Why You Should Not Pirate Students From ESL Companies

I would be lying if I say I never thought of pirating learners from my company. I sure did. A million times. I had long days and sleepless nights thinking of ways and strategies of getting my own learners and keeping them. And my list always included importing my “loyal” learners. I’m certain a lot of you are dying to, as well. But here are the reasons why you should give that a little more thought.

1. It’s unethical.

That’s needless to say, really, and this is probably the most binding reason why you haven’t done so. But at the same time, you can’t stop thinking about it, can you? Now, if you are someone who hates your company, you probably don’t give a shit about pirating their students. After all, they are your students. You may even feel justified for doing so. But, whether you realize it or not, you will end up doing more harm to yourself than to your company in the long run. Read on to have a better understanding why I say so.

2. It’s risky.

There is that risk of you being kicked out of your company. This is all part of your company’s rules and policies to not exchange any contact information with your learners; to not have any form of correspondence with them outside of your lesson hours; to not meet with them when they visit the country; etc.. Why? It really isn’t because the company is threatened of you “pirating” the students. Rather, to avoid any misrepresentation of the company. Or, so they say. But let’s all be honest here. Many of us have become friends with our learners. Some of us have met with some of our students visiting the country. Because some of the company policies are just plain silly and stupid.
I mean, let’s see…. A lot of ESL companies make you create and use your own Skype account, add your students to your own contacts, and expect you to not have any exchange of other information?! Not to mention, they do not have reliable means of monitoring that. I’ve had students with whom I became friends on Facebook and I can’t be the only one who did that. That sure, is against the policies but did it get me or my students in any trouble? Or the company, for that matter? No.
Now, to the ESL teachers, success sure involves a great deal of risk-taking. Always make sure you are well aware of the consequences of your actions and that you will own up to them.

3. It’s not sustainable.

So I toiled days and nights, weeks and months and considering all the stress, the hard labor, the energy, and all effort I was putting into reaching my goal, I realized, “No, there is no way I could be charging my learners just the same amount companies are charging them.” At that time, my previous company was charging just a little over what they were paying us, their tutors. This was also the time I came to appreciate my previous company all the more. And there’s no way my loyal learners would be willing to join me for a higher fee, long-term.
So if you’re thinking to “pirate” students just so you can get 100% of what they pay, think twice and hard. Sure, you can do that but it won’t be long till you realize it’s not worth it. It won’t be long till you need to take a rest and therefore, be absent and your students will be left without a substitute tutor which ESL companies readily provide. It won’t be long till you realize that you may have acquired students but it’s keeping them that is the more challenging. Not like when you’re teaching for an ESL company where students come and go, you will have to do the work of marketing your services to new students. You have to figure out a way to have your own students.
In a previous article, I have mentioned that if you have already acquired lots of loyal students, finding your own students would be the least of your worries. Now, I understand how many people interpreted that as a suggestion to pirate students and yes, partly true. Again, I’d be lying if I say I didn’t think about that. But here is another part of the truth. If you have tons of loyal students, isn’t that a clear indication that you are really that good? And if you are that good, why would you be worried about not having students of your own?
There are tons of student-teacher matching websites out there. I have shared quite a few with the members of my group. These are matching sites I have personally used, therefore, tried, tested, and proven to work.

4. It’s not the only way.

Simultaneous to when I was building my website, making my own materials, and realizing that even P300/hr for all the work I was putting in would still not be worth it, I had to think of other ways of getting my own students. Having a little over a thousand bookmarks by students, I was confident I could go out on my own. I was never worried about not having any students at all. In fact, what made me anxious was having way more than I could handle. I signed up on different ESL Teacher-Student matching sites. Some of the sites had premium membership options that would allow you to exchange messages directly with prospective students. I paid for those fees and they were actually pretty reasonable.
In a few of my free coaching sessions, I have shared how I used Facebook to advertise myself. April 2012 was when I published my Facebook Page and paid Facebook for “likes.” Trying to get the most out of it, I set my demographics to many different countries, I can’t even remember them all now. I thought it shouldn’t be so difficult and sure enough, in just a matter of a few days, I started getting “likes” like crazy and getting emails of inquiry from different parts of the world. I got messages from Russia, Germany, Egypt, Austria, India, Dubai, etc.. I didn’t think it would be so difficult but I sure didn’t expect it to be so easy either. I was so overwhelmed I had to unpublish the page after only a week! And you know how much I paid Facebook? P1200 only! How sweet was that?!
Well, that was in 2012. Facebook has made several changes on the advertisement policies and pricing since, and you bet they continue changing them. I built an audience of over 6000 people on Facebook for only Php1200. The last time I checked, it now takes Php240 to get at least 80-150 likes. This is another reason why you have to grab opportunities as soon as you can.
I intend to write another article related to this soon, so please check back and thanks for reading! Cheers for now! 😉