How To Use Martial Arts As A Marketing Tactic

Marketing is the key factor that determines if you make $100 or $100,000 in your business.

When I published my first book back in 2021, I didn’t have a drawn out marketing strategy that I was going to implement in order to make sales.

To be completely honest, I didn’t even know how I was going to sell it. I just knew I had ideas I wanted to share and I needed to find a way to communicate those ideas with people in a way they would resonate with.

I started off like any normal person would, I shared my books with the people I already knew.

I had already built a network of like minded people.

At the time, my martial arts journey took me down a path of self discovery. On that journey, I met people who were into community activism, entrepreneurship, fitness, and obviously martial arts.

It was through this network I was able to make my first 50 sales of my book which truthfully took me by surprise. I was already used to selling personal training but to be paid for my own thoughts and opinions was a new experience for me.

It was also through this network that I met a brother who hosted martial arts tournaments in the Atlanta area.

I saw this as a perfect opportunity to not only compete but to also display my own martial prowess to others.

People are more drawn to you the more you can authentically express yourself.

Bruce Lee has always said it best, “To me, ultimately, martial arts means honestly expressing yourself.”

I took this philosophy into the tournament with me because knowing this was my first time competing in 4 years and knowing I just published my first book, I wanted to make sure I put on a display that represented me and the thought I put into my martial arts training.

With all this in mind, before the tournament began, I first performed a martial arts demonstration.

In this demonstration, I remember my main goal was to display the fluidity & gracefulness of martial arts not in a combative sense but as an art.

By doing this, I was able to capture the attention of the audience first before the fighting had happened.

This was my first sign of how I could use martial arts as a marketing tactic.

Leading towards my actual fight, the show my opponent and I put on left the crowd in awe. To this day, people still tell me how that fight was a movie, and even though it ended in my loss, I won so much more than just a match.

There is still victory in defeat; You must find it by shifting perspective.

After that fight, they hosted another tournament 2 months later which I participated in again but this time as a vendor & not a competitor.

What I was not aware of was that my last bout spark interest in so many people so much that most people came back to the tournament just to watch me fight again.

After they realized I wasn’t competing, their attention shifted toward the books I was selling at my table.

Instantly this sparked conversation and led me to do what I do best, talking!

I’ve always had this gift to be able to tie almost anything about life into martial arts and once I start talking, it becomes very hard to stop.

Yet this actually worked in my favor.

• I already had my potential customers warmed up with my demonstration of martial arts alone.

• I gained more favor from the crowd after actually competing

• Now sharing my knowledge & communicating martial arts to other people was the glue to piecing it together!

After this day, making sales became child’s play.

Sometimes your best skill set can also become your best asset.

The tournament gave me a lot of “pull” or leverage to venture into other endeavors.

I had other fighters reach out to me for coaching, fight IQ lessons, being their corner man, and even public speaking opportunities.

Mind you during this time it was 2021-2022 and I still have yet to understand what marketing really is. I wasn’t running ads on Facebook or Google and I even wasn’t super consistent with posting content.

Looking back, it was the combination of a few things that allowed me to scale the way I did which was:

1. displaying my skills in martial arts

2. sharing my knowledge of martial arts with others

3. and other people sharing my skills and knowledge with their friends

Believe it or not, each tournament or pop-up shop I went to after those tournaments, I had a new person approach me that said they had either seen me fight before, saw it on someone else’s Instagram page, or someone told them about my book.

As they say, word of mouth is the best form of marketing too!

If you have the ability to attract others with your skill sets, do it!

They say the flashy techniques don’t work in a fight. Well, it just depends on the kind of fight you're talking about.

All of my flashy techniques work very well in the fight for the sale of a product. So if me doing a tornado kick in a parking lot or if me sparring with my friend in a busy park will draw attention to a crowd, then that’s what I’m going to do.

Business, marketing, and fighting, they're all the same. You can’t be so linear with how you engage your opponent or customer.

Sometimes the best course of action is to go against the grain, get creative, and use the methods that comes naturally and work best for you!

See you next week!

~
RastaRiek | The Martial-Preneur

About the Author: 

RastaRiek, also known as The Martial-Preneur, is a dedicated martial artist and entrepreneur committed to helping fellow martial artists achieve success both on and off the mat. Through his newsletter and coaching services, RastaRiek empowers martial artists to turn their passion for martial arts into a thriving business, following in the footsteps of legends like Bruce Lee.

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