The Voice for Fitness Professionals Podcast

If you’re a female fitness business owner, even a solo personal trainer, and I would include, one working for another business, this is for you.

Because 2020 rocked all our worlds, nowhere as great as fitness face-to-face and restaurants, and hotels and airlines… you may have realized you put all your eggs in one basket. Attracting customers was easy because in fact you didn’t have to do it. Someone else fed them to you. If you established a reputation of helping your clients get results, you initiated some attraction. But when that model got taken away, and even now still when a very high percentage of customers are not looking to return to the gym any time soon, you realized, uh-oh.

This Episode is for You

This episode is both a little tough love and a little how to take back power that was yours to have all along.

You have the most power if you can sell. There are superficial titles that may make some of your fitness icons look successful, but news flash… if someone has more than 2 or 3 titles …. They don’t have more revenue. And they definitely don’t have more time and freedom.

So, know what you want. The limelight is okay if that’s what you want. Just realize it may be a swap for the finances and the freedom of time and energy to live your days in charge of your own schedule.

How Female Fitness Business Owners excel at sales

When you feel like you can’t sell or promote your own services or products, you have a belief problem in either your services or yourself. You’ve got to:

• improve your product or service or
• get support to build your confidence

Everyone sells. Everyone. Some do it so easily because they truly believe what they sell helps people.

When I was selling for someone else, selling the services of trainers who worked for me, it was so easy. When I went from taking clients who came to me easily and filled the limited slots I had to selling my products for 100% of my income, it changed everything. It in fact, rattled me a little. You falter, you shrink… temporarily. Or at least I did. Then you either pick up your big girl self and get on with it or you go find another job working for someone else for less than you want, for hours you don’t like, and give up freedom and potential to make whatever you want.

When you work for yourself as a female fitness business owner, you create money today where there was none yesterday. You can decide to create a package and sell it five minutes later.

There’s nothing in the world as powerful as that.

How do you get there?

Flex your muscles. Start doing live social media. You can start with recorded sessions but once you do them and realize video is king, queen, and prince and princess of social you want to do lives. But how, you ask? What are you going to say? (Link to prior live social media episode)

Most women do well when they start storytelling and teaching.

There is a difference however in teaching/preaching and raising/praising.

Teach in a way that is not condescending.

• Don’t tell someone they need discipline.
• Ask them if they’re committed.

• Don’t tell them they need to ditch dieting.
• Ask them if they’re ready for a more reasonable, realistic way.

• Don’t tell someone they owe it to their family to be their best.
• Ask them who else will benefit if they are, or who else suffers if they’re not.

Do you hear the change?

My bet is that when you aren’t selling with confidence, it’s not that you don’t believe in what you’re doing. It’s not that you don’t believe in yourself or your ability to help. More often it’s that the way you’re trying to do it, backfires on YOUR ability to feel integral around it.

It feels wrong but you can’t put your finger on it.

Am I right? I would love to hear your comment on this – below the show notes or a rating and comment in iTunes if you’re on an iPhone.

You’re a Badass Female Fitness Business Marketer Waiting to Hatch 

Look at the scripts or bullet points you prepare for yourself.

Rewrite them in a way that you feel like you are supporting and backing up a customer who has been frustrated and shamed by programs and trainers in the past.

Review the content in the show notes here. My hope is that it will help you start to automatically convert your messages into those that connect you with the right audience.

More resources: 

Flipping 50 Fitness Specialist

Fitness Marketing Mastery Build Your Business Mastermind

Mentioned in this episode: 

Previous episode on Live Social Media 

Live social media sessions are the best possible use of your marketing time for so many reasons. You can repurpose them

• You connect in real time with those interested in you and your topic
• You learn from the questions and from the topic
• Your platform algorithm will reward you for doing it
• You gain confidence every time you do it

But, if you don’t plan what you’re going to talk about based on your followers, fans, and prospects asking, What’s in it for me? You could be wasting your time.

Social media lives that feel like a blind date may not hold enough attraction to get me there.

Live Social Media Strategy

Are you asking people to show up for live social media sessions without giving them a reason to show up for lives?

If you’re Jillian Michaels, the president of Lifetime Fitness, or CEO of Club Industry… maybe you’ll get lots of people showing up because you announce you’re going live at a date and time.

But if you haven’t got a lot of followers, established a reason why you, or a topic that is JUICY, or given a call-to-action beyond “this is free, you should come” then you’re making a cardinal mistake.

Sharing that you’re going live with your email list will help, if they’re also on that platform. It will get more of your buyers there and that will help tell the platform to show your content to more people like them. But if your buyers aren’t on that platform – aka – big mistake to try to use Instagram as your number one platform if your current customers aren’t using it as their ideal platform yet.

Be Careful Sending Customers Backward Without a Plan

Why spend time and energy promoting a social media platform? When they’re already your customers? I’d say that’s a silly waste of time when you’d want to be thinking about how you upsell those people and keep them busy doing your program instead of taking them back to a relationship on social. Now if they’re there…. Great. But you want to be giving your paying customers more exclusive material, more step-by-step systems to reach success.

Tell them what’s in it for them. It’s all they care about.

• What will you teach?
• What will they learn?
• What will you share?

In fact, when I do monthly webinars for my customers that’s exactly how I lay out the content on the page. My team requests that content, I add it to the form we’ve created and they’ve got the layout and system down. I’ve been doing webinars monthly for 6 years and before that for 2 years I did them weekly… yes, weekly. And I do a separate one for my membership. That’s a crazy amount of practice. And that’s only one arm of my business. When you add the fitness pros master classes I do onto that? I’ve done close to 300 live master classes.

