to have less inquiries across the board and just more direct enrolment? I believe philosophically in building out

your studio systems and marketing that lead people direct direct to enrolment. Now, if we're going to do that, we have to be really successful at a few things. We have to understand the psychology of sales. We have to understand that when they come from Google or from an ad to your website, they've got questions in their mind. They've got hesitations. They've got things that they want. They've got things that they definitely do not want. And we have to kind of walk through on the website and address them.

if you want people to be able to make a decision straight away. So the whole thing that we want to set up is, is your website set up so that the navigation is so clean? They go to your homepage, they then navigate to the right program that's perfect for them based on age group or level of beginner, excuse me, status, and then they navigate to that kind of what I would call a program page, and that program page,

beautifully educates them on like this is perfect for you if and what you'll love about this is and this program is here to give this to you and for you to experience this and to gain this and you'll notice within X amount of weeks that you're going to see this happening in your life and what you'll love about what you're going to see this A, B, D, E, F, G and there's case studies and there's testimonials and there's guarantees and there's assurances so we actually build out the program page with the details that they need to make a decision.

If you don't have that, people are gonna email you. People are gonna come on your website, they'll bounce off. So it's about making the program pages on your studio. And again, like this is, teach this explicitly with the exact formula in the late, jump on in and take the leap if you can. But that's what we need first and foremost, right? We need it so that we are across the board driving more direct to enrolment that doesn't need as much human touch. We're never gonna fully eradicate inquiries.

And that's not wrong. People might have specific questions about their needs, but what we can do is for them bulk drive that. And can I tell you why this gets really exciting? When you get a website that actually really is dialed in that kind of converts, like someone arrives and walks them through the emotional, like, yes, it's got that tick that box, tick that box, good to go, enrol paid, done. It's then really easy to turn on ads because you know, you can just send more people to that page and it works. And this is when we just turn on the taps of marketing.

and your studio grows. But unless we have that page really optimized, it's hard to get that traction happening. So what we're looking for here is a really strong approach to your website first and foremost. So you can work on that Tash before you go gallivanting.

Michelle Hunter (10:40)

And Chantelle, when Tash talks about, you know, how can I get my funnels prepared? If she's talking about like, you know, a specific peak intake, is it like building that website? So, you know, she's just focusing on the one program that she wants to push, it's just like, when you land on that page, it's like where you are at, it is very easy to decipher the road that you go down.

Chantelle Bruinsma (11:00)

Yeah, that's exactly it. I would kind of encouraging all of you. So what I mean by a program page is like, you know, let's say you've got a beginner dance program, like a kind of preschool dance program. Let's say you've got a beginner reformer, kind of, you know, entry level kind of introduction to yoga, you know, starting piano. We have a dedicated page on the website that really walks them through everything from the headline. And we build that out very, very, I mean, like

Some studios don't even have pages like that that speak specifically to that program. You want to be building a dedicated program page for each significant program you have in your business. And that's going to allow us to build funnels as kind of Tash was saying, like we can have a dedicated ad that speaks directly to the heart of that preschool parent of a four year old who's looking for their first dance class. We can do an ad that speaks right to the heart and crux of what they're looking for. Send them to a very, very particular page that guides them through the process and bam.

they can enrol and ding, you can get the notification whilst you're on a canal in Amsterdam. Like that's my goal, that's my goal for you.

Michelle Hunter (12:03)

And as we said, it's not going to eradicate all inquiries, but if you are running an ad or a big promo and that was not dialed out on the enrolment page, you're going to get a hell of a lot. And that's a lot of admin and you know, manual time. So in Tash's instance where, you know, they're leading direct to enrolment and, know, and we only hope that, you know, it's going to be a flurry that come through for Tash and her studio. But when you do have a couple of that come in, what is your philosophy on her?

who is there? So say if you don't have a big team and you you got a couple of months notice now, maybe you got like four to six week lead time. Who do we want in? Because it might not be a lot of time per week, is it Chantelle? It might be just like scooping up those extra leads that might have those final questions that were, you know, that are very personalised. Who's that right fit?

Chantelle Bruinsma (12:35)

Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

No!

I mean, it's probably like less than like five hours per week. Honestly, it's probably less than five hours per week. So we're wanting to have, you could ask a teacher to step in. If like normally you're the one holding the phone, you can go do down the road of hiring a lead nurturer. This is a project we really encourage our clients to have because it is game changing for the trajectory of growth. One of our clients right now, he's about to, they've gone from like $200,000 a year to a million dollars in revenue in about six years. it's been through.

having a lead nurturer dedicated on like chasing and kind of connecting with every single lead, it is radical. You can actually find someone, maybe it's a parent who knows a lot about the program and you just pay them for this kind of hourly rate. We estimate it's going to be about five hours per week and that might be like they'll get text messages and they'll kind of just connect back. They might give them a call. They might have access to the inbox for that period of time. But here's the thing that we see happen quite a lot, right? It's that you bring someone in to

do this and they actually do a good job. They do a really good job. And you're always like, I've been holding onto that for very long time and not being able to kind of let that go. And actually someone can do it pretty successfully. And that gives you permission to actually bring someone else in to manage that entire part of the business. And I do want to say that, honestly, the mental load of being constantly chasing and being aware of every inquiry as they come in is one of the most draining cognitive

Michelle Hunter (14:00)

Yeah.

