One of the quickest shortcuts to breeding successfully is to invest in a proven breeding pair. You can purshase a pair from your local acquarium shop but be sure to ask specifically for a compatible pair.
It will take some time for the breeding pair to settle down in their new environment before they express any interest in starting to spawn. For my Flower Horn pair it took about 1 week before there was any interest.
The loss of one member of an established pair can also raise difficulties in terms of pairing the surviving cichlid up again in the future. Fighting remains a huge risk too so watch out for this if you do experience a loss.
Never try to add a single individual fish to your existing aquarium with your new breeding pair, even after a suitable period of isolation, because the established fish will almost certainly harass it relentlessly which can be fatal. I found this out the hard way after I witnessed fins been bitten off from my other fish.
The best hope of ensuring compatibility is to transfer both cichlids to a new setup, where neither has a territorial advantage. Another option is to separate the pair from the rest of the fish in the tank by inserting a divider in the tank. I tried this when breeding my Flower Horn pair and it worked perfectly. Just make sure you secure it nice and firmly bc the fish can easily knock it out of the way. Move any decor around so that in effect the acquarium becomes a new environment for all the fish in the tank.