Easy Entry with Live Social Media

You don’t have any barrier with social media like you do with webinars. You don’t need to use zoom or gotowebinar or be comfortable with them. But you do absolutely want to be as organized as if you were doing a masterclass/webinar. This is your first date. A blind date. The question you have to answer is, will there be a second date?

Use a Proven Model

Take a look at any syllabus from a course – university or CEC – it doesn’t matter. Or the “blurb” used to advertise a course at a conference or a program you signed up for.

That detail is important… if it got you to sign up, it’s likely got some good strategy.

It offered and teased some good content.

Now, who knows whether the content was GOOD.

The point is the marketing was good. Good enough to get you to invest time and money and energy in doing it.

Most of the things you and I are going to choose to spend time on we’ll make decisions based on level of importance.

And maybe convenience.

So, if I see you’re live and happen to be following you, I might check it out for a few seconds – yes, a few seconds. (that’s another podcast… about getting on and getting started ASAP – no chit chat)

But if you go to the effort – and you should – of promoting a “live” at a certain day and time, then you want to make sure you’ve thought about that schedule.

Will they stay?

Is this a time when your audience wants to be on social media?

I can tell you the best times for my customers – not you dear business pros – but my customers… and that is late afternoon at best, very early evening for East Coast, or it’s early in the day on the weekends.

Do you know when your customers want to be online, and when they’ll show up? Are you consciously thinking about what’s in it for them?

I hope I’ve given you some things to think about in regard to your live social media strategy.

Spontaneous?

You of course, may just want to do it, jump in and get comfortable. Then get more organized and use what little intel you got from those. But to help calm your own nerves and boost your own confidence… have a list of things you’re going to talk about. Have 3 questions about a topic you’re going to answer. It has to be organized for you… and for them or you’ll never be able to attract customers and build authority in one niche. Remember the key to success is going deep not wide.

Resources:

Building your online marketing strategy master class link

Social Media Marketing for Health & Fitness Professionals

Expert Instagram Support

The Ultimate Free Consultation

You know you need an email service, often called a CRM (customer relationship management). You can’t send from your gmail or your yahoo account if you plan to have a fitness business, be a business woman, and scale a business.

This episode is to help you go from “tell me more” to “how do I sign up?”

Before you ever jump in to setting up what’s known as a funnel you need to know your customers inside and out. So, this episode jumps in somewhere in the middle of the story… and I want you to know there’s some homework to do before you get here.

I’ll link to a few prior podcasts and blogs in case you don’t know that customer like you know your best friend.

What You Need to Know to Use Your Email Service Optimally

• Know the end thing you want your leads to do. What will they ultimately buy? Is it one-on-one coaching? Is it a course, is it a year-long program? What transformation do you provide? Some trainers will say weight loss. Some trainers will say athletic performance. Some trainers will say energy and optimally aging. You have to know. You may be working with people on more than that, but you have to narrow it down to something very specific if you want to grow a brand and increase business. This first step is crucial
• Create a freebie. Something that your audience wants so badly they’ll give you access to their inbox and invite you to send them emails. It has to have a specific hook and it has to give them a quick win moving toward the bigger transformation that they get from you.
• Create an opt in form. That’s just the little box where they add their name and email.
• From there you create a series of what is called autoresponders. It’s the first email they get that delivers the yummy recipes you’ve created for them, or the workout video, or pdf.
• Don’t set it and forget it. Watch it. Make sure you’re watching what happens when you email. Do they open it? Do they click on it? How many emails in do they drop off? What could you do instead? Your email service doesn’t do the thinking and adjusting to the analytics. You do.

Why Email Is the Way

Your email service can help you meet more people and care for them easier, effortlessly, and find the best customers while allowing those that aren’t a good match to know it and move on. Ultimately, that’s what you want. There’s an abundant amount of people in the world who need exactly what you have to offer.

 You are the wrong match for some people and jobs, and for others you are absolutely perfect. 

There may be things about your job you love more than others. This email service should be one you love. If you’re reluctant about it, I’m willing to bet, dear trainer or coach, that you’re thinking about it all wrong. You’re getting stuck in the its-new-and-I-don’t-know-what-I’m-doing… and we can’t be good at something we’ve never done before.

But if you instead think of the emails you’ll write, as if you were having a conversation with a client, your ideal client. And you write to that client.

Then, copywriting becomes FUN.

Copywriting is For Winning Email Service

Want a little info on an upcoming copywriting masterclass? I’ll put some details in this email so you can tell me more about what you want and decide if it’s a good fit for you. I’ll help you write everything from your emails, to your website sales pages, and your product descriptions, to your video scripts. Everything you say, and write is copy. Is yours working and consciously written for a fit or not?

Click for details on the copywriting clinic

You might also like:

Why Your Emails Don’t Get Sales

Are the Words You Use Costing You Customers

Are you a medical fitness professional or want to be? On this episode I catch up with founder of the Medfit Network about the 2020 and what’s a head.

My Guest About Medical Fitness Now

Lisa Dougherty founded the MedFit Network in 2013. It is both a free online resource directory and professional membership organization. She established the MedFit Education Foundation, a nonprofit 501©(3) in 2017 to elevate the quality and amount of available education for fitness and allied healthcare professionals.

Beyond COVID we are still facing a chronic disease, obesity, opioid and mental health crisis.

This is an opportunity for the fitness & healthcare professionals to up level their education and services to be the front line of healthcare by aiding in the management and prevention of chronic disease.

This is a time where they can expand their offerings and services to the largest, fastest growing demographic in the US (the world).