Chantelle Bruinsma (14:16)

bits of being a studio owner, right? You're just like always like, shit, I haven't got back to that person. I've got to respond back. It's exhausting. And when you don't have that kind of cortisol dosing you every single day, it gives you a huge amount more spaciousness. So that's one of the things that we really recommend that you look at is getting someone to help with lead nurturing in the months to come.

Michelle Hunter (14:17)

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yep. And this is a great time to try it. You know, if you don't have a team or you want to actually take a proper break or you're going away like Tash, this is the time to try and plug them into the business and see how they go. And if you really have built out your website, you know, with that specific intention of enrolling them, that lead nurturer, you know, doesn't have to do all the admin. They're directing them. They're just answering their questions, you know, assuring them and leading them back to that enrolment link.

Chantelle Bruinsma (15:03)

You know what I would probably also do? I would rely on video a bit on this. So on the web page, the program page, actually doing like a beautiful kind of program tour, like a walkthrough of like, here's what you can expect. Here's what you're going to receive. Here's what it's like inside the studio, answering all the questions and just literally reading through and talking through the web, the program page you have. You can also email that out. So one thing that is really beneficial, and I don't know if you can have time to kind of bring this together, having an automated email sequence,

Michelle Hunter (15:07)

Yeah.

a

Chantelle Bruinsma (15:33)

which is what we call a nurture sequence. So someone's gone to your website, they've popped you a note, hi, it's Chantelle here, I'm looking for a class for my daughter, but she is, I've just got this sort of kind of question if you're right for me. The thing to know about that is that they, at that point, they're not necessarily, it's not a good detail thing usually. Often it's like, do I belong here? Do I feel safe? And are these my people, right? They're reaching out.

Michelle Hunter (15:57)

So true.

Chantelle Bruinsma (15:59)

to see if they belong and if they feel safe and if they connect with you as an organization before they can proceed. Which means to me that on the program page they haven't got enough of that. So we need to bring more emotion and more heart and more trust and more belonging essence into the program page. So that's a little aside. So they've reached out, they've emailed you and they've got this little question. Then we set up a direct response email series, right? And the first one's like, thank you so much for reaching out. Our team's gonna be back within X amount of days.

But in the meantime, could you tell me a little bit more about your child or yourself and what you're looking for as you're kind of starting yoga classes or starting art classes. And that gives you, buys a little bit of time for your team to respond. They get that response straight away. And then the next day they get an email with like, here's a video walking you through inside the studio. Two days after that, here's the five things to know about before your first class. And then two days after that, there's another email educating them on like here are the biggest questions people have when they enrol.

about whether this is the right studio for them. And literally you've just got this series of like, let's say seven emails that go out across the week or 10 days, that just keep educating them while it's still hot of mind. And what this does is like, you don't have to remember to reach out to them. These emails are just being drip fed. This has been radical. We have had studio owners enrol dozens and dozens and dozens of more students simply from implementing this one strategy and seeing such an amazing uptick in growth. So.

That is one thing to definitely consider is bringing in an automated nurture sequence. You can do this with a program like Active Campaign. There's a bunch of different email programs you can integrate very easy, cost effective too.

Michelle Hunter (17:39)

there's a lot. There's a lot. So Tash, you asked and we gave you the breadth of, know, from team, if you haven't got team, who to put in there and even to the automation. And look, I think the crux of that Chantelle is like the more you can do now, the more you can just like roll your sleeves up and get into it. And looking at that website, the page, and if you can, I call that level two, that nurture sequence.

Chantelle Bruinsma (18:06)

Yeah.

Michelle Hunter (18:06)

it is going to give you more peace of mind when you're galavanting around Europe.

Chantelle Bruinsma (18:10)

And look, here's my how I kind of see it. It's like buy your own holiday. Like if you want to go and have a break, then you kind of put the work in before and then you pay people to kind of maintain the deck while you're away so you can actually have a proper break. You need it. As a studio owner, you guys need it. You crave it. I'm taking seven weeks off this year, about probably 95, 98 % I'll be off. I'll be tapping in a little bit here and there in January.

Michelle Hunter (18:14)

Exactly.

Yeah.

Chantelle Bruinsma (18:36)

but seven weeks off. the last two weeks have been peak for me because I'm like getting so much done so I can have this space across the summer with my kids.

Michelle Hunter (18:40)

They've been tense. Hunched on.

And it's just, it's the reality, it's the truth. If you want that time to really, really take that break, Chantelle, that you deserve, it's like you gotta put in the work before you go.

