Why the most of music students quit

Did you know that 80% of music students probably drop out of education in the long term, or even stop making music and leave the whole music scene?

At first, it sounds shocking, but after 10 years in the education business, after doing a few thousand lessons and courses, and working with fellow educators and schools, all of them have stated the same. The 80% dropout rate is real—not in the short term, of course, but in the long run for sure.

Today I’m going to cover this really important topic and provide some background explanations and even solutions, because at first you don’t even realize that it might hurt your educational business.

Hi, I’m Daniel. I’ve been working in the music industry for 25 years now.   📍 📍 📍 For the past decade. I focus on education, teaching, publishing, music books, creating online courses, and producing educational content about music and industry around it. Over those 10 years, I built my own company from scratch into a six figure business with revenue coming. Entirely from education, just teaching courses and knowledge products. Through the process, I realized something important. Many talented teachers, musicians, small music school, struggle with the same challenge. They're great at what they do, but the business side of the teaching often stays chaotic.

Okay, first of all, let’s face the harsh reality. Most students in the music education ecosystem, whether it’s private or public education, won’t make it as professional musicians. By professional, I mean someone who makes a living entirely from music, with no side hustle. Some of them have no motivation to go pro, some of them already have a career or school, so for them, most of the time, music learning and making is a hobby, and it will stay that way.

In my experience, professionals rarely take courses or lessons because they believe they already know everything, and no one should advise them or tell them what they should or shouldn’t do. It comes from ego or tunnel vision. The main point is that because of this mindset, they won’t be the typical customer in music education. So the main focus—around 95%—will be beginners or semi-pros.

The problem with beginners—and this is where our topic starts to escalate—is that because of social media (which always promises quick results and makes everything seem easy), they only see the bright side of music and music-making. So they believe it’s really simple, because people say that anyone can make music these days. Because of these false assumptions, beginners are often the biggest impulse buyers. They think it will be quick and easy. The technical side is getting easier day by day, especially with AI, and from their feed it looks like every new artist is breaking through out of nowhere. If those people can make it, they believe they can too.

But as time passes in the learning curve, they don’t get quick results as they expected when they signed up for the course, and they eventually give up because of a lack of micro-successes.

So the first reason is false expectations and the lack of micro-successes during the learning process.

The second reason is more obvious. I’ve mainly experienced it with adults. Six out of ten times they drop out not because they are discouraged or lose interest, but because of random life events. For example, they overestimate their free time for learning, and life makes their schedule busier. They can’t keep up, and they cancel non-priority tasks. Or their working hours change because they lose a job. Some of my students joined during a period when they were between jobs and had a lot of spare time. Or private life events, such as wedding planning or the birth of a baby. So the reason is life. And because for them it’s a hobby—like playing tennis or going to the gym—they can easily skip or pause it for a while.

So how does this hurt your educational business?

First, I think you’ve already experienced it. As I mentioned in my previous video, if you’re using an hourly, pay-as-you-go model, you basically lose money every time someone disappears. They might come back after a while, but they might also be gone forever. So your predicted outcome from a course is always at risk. Without long-term planning, you can’t scale a business.

The second problem comes from the first. If you have a high quit rate, you have to replace those slots with new students, so you constantly have to market yourself to gain new customers, which is more expensive than keeping existing ones. It takes more effort, money, and time. It leads to endless instability.

The third problem comes from the mental side. Every student who leaves can start to feel like a personal failure, and it can destroy the teacher’s self-esteem, which slowly leads to burnout. Or every dropout can create a moment of panic.

If I’m really honest, it’s partly the teacher’s responsibility, but on the other hand, it’s also beyond our control.

Okay, now we know the causes and the effects, so let’s see what we can do about it.

First, get rid of the hourly model and restructure the whole business model and the strategy behind it. There are several ways to do this, but it requires rebuilding the system from the ground up. I’ll make more content about this if you’re interested.

Second, if you can’t escape the hourly model, there are some solutions that may decrease the chance of dropouts:

– Clear student journey, so they see what they can expect– A clear vision of the road ahead, with milestones and realistic expectations– Pre-filtering attendees before onboarding, so you can filter out students who are not a good fit or are not motivated enough– Developing a curriculum that includes enough micro-successes at each step, so they stay motivated. Most of the time, quitting comes from demotivation

I think I’ve covered most cases. If you want more content about this, let me know in the comments below. If you need help restructuring your business, just message me, and maybe we can work together.