Questions we answer in this episode:

• Who joins Medfit?
• What do you see Medfit members doing differently than a year ago when we were normal?
• Do you agree that this may also weed out the weak and leave us with the strong?
• As the founder of Medfit what have you found was the message of members during the pandemic? Were there noticeable waves of response?
• What have we learned about fitness and health habits during the pandemic?
• What have we learned about serving clients?
• What has changed for Medfit and what has stayed the same?
• You’re offering some new ways to connect and interact?
• “The average personal trainer fails within 2 years”

~Lisa Dougherty, Medfit founder

Medical fitness is something a large percent of the population needs now or will. Even during the past 12 months of pandemic, weight gain, depression, anxiety, and muscle and bone loss among individuals who were less active during lockdowns have increased the need for medical fitness. Are you ready?

Connect with Medfit:

https://www.medfitclassroom.org/
Social media: https://www.facebook.com/MedFitNetwork

60-day free trial membership https://medfitnetwork.org/promo/

Other episodes you may enjoy:

Fitness Passion to Fitness Profession and Career

How to Choose Your Next Fitness Conference

Burnout among personal trainers is up. Are you at risk? This post shares a new study published in the Journal of Strength & Conditioning Research.

I’ve written for the fitness industry for over 20 years in places like Fitness Management, IDEA Health & Fitness Professionals, and NSCA’s Strength & Conditioning Journal.

Full Time?

Today, or pre-pandemic, more trainers are employed full time. Many trainers are at risk for job-related addiction which often goes undetected and because of that is promoted. Consider it yourself, what’s the stereotypical trainer like for you?

• Chicken and broccoli daily
• Protein shakes
• Lululemons
• Always exercising and eating perfectly
• Never misses a workout
• Often puts clients ahead of family or friends
• Allows clients to dictate work schedule.

Sound familiar?

Reasons for Burnout Among Personal Trainers

Work-related stressors for trainers during the pandemic included:

• Less access to clients if they were in an in person only service delivery
• Working 100% on commission for training sessions and or experienced layoffs
• Need to adopt new training services and delivery options for multiple revenue streams without the education, experience, or skills to execute quickly
• Inability or unwillingness to pivot quickly to adapt to the new and unique problems people faced during the pandemic and
• need for new marketing strategies that reached them

Those stressors likely spilled over burnout among personal trainers personal lives. Financial burden and new home life changes affected all of us. Home became work, gym, leisure time, and school for all of us and limited our additional sources of social support.

Starting Your Own Business? Surround Yourself with Support

In times when you may or may not be able or choose to gather in person, I hope that these suggestions will help you. One thing that definitely can, in a time for you may have taken a risk and begun their own business is knowing that while many suffered losses during the pandemic, for others in fitness 2020 has seen a huge growth. It’s for those willing to remember that where there is a problem and a solution, there is always a business model.

If instead your burnout comes from work addiction, where you’re a trainer who finds herself (or himself) constantly seeking. If you’re always reading, watching, taking courses, in addition to doing your own fitness workouts, seeking the best nutritional advice, and never breaking for your personal interests beyond your career vocation. What hobbies outside of fitness did you used to love? What people have you stopped spending time with? What activities do you love and lose track of time doing?

Pre vs Post Covid Results

Within Personal Trainers, 33.0% reported personal burnout, 29.6% reported work-related burnout, and 17.4% reported client-related burnout.

Higher levels of burnout, across all scales, were observed in those who were:

• PTs
• women
• unmarried
• living alone
• would not choose to be a fitness professional again
• took the survey post-COVID [as compared to their respective counterparts]

Findings suggest that fitness professionals are not exempt from the stressors associated with personal and occupational burnout. Strength and conditioning coaches and PTs may reduce the risk of burnout by increasing social support, continuing education, and allowing for personal-care time with the intention of buffering these factors.

Social Support

• Friends outside the fitness community
• Fellow trainers and colleagues within the fitness community
• Mastermind groups – to avoid burnout within personal trainers get support growing your business from people who have done what you want to do or are still doing it is required – no one does it alone

Continuing Education

• Do it to completion – for many fitness pros the shiny object syndrome means purchasing courses they never finish which can actually increase feelings of burnout and overwhelm
• Determine the value of con ed based on: 1) what it will do for your revenue and 2) what you’re most interested in and 3) how will it improve the quality of training you provide to your clients
• Plan your con ed so you’re not forced to take multiple courses at one time, at the end of your recert period when there is pressure

Personal care/Self care

• Do seek leisure time content beyond your work. Look, most trainers have science books on their nightstand. Find books, movies, and rekindle hobbies you’d forgotten. During the pandemic I personally took up reading “fluffy” novels again instead of heavier science-based content. I read Nicholas Sparks and similar books before bed, a complete diversion from the heavy work and political climate we’re in. Right now I’ll take a predictable happy ending any day.
• Schedule your breaks so work tasks aren’t an option. I know a fitness owner who goes to mass at noon most days. Find a way to recharge your batteries before they’re dead. Make (even online) dates with friends to complete tasks. You don’t even have to be working on the same thing but knowing that a friend is also focused on a project and you’re touching base again in an hour, keeps you on track.
• Rethink your workouts. During the pandemic when other areas are cranked up the tough workout you think you need may need to take a backseat to less. Before you hit the wall, consider getting exercise instead of driving yourself to illness. I know a trainer who thinks he’s fit because he runs 10 miles most days. Honestly, he’s sick more than most people I know. That’s not fitness, especially not in this climate.

Modify for the Times

I’m an 8-time Ironman. I’ve been swimming for 30 minutes a few times a week and doing a 30-minute weight training session a couple of times a week along with a lot of walking. Train for the energy you need instead of training as if you’re not in a pandemic, don’t have stress. For women especially, less is more if you want to avoid hormonal disruption that actually leads to sleep issues, and weight gain.

Burnout Among Personal Trainers

Burnout among personal trainers is up and job satisfaction is down the greater number of hours you work or perceive you work even if you’re not earning money. This is a pivotal time in history and in fitness. You have a unique and never to be experienced again opportunity. The pandemic has created additional problems that require solutions for those who are willing to go beyond just providing online classes and training via Skype and Zoom. Are you ready to create multiple sources of revenue? Be somewhere else and still be providing value and earning revenue. Click here for details.