Chantelle Bruinsma (18:57)

And get some people to help you, pay them. Pay them an hourly rate to maintain the inbox and maintain the phone lines while you're away. It's as simple as that. And be really clear, you know, I've got no problem with you kind of saying over, you know, between Christmas and New Year's, there's the complete office shutdown. We will return to your, you know, email after this date. But again, if you've really worked on the website to really do the emotional connection and give all the logistical practical details, there's a high likelihood they can just enrol straight away, right?

Michelle Hunter (18:59)

Yep, yep.

Shut.

Chantelle Bruinsma (19:25)

If we're designing this so people don't have to inquire, we're ahead of the game.

Michelle Hunter (19:30)

Completely.

Chantelle Bruinsma (19:31)

Mm-hmm.

Michelle Hunter (19:32)

yeah, I am. was thinking of, my goodness, that'd be such an amazing holiday.

Chantelle Bruinsma (19:32)

I'm jealous.

Enjoy, enjoy, enjoy. And for all of you, who haven't, you know, many studio owners who haven't taken a vacation, who haven't taken a break, and the perspective you get when you go and just like have some proper time out where you can actually think that the, how things just crystallise, it's really worthwhile giving yourself that. It's important. Just ask people to help. Buy your own break. Go do that.

Michelle Hunter (20:00)

So we've also got another voicemail that's sent through from a studio owner, Gina. And Gina has some more specific questions in regards to the holiday close down period.

Great question.

Chantelle Bruinsma (21:19)

Yeah, really, really great question. And I think it's interesting of what you're comfortable with. And, and this is the balancing between like what the business needs and what you want. Right. And like, you need to rest and the business still needs to be able to get these leads and inquiries connected with. And both can exist. This is an and how can I have proper kind of shut down time and also have that taken care of in the studio and you know, listening to you, Gina.

This is again the hesitancy I see in so many studio owners of like, but you know, I'm sure my team don't, I don't want for them to be emailing people over, you know, working a bit over Christmas, so I'll do it, right? And there's a little piece of me that would be curious of maybe they're not opposed to it or say like, this is what we need to do as a team, friends. Like we need to have like some sort of roster or rotational system here where.

you know, maybe you could do this week and I'll do this week, but that allows all of us to have some downtime over the business over the summer. It will be paid and that allows for the continuity of making sure that we're getting the new students ready for the beginning of the academic year. That's what I'm thinking, Michelle, right? I don't think it has to be all on your shoulders anymore.

Michelle Hunter (22:33)

No, no, not at all. of course, and as we said, there's shut down period, which I think is are non-negotiable before Christmas and just after the new year. But after those periods, I think it is fair for some kind of monitoring to be put in place. And it doesn't all have to be you. You you can swap that. And you do actually find that sometimes if people close the week before Christmas and that week of Christmas into new year, but from that new year, it is, know, school might be out, but

That's when it's time. It's go time. It's time for inquiries. It's time for enrolment. You know, there should be someone monitoring in some regard and it doesn't have to be you.

Chantelle Bruinsma (23:11)

And look to kind of equivalence for the Northern Hemisphere. So, you know, over the summer, you've got two to sometimes three months worth of leave. And it's again, like you deserve a need to have some downtime. It's okay to have like a proper close date. And if you did ask like, how much time do I need off and be really active instead of like having the boundaries around it. I want this time for myself and how can I invite someone to support in that and just get them trained up?

get them all kind of set and ready to go and enjoy that actual break. Too many studio owners don't get any time off and it's crap. You know, it's really crap. Unless you give it to yourself, it's not gonna happen. Ask the questions, friend. Is anyone able to help? This is what the business needs and you know, going forward, you might even include it in some of your contracts, right? You know, we have team members who are, you know, we go to a skeleton staff over that kind of close period, but we still have people working and it's...

Michelle Hunter (24:06)

Yeah, we still have people on.

Chantelle Bruinsma (24:08)

Yeah, it's just normal, right, Michelle?

Michelle Hunter (24:10)

Yep. And it is normal and it's, and it is the peak period of your business, you know, and it's just how the cookie crumbles and we've still got to run a business at the end of the day. You know, I heard, statement the other day and one of our key trainings like you're the bank doesn't pause your mortgage over the Christmas holidays. So we still have to run the business and we can ask the question and there will be team who are willing and they might be not, but you'll be able to land somewhere in the middle.

Chantelle Bruinsma (24:31)

Yeah.

Michelle Hunter (24:39)

and be able to take that break for yourself as well.

Chantelle Bruinsma (24:41)

Yeah, it's worth it friends, it's worth it.

Chantelle Bruinsma (24:44)

All right, beautiful ones. Thank you so much.

like to leave us a voicemail, we'd love to hear from you. Where are you gallivanting to? What's on your mind? What's on your brain? We can't wait to hear. Go to our little show notes. You'll find the link to Speakpipe and you can absolutely leave us a message and we'll get back to you on another episode of our pod. Thank you, beautiful ones. Thanks, Michelle.

Michelle Hunter (25:04)

Thank you Chantelle and everyone, have a great holiday. Bye.

Chantelle Bruinsma (25:06)

See ya, bye!