Resource:

Snarr, Ronald L.1; Beasley, Vista L.2 Personal, Work-, and Client-Related Burnout Within Strength and Conditioning Coaches and Personal Trainers, Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research: January 22, 2021 – Volume Publish Ahead of Print – Issue –

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/?term=burnout%20among%20personal%20trainers

Finding it impossible to do your fitness marketing? Here’s how to get it done in less time.

You’re the trainer, the bookkeeper, the advertiser, the marketer… and then you’re the chef, the cleaning lady, errand runner and oh, yeah trying to stay fit to walk the talk.

Have I about covered it?

So, I’m no different. And I don’t want to tell you that I haven’t had times when I did wake at 3 and probably slept by 8 or 9pm in order to get in a workout and be the golf mom, the manager, the trainer, coach, and all the things. And I thought I loved it. In truth, all of that was a lot of pushing, pushing, pushing and maybe proving… or trying to, prove something to myself or someone.

So, no matter who you are, if you’re an energizer bunny – and I mean really… without the caffeine and the adrenaline rush of attention or pressure of deadlines, or fear… you really are, great. But if you’re exhausted by all that action that you can’t see traction from this is for you.

Here’s how I finished a month of podcasts in 2 ½ hours this morning.

I had brief outlines and bullets, already waiting.

When I get an idea I add it to a list. It may never become a podcast or blog. But it might be a post or talking point for a consulting client. So I fleshed it out, decided what details like resources will make it more valuable to listeners. I add the intro and outro in case we’re promoting anything like the business building mastermind & masterclass series right now.

I allow no more than 30 minutes each.

Since I’ve already had these ideas marinating on my desktop, this was plenty of time. When I walk or run ideas come up and I just add to them. Any task will expand to the time you allow it. So don’t.

I repeated the final steps for each.

Then I get into my recording space and turn on and go.

I try to record start to end and have the least possible amount of editing. For an urgent timely message, I’ll skip the music and go from recording to postproduction in the same day. Listen, you don’t listen to a podcast for the intro and outro music. At least I don’t. You listen because the podcast gives you concrete applicable steps you can take or helps you feel like you’re not the only one in the world going through what you’re going through! Music is overrated!

Later today I will load these up into my host, Libsyn.

Then share show notes on my site. But listen, that’s copy and paste work. I can do that late in the day when I’m firing on fewer cylinders like I am early. It’s actually relaxing for me to do that. And next month when I’ve got support, that is one of the things I’ll hand off.

A support person you can hire for $10-20 an hour should be able to load up at least 3 in an hour, check for mistakes and allow you to either earn hundreds more doing something only you can, or to relax and do nothing.

Create the social media posts ready to share for release date.

Again, down the road to do your fitness marketing in less time this is just a system you create. But you don’t have to do it. Not once your time is so overscheduled that what you really need is a break and time and space.

There you have it how to do your fitness marketing in less time. Broken down into one specific task. But it works for everything. I tell this to my customers all the time. When they say I hate cooking! Or I don’t have time to cook! It’s because they are overwhelmed with the whole idea of ALL of it.

But.. in these steps:

• Choose recipes
• Write the shopping list
• Do the shopping
• Do the food prep

…it’s not overwhelming and other people can help if you let them.

So it is with you in order to do your fitness marketing in less time.

I hope this was helpful. Whether or not you have a podcast. That’s not the point.

Resources:

5 Day Build Your Business Bootcamp

If you offer a free consultation to get more clients, you may have any one of these problems:

• Getting people to book sessions
• Getting people to show up for sessions
• Making a sale from the consultation

Then there’s what if you don’t make a sale at the consultation, if that was the purpose of it, what you do next with that lead.

Stop the Anti-Sales Chatter

Let’s be clear that I totally understand none of us wants to be salesy, pushy or sleazy. So, since I didn’t even mention that ‘til now, I want you to do a selfcheck here on how you even feel about this whole episode title and the topic of sales. Unless you’re going to work for someone else, and even then, if you can’t sell, you’ll never be in charge of your own destiny. People who can sell, run the world. The people you can help need to buy your services.

Improving your success at any step of your consultations will help your business. Improve your success at every step will boost your business significantly.

>>If you aren’t a part of a mastermind or a sales and marketing strategy group so you review: how you get leads

• how you convert leads to customers
• how you get more value from every customer
• how you renew and keep customers
• how you get more new customers from current customers

…it’s time to be sure this is a part of your business, every week. The earlier in your business you start, the sooner you realize, if you didn’t ask anybody to become a client today, no one can say yes.

Before you even take any of the suggestions I’ll list in this episode, I highly recommend that you start tracking your statistics. Look at your insights. Listen, you can do that on a platform like Facebook or Instagram that you don’t even own, so if you’re not looking at every move you make in your own business, what are you doing?

Track these things:

• Month/week/day
• Number of consultations booked
• Number of consultations conducted
• Number of sales from consultations
• Number of sales from prior consultations
• Number of “no” at consultations
• Reasons for every missed sale
• Number of total sales

You or Your Team?

If you personally don’t do every – or any – free consultation to get new clients for your business track anyone on your team who does.

Should they be? Or should they have additional training? Average closing percentages in the business are about 40% for consultations. But if you do a good job of preparing people before they get there, I believe they should never be lower than 50%.

Look, most of us did not go to school to learn sales, or persuasive language, or copywriting. I’ll bet that the courses and continuing education that you’re taking are all about conditions, and training strategies, or joints, or something you feel lacking in as opposed to something that will help you get the clients you want to train with that knowledge.

Don’t be the best kept most educated secret.

It takes sales: do well at marketing and the sales is easy

If you’re not a part of a group of people supporting you to grow your business, your profit and identify how to keep the money you make by being smarter about expenses – so that you don’t out-educate yourself, instead of marketing yourself, find a way to fix that. If you want to be in charge of your own future, and the revenue and profit you make, you know how to sell. You’re good at it and you enjoy it. If you’re not there you can learn. It’s the path to helping people. If you have a money relationship that is damaged, you’ve got to fix it and that’s another episode.

If I could have shared that message in thousands of trainers that I’ve met from university teaching, managing personal training department, and presenting internationally, it would be that. Yes, of course, you’re passionate about the workouts and the learning more as you should be, but the presenters you envy and love … don’t even have the life and freedom you want. Make sure you’re following someone who both loves their life and has built the business.

Is a free consultation to get clients a good idea?

It is if it works. But look closely at who books and how long they’ve followed you and been looking. A free consultation is a big, huge, first step for someone who is intimidated, feels like a failure, and doesn’t want to be judged. So that leaves about 15% of the population who are already quick decision makers and they’re ready that will be most likely to book a session.

If you’re not careful with them, you could talk them out of it. They’re already annoyed that they can’t get started and couldn’t figure out how to buy what they wanted.

So, it’s clear you have to be clear. What is your objective for the free consultation? And what is the message you send the potential customer about this free consultation? If you don’t send them a message about this being the time when they decide WHICH way they’re going to work with you and take care of all the details of getting enrolled, but that’s what you intend? Then they may expect a free session that will show them what they need and how to workout so they can do it on their own.

What Happens If They Feel Misled?

Imagine how they feel if they don’t get that. Not likely that if you shock them at the session and there’s no exercise, or assessment, that they don’t get what they wanted they’re going to be excited about working with you after that.

Imagine instead that you’ve asked exactly what they want at the session, so that you can give it to them. What if you share with them the exact process of how the meeting happens and the objective, and what they’ll leave with before the meeting. Then you remind them of how you’ll spend time during the consultation during the first few minutes, and then you summarized the session at the end. How will they feel after a session like that?

If you’re nodding your head, you get it. We all like to know. Clear expectations make a huge difference in our satisfaction of an experience. So, those big signs and invitations for a free consultation with a trainer or a health coach or nutritionist are a big mistake. Give them some description. Start with who this is for, who it’s not for, what you’ll learn, and what you’ll take away.

10 Parts of a Free Consultation to Get Clients

1 Free vs Fee

Paid – flat

Paid – and applied to first purchase

2 Preview & Screen

A survey before they can book

3 Reminder

Email, text

You’ll contact if they don’t arrive on time

4 Overview

The way these sessions go…

Ask permission

5 Middle

The more they talk the better

Problem

Agitate

6 Pre-Close

If I could …

Would you like help with that…

7 Close

Would you like my help with that?

Take care of the details

Here’s what to expect next

Many of my customers ask to add ___, do you want to do that too? If you’d like to I’ll add that for ____ off. Or you can get it later, if you want to think about it, at the regular rate.

8 Follow Up – immediate

Same day for either a thank you, or for the links to complete transaction

9 Follow Up – a couple days

A down sell for those that didn’t purchase and a check in for those that did

It wasn’t the right time to do ____, I do have this group/program, starting and I have some spots left, and I thought of you

10 Follow Up – long term nurture

Is now a better time?

Are you still interested?

There you have it the free consultation process.

Make money in your jammies, they said. Passive revenue, they said. Are you participating in affiliate marketing yet? or unsure of how to get started?

Have you begun to do any affiliate marketing yet? Affiliate marketing for health & fitness coaches is a natural, especially now! It’s probably easier for you to list the clients who didn’t want to know what they needed for home exercise than to list those that did not ask you.

I’m in the process of reviewing all sources of revenue – something I do before the last quarter of the year to determine what I need to do more of, less of, start or stop in the next year. But now given we’ve all got to do taxes I’m diving deeper into revenue sources outside of my products, services, consulting fees, and speaking fees.

Free and Easy Passive Revenue

Passive revenue is not too good to be true. Every month it’s so nice to have that extra money drop in. It’s not like I have a specific revenue goal, unless I’m helping an affiliate with a specific launch and they are doing it through me and only me. And that’s rare.

Early during the pandemic I rounded up a blog post of all my favorites. I shot video of those items explaining why I liked them, what they were helpful for, and how to use them. Amazon was sending me gift cards (my choice for payment) regularly. I also gained a lot of subscribers by layering the YouTube videos in the blog and pointing from each individual item back to the blog. It was relevant and timely.

Choose Affiliate Marketing Partners Wisely

That’s exactly what every one of the affiliate partners I choose is. Skincare you may be thinking, how is that relevant? Well, in my book I talk about hormone disruptors that interfere with fitness efforts. If you’re putting a lot of toxins on and around your body, they’re going to sabotage my audience. So, it’s very relevant. At least for my brand.

If you’re gorgeous or have amazing skin… your people may be asking what you use. That makes it relevant too.

I encourage you to make a list. If you are your demographic, list the things you use on a daily basis. If you are not your ideal customer, then list the things you wish they would use, and need to know. And know, sooner or later someone will ask if you want to partner with them.

I always ask two things before I say yes:

1. Does spending time doing this take me off my mission?
2. Is this really something that I know, like, trust and feel good about putting on my site?

My Favorite Things: Affiliate Marketing or Not!

These are just a few but some of my favorite products to share with clients. Everything you see here and I share, I know, love, and trust it before I share. I use it, own it, and or know the program and the company – often the owner has been on the Flipping 50 podcast.

• Sauna
• Electric bike
• Beds, Sheets, & Pillows
• CBD products
• Bone broth
• Skincare products
• Thrive Market  
• Natural hormone support  
• Castor Oil Packs
• Coffee & Tea 

I also share programs that serve my clients:

• Emotional Eating Programs
• Fasting programs
• Function Medicine Coaching
• Instagram Success   

Remember again that the whole point of sharing anything – including programs with your customers and audience is to HELP THEM! Customers are already trying to crack the code… on something! Hormones, emotional eating, or for you and I Instagram, or YouTube ads, and I don’t do it all. I teach marketing strategy, consistency, and messaging. If you want an expert to teach you how to create an ad or get the best engagement on Instagram you want an expert!

If you work with seniors for instance, you might be sharing senior cell phones, alert buttons, chair lifts, and yes, they are online and if they’re not the sons and daughters seeking solutions for them are.

Start with Amazon?

An easy first step to get started with an Amazon store front as an Amazon affiliate. For me and likely for you when you find yourself answering the same questions over and over, it’s best to create a page. They ask you what scale you use, what weighted vest, what tubing or bands, or if there’s a brand you like.

I share it all on a resources page. Not all things there are affiliate, some are simply things I love and use or am asked about so very often I share them there.

Test Options for Passive Revenue

I also love to share the process I use with clients to get them better results and derive a better program for them. I do DNA test result overviews and lab overviews. It’s important to stay within your scope of practice. I tell clients the purpose is to teach them how results can help them make decisions, help me create specific questions for their health care provider, and what it might mean for exercise based on other clients results and examples.

• Self-directed lab tests
• DNA testing  

Things That Didn’t Work or I Said No

Even passive income shouldn’t make you compromise your mission. There have definitely been some failed items sent to me to try that either weren’t successful or weren’t something I could even speak positively about. My agreement with a company is always to offer negative feedback to them and positive feedback if it’s right for me to promote.

Some of those products include: a lower back support, a painful pair of sandals, an equally painful pressure point mat.

Lesson Learned

The biggest lesson I learned and I’ll pass on to you is that if you’re not sure, I’d pass. The lack of authenticity if you don’t love it, will deem it ineffective. And it takes time to vet those things. So I would definitely pass if you aren’t going to promote it a lot or you don’t love it.

If you want to go and look at some of your affiliate marketing options, you can also start at an affiliate center – it’s like a hub for affiliates. Some of your favorites and mine like Power Systems, Perform Better, and Road Runner or JumpSportfor instance use the platform to operate their affiliate programs.

5 Easy Organic Ways to Start Affiliate Marketing Now You’ll Love 

• Add a resources page to your website
• Create gift guides for specific holidays
• Create a top 5 list cheat sheet
• Insert a link or image into a relevant blog
• Link to items in recipes or workouts

Sure it can really be passive revenue and it will be less than if you put a little thought into it. But overall, it doesn’t take a lot of effort to bring a lot of good to your customers and to your business.

Some months I have a few hundred and others it’s a few thousand extra dollars to the bottom line. Like anything you do want to plan your promotions to make the most of it. In the mastermind group we’re running this year, I’m sharing exactly the things I use, especially the ones that help my clients solve problems they’re asking me about.

Your Own Affiliate Program Creating Passive Income for Others

The flip side of affiliate marketing for someone else is creating your own affiliate marketing program. Do you sell a program or package that you can afford to gift a percentage of to a partner? Consider if you had to advertise for that customer what the cost would have been and that if the referral comes from a friend it’s likely to be a great customer.

Don’t give your time away however. A small percent is given if you’re giving away your time coaching or training. On digital programs the percentage is usually 40-50%, or sometimes a flat fee. You may not yet be ready but think about who you would partner with if you were. Start building relationships now.

Learn more about getting started in the Mastermind at one of 3 levels while this crazy perfect storm is yours.

Resources:

https://affiliate-program.amazon.com

https://www.cj.com

You might also like:

Personal Training Revenues

50 Ways to Boost Your Fitness Leads, Sales, and Revenue

So, imposter syndrome. First of all, let’s define it, it’s that feeling when you’re ready to go live but you have this feeling or thought of what’s everybody gonna think? what are they going to think when they see this? What if they knew that I don’t know all the answers? What if I’m live and somebody asks a question that I can’t answer? Those are just a few of the questions actually that came up this week.

In the last six days I’ve been doing a build your business boot camp for fitness professionals, primarily females helping other females in midlife that may not be your niche, but the things I’m about to talk about with imposter syndrome belong to all of us.

You’re Not Alone

No matter what level you’re at, one of the things that I want to assure you of before I go any further and help you break through the imposter syndrome that we can all feel is that everyone does experiencing it, everyone experiences it at every level. And what I mean by that is if you’re teasing yourself and imagining that when I get to that place, maybe you’re looking at someone else who appears to have all of it together, or all have their shit together. And you’re thinking when I’m in that place in that position, then, then I’ll have confidence, then I won’t have that imposter syndrome because really that’s what imposter syndrome is all about. You lack the confidence in yourself.

You Do Deserve It

Somewhere deep down you don’t believe that you deserve it. Now, that’s a topic for a lot more than a 20-minute podcast, and there’s really one I give you here is something really short and sweet to take away, and some tips to maybe listen to, or habits and routines and rituals to get into before you go live. That will get you up. Excited enthusiastic and remind you, who you are. It actually is very helpful to talk about a topic that makes your blood boil a little pain. If you feel that there’s an injustice.

The World Needs Your Voice

Among those fitness, quote, unquote, professionals who really aren’t qualified, who really can’t help, who are making mistakes because of not intentionally, but because of a lack of education. Do you know, quick fix, crackerjack box certification that really is a weekend certificate. That doesn’t allow them to really be working with some of the people who’ve got special injuries special conditions and need TLC. And you know, that what’s between you and helping that client. And the person who got them, who’s helping that client is very likely being in the right place at the right time with the right message that my friend is marketing.

Get Angry

So, if it upsets you that someone who’s unqualified can win that customer because they have the better marketing strategy. Okay then think about that before you go live. Because if you don’t get your message out there. Strong enough, you don’t get your message out there, frequently enough. And you don’t get your message out there with enough heartfelt clear conviction. You can’t win clients.

And if you can’t win clients you can’t help clients, and if you can’t win and help clients, you can’t win revenue, and you will then convince yourself that you are an imposter you can’t make any money doing this and you have to get a quote unquote real job. Is that where you want to go. So, wow, that went downhill quickly didn’t it.

Everyone Has Imposter Syndrome

So let’s back up, back to this place. First of all, everybody feels imposter syndrome, on a regular basis. I would guess, daily, if they’re actually putting themselves out there and listen here’s the thing, maybe this is the gauge of whether or not you are actively doing enough in your business. And that is if you don’t feel imposter syndrome on a regular basis, you’re probably not working hard enough

At outgrowing your current comfort level.

Get Uncomfortable

You’re not stretching yourself, you’re not reaching new people, you’re not being the first one to walk into the room and stick your hand out and be the one approaching someone instead of waiting to be approached. And what I encourage you to do is if you’ve got a mentor somebody that you really respect and you can open up to about questions you’ve got, knowing you don’t have to have all the answers without certain person. I would ask them, Do you ever feel this way?

Everyone Has Imposter Syndrome

Here’s what I know, from mentors. When I first began spending the kind of money that I do now for masterminds. When I first plunked down my first $20,000 for a mastermind on an annual basis. First of all, I had never joined a mastermind for anything less. I just went right for the top, pretty much the way I went from doing a sprint triathlon to doing an Ironman distance, most people work their way up. I was all in.

And when I did that, the first day of the first mastermind of the year. I walked into the room, and I literally met that coach at the door and I said, Okay. Have you ever felt like a really small fish in a really big sea? And she said, all the time, she said I put myself there on purpose, said My goal is to always be the most naive person in the room. I want to be surrounded by people who were smarter than me, who I can learn from it doesn’t do you any good to be surrounded by people who know less than you do, or who know just the same as you do so that you can share ideas back and forth.

To Grow

You have to be surrounded by people who have a difference of opinion, who have different experiences, and who can help you grow and stretch, because they don’t always think that everything you say, is correct. And it’s very uncomfortable, but I still do that, and it’s now five years later, I’m reaching out to even more groups and doing the very same thing. So being the quiet person on the call or on the video really doesn’t help you at all.

Getting Over Imposter Syndrome

How do you get over it though, because saying you’re not alone, not so much helpful when it goes to the lights on, that cameras pointed at you, and somebody is waiting for you to talk. I want you to remember this, that it’s about them. And I first gave you that one tip, if you can think about something that gets you upset.

Like, There are so many marketers out there, winning people over by their quick fixes by their fast game z sales the, this is going to work and you’re going to lose 14 pounds in 14 days, you know there’s a lot of that out there in January, but listen there’s 11 more months in the year and it happens all year round and you know it, and soda why. Think about those things.

What’s Your Why

Because if you don’t speak up, if we don’t have more voices out there saying the right thing, then it is the squeaky wheel, right, get the grease. It’s true. The message people hear over and over and over again. Are is the one that they’re going to respond to. If you go dark and you go quiet. There’s not much response on the other end right?

It’s About Them

So, think about those things and then remember, it’s about them. When you’re about to go live if you start all getting up in your own head about what are they going to think, you know, are they going to think you’re trying to be some big thing you’re in your own head. You’re in your own ego worried about little old you and your quote unquote reputation will listen sister, maybe brother, I don’t know who’s listening, but maybe you think a little bit too much of yourself.

Maybe you don’t have a reputation and maybe they’re not even thinking about you in the first place. And the whole goal of you going live is not about you. It’s not whether your hair is actually bleached as blonde as you want it, or your teeth are as white or your hair is combed correctly or not sticking up. It’s about the message that you’re about to tell them how strong, are your conviction in that message and getting it across.

Be Human

Do you know that it doesn’t really even matter if you get a little tongue tied, while you’re on a live video, because that’s human people actually need to be able to relate to you. So if you take 10 takes to get it perfect. You’re probably never going to be satisfied with any one of them. You’re always going to be imperfect, that will never be good enough. And all those messages my friend said gently with respect, are about something in your past, somebody didn’t think you were good enough and gave me that message. Somebody was always critical of you. I don’t know who it was, but they’re not here anymore.

What Do They Need?

And now it’s up to you to shake that off and think about the people on the other side of the camera, and make it about them. What is it that they need to hear from you. What is it that they need to hear from you right now today before they go sit down on the couch instead of taking a walk before they go to the cupboard and get something with a barcode, instead of going to the refrigerator to get something that was recently alive, what do they need to hear from you.

Right now, today.

Define You’re Why

The next thing to help you get out of that imposter syndrome is really to think about what is your why. And a little secret. So I’ll share a little piece of one little inkling that we did on the five day build your boot camp challenge. And that was having a riveting go on and talk about their why. Because, what is your why is the reason that you will be there in the first place, you’ll be reminding yourself as you reconnect with your audience, they need to like you. Yes, but more so they need to believe that they’re a little bit like you that you’re like them.

You can’t be up on a pedestal and perfect. Isn’t that ironic. The reason that you’re going to stop yourself that you’re feeling imposter syndrome is because you feel like you have to be perfect, you have to know the answers to every question in the universe that a client might possibly ask you. And if you don’t, or if you don’t have a degree and you don’t have a certification in this and that thing you feel like oh I’m not quite ready I can’t really do that, you know, it’s crazy, because nobody has all those things.

You’ll Never Have All the Answers

Nobody ever knows all the answers in every instance in every situation. And you wouldn’t expect that of anyone. Think about your mentors, the people you most respected, whether they were your professors or your major. Professors you’re maybe

parents maybe they were friends of your parents. Maybe it was someone in your church, those people that you really respected in your life Do they really have all the answers. Did you ever hear them saying you know I’ll have to find out. I’m not sure about that one but I will get back to you, because that’s a logical answer for intelligent people, to give.

You’ll never have all the answers, and you don’t have to be doing it perfectly. listen. Didn’t you have an overweight coach at some point during junior high or high school or even call it mean, they weren’t perfect, but yet that didn’t mean that they couldn’t be a winning coach. Remember your role. you are not there to do it perfectly. You’re there to interpret it perfectly for someone else.

Find a System, a Method, a Blueprint

It’s called Personal Training, it’s called health coaching but it’s one on one. And that really means you’re not telling them the way you did it, or how you would do it and what would work for you. You’re telling them the path the blueprint to get them there. So it takes the pressure off of your need for perfection. But let’s come back to the number two thing that I gave you. Number one was it’s all about them number two is, what’s your why go into that tell it. Why are you here, why are you not a teacher or a plumber or a nurse or a doctor or a foot salesman bicycle repair.

Tell Your Story

Why are you not one of those things instead of a health coach or a personal trainer. If you can get into that mindset about well here’s my why this is my why, because I know you’ve got one, you’ve got one is probably emotional. Maybe it’s because of what fitness did for you how it lifted you up when things are dark. Maybe it’s about saving the life of someone that you love. Maybe it’s that someone you love with sick, and with the right help and how they have this information they wouldn’t have been, I don’t know what your, why is.

But I know you’ve got one.

What If You Never Do It?

And if you could tap into that right before you go on, even tap into that as the first thing you do when you go on, you introduce yourself you tell them what you’re going to talk about. You tell them your why and then you launch into what you’re going to do. Okay, number three. I want you to think about this. This is putting fear in you. For something that could happen. If you don’t do this. So this is what I call that could have been me.

You don’t want to be in those shoes of somebody who, in a year or two or three or five see someone else who took a risk who took a chance. And look at them and say, that should have been me. You don’t want to be in those shoes. But unless you get out there, take a risk put yourself out there and start getting clear on what your unique and distinct messages.

You’re the Only You

Look, we all may be talking about core exercise or functional movement, but you’re going to describe it in your own unique way with a unique tone of voice that is a mind. It isn’t somebody else’s. And you’re going to resonate with someone listening, because it’s you. So if you ever heard Marie Forleo heard of Marie Forleo. She’s a fantastic marketer. She’s a fantastic motivator. But one of the things she will say, in her show in her preamble and her PostScript is that you’re sharing, only the gifts or the gifts that only you can share. And that is the whole point.

Don’t Miss Out

But if you don’t get started, potentially, you will still be there in that moment you felt that haven’t you somebody invents something and you think, Oh my gosh, I had that idea so long ago. I should have done that I should have done something with that could have been me or you see another trainer. And they’ve established some kind of credibility or maybe sense of sense of shame, however big or small it is, but you might just have a little bit of envy or jealousy.

Well, harness that that’s a piece of your that could have been me, or that should have been me and you don’t want to be that person in five years thinking. Had I done this, that could have been me.

Review imposter syndrome

Number one, remember this, we all have it. And you have it now. And you will when you level up, because as you level up, you will sure you’ll gain competence, but you’ll only have the competence when you’re looking down as you’re looking up to the people and the peers and people you aspire to be, like, later you will still feel like I don’t quite belong here yet. And there will always be just a little bit of that.

• it’s about them.
• what’s your why.
• remember that that could have been me, that should have been me. And you can stop that from happening.
• Remember the thing that makes your blood boil, what gets you going.

Got Comments?

All right, if you’ve gotten comments or questions, or you just want to admit that right along with me. You too, sometimes have imposter syndrome. But you’re going to commit to not letting it stop you from doing what you need to do to help the people that you know you can help.

Leave a comment below the show link at Fitness marketing mastery.com, forward slash imposter. What are you waiting for, the world needs us right now, more than ever.

Need help getting your message out? Learn More About this Fitness Mastermind

Trying to get results on Instagram? The platform that’s becoming a search engine, a resource for answers your clients are looking for?

My guest is the founder of Capture Social Group and the Social Butterfly course. She’s become a social influencer with a message and created a proven way to do it over and over again for her clients. Theresa Depasquale is a prior fitness pro and gets you. She’s been where you are and understands the day to day list you have.

CEO and founder of Capture Social Group, Theresa began her career as an entrepreneurial fitness expert. In 2012 She started her Instagram page and used her business acumen and marketing skills to quickly dominate the social media space by successfully building multiple large, revenue-generating brand pages on Instagram. Her own personal brand page @TheresaDepasquale has over 230k followers and is still growing today due to its motivational and educational content.

With over 10 years of online branding and social media experience she’s worked hard to master the art of online branding and social media strategy and has become the go-to for many high-level clients and companies providing one-on-one consulting and programs to help them successfully build their brand online and to grow their reach and credibility.

In this podcast we answer:

• What’s the magic of Instagram?
• Who is on Instagram?
• How does anyone ever keep up with changes?

So if you:

• want to build a brand online but don’t have time to figure it out
• want to gain credibility and establish yourself as an expert
• want to use social media to positively impact your business
• are willing to get out of your comfort zone and commit to a system that works
• Then hop below to the link in this podcast to learn more about the upcoming program.

Learn more about the next course: 

https://www.flippingfifty.com/social