Think Your Fitness Career is Down the Drain?

Are you a trainer whose business is down the drain?

You think that everything that you just spent your last 20 or 30 or 10 or 4.. recent college grad, I’m talking to you, is all down the drain?

I call B.S.

This episode is all heart… and more than a little frustration.

If you think right now that your education, and all that time that you put into learning how to be a personal trainer or how to be a health coach is a waste of time or it’s down the drain. You my friend, are pretending you’re a victim.

And you are not.

If you choose not to be.

That is, you’ve got to get creative.

I know people who will survive, people who are truly personal trainers, understand that they weren’t just somebody who had a job.

If you think about what you do, and what I do and how I’ve done for 36 years….

Its problem solving. We solve problems. You can solve problems on the telephone, you can solve problems, via FaceTime, you can solve problems via Skype, using zoom.

People have problems and you can solve them today just like you could in January and in July 2019.

You can use any combination of those tools, but those are just the platforms. It doesn’t change the way you relate to someone.

If you can only deliver your services by demonstrating them? You may be in need of improving your communication skills.

How well can you articulate, either through your voice by speaking it, and giving excellent cues, or by writing it, or transcribing what you speak?

So you are an excellent instructor. You can cue.

You can tell someone how to do something where to feel it, where not to feel it, and how to correct their movement. With the excellent articulation of your instructions.

No one took that away from you.

If you can do that speaking. You could simply transcribe it so it’s written. And you have minimal editing to do to make that. I did exactly that with this episode. I created it while on a walk, talking to my phone. But every episode is also a blog post at the show notes on the site. So the transcription has time stamps.

You can create a checklist, a description that accompanies a video of yourself. Now you have a product that you can sell.

Not just to one client, one time, one hour at a time. No, you can sell one thing over and over and over. If you’re open to possibilities. And you are really somebody who’s passionate, not just about getting dressed, being in a position where you are in front of a mirror, or on a stage, you can do this.

If you’re really about problem solving, then you’re not seeing this as a huge obstacle after more than 3 months. It’s just a reason to get creative.

There is always going to be a business model for trainers for health coaches for fitness instructors who are excellent at communication.

As long as they don’t get stuck, thinking there’s only one model of delivery.

Pick up your telephone call those people who you had been helping. They still have problems. They need them solved.

But the problem somebody has, in June and July and August of 2020 and far beyond that, during COVID-19 are different than the problems that they had in January in February of 2019 or 2019 or 2018. So, if you’ve been a trainer for a while and you’re stuck, thinking, the gym is closed (that you worked for), or it’s open but clients aren’t feeling safe coming back in. You really don’t have a problem.

You have opportunities.

Because your gym isn’t serving these people.

So you have two options. If you were working for a gym, you either approach the owner or the manager and suggest that collectively as a team, you begin to deliver service in virtual or digital way, by phone, by Skype by FaceTime, by zoom a combination of those with products or single sessions. That you create that serve problems.

And you’ve got to remember that this is opportunity.

This may actually make you a better trainer.

If what you’ve been doing in sessions, has been more about simply accountability. And I don’t discount, accountability, because for some people that’s 90% of it, but you can still do that in every virtual way that I’ve just described.

You can also be a better problem solver. A blind person it’s said has a heightened awareness and use of every other one of their other senses. They can smell, taste, and feel with their fingers, better than they could, better than sighted people, because they’re forced to.

You get better

And when you no longer are simply entertaining, you’re no longer distracted by everything else going on in the gym, by everything else that a client might be talking to you about, or that you might be excited to talk to them about like what happened to you last night or last weekend. What you’re looking forward to tomorrow or next weekend…they’ve done this weekend and they’re doing next weekend.

You know, it’s part of conversation, as you’re building rapport with your customers. Sometimes that becomes the conversation. Sometimes, to the extent that your training is actually overshadowed by the need for a social life for your client, and maybe for you.

If you think about it, we all spend a lot of time at work, more time that we spent in our own homes. Sometimes with our families. And sometimes we can get confused and the boundaries get blurred.

When you take yourself to digital delivery your other senses will improve. You’ll become a better problem solver. So rather than thinking about a creative workout for your client, what you’ll be doing more of is creating a workout that solves the problems of that unique client.

And when there’s one individual who has those problems there’s another one. There may be 10. And there may be dozens, and there may be hundreds, or maybe thousands. And that’s where you really give birth to a business model.

If one client has lower back issues.

Where there’s one there are more

If one client has a lack of mobility, solving those kinds of problems, then becomes something you can sell to the masses.

Now you have a business model based on problem and solution, not based on personality, not based on how you look, or your popularity. Not based on a single client meeting you for a single hour. There’s an opportunity right now that has never been better for trainers who can see it. And if you’re willing to do the work you may have a learning curve.

But it doesn’t take much to learn how to turn on your FaceTime doesn’t take not to learn how to record a training session on your phone. That you then have in a library, not just for one client. For many clients.

To get started, as soon as you’re willing to open up your mind to the fact that the strong will survive the creed, those willing to those who really do have a passion, and that platform inside a gym is only one way to look at things. Don’t wait to become better.

You can grow and be bigger, and really have a business that’s sustainable, potentially than where you were before, where you have more revenue than you had expenses.

So create products that people want because they solve problems.

Additional Opportunities

One of the other opportunities that you’ve got in front of you is thinking about what do you know, that other trainers and other health coaches need to know. Are there things that you can teach them that they otherwise wouldn’t acquire on their own, or that would years for them to acquire, can you accelerate their progress.

Can you accelerate or amplify the reach that they can have by teaching them new skills, making them more attractive to more people. Use your skills and apply them to their specific niche or market.

For Example

So, a trainer works with young student athletes. Maybe High School maybe college. Maybe those that want scholarships, pending we opened back up. At some point, we will. But those students right now may not be working with coaches and won’t be necessarily doing team workouts. And those students who have motivation, and they have the programming that can get them ahead. Will Survive potentially and thrive and be the ones who stayed consistent and not waiting for things to blow over.

So can you teach. Another trainer, how to use the skills you have, maybe its back pain prevention is your thing, your special power. You go deep in that. who doesn’t need that, right? Specifically athletes need it.

You know, and so how can you teach that and offer it to them? And you can also teach it to trainers who work with older adults, males or females. You could teach it to trainers who do specifically golf conditioning or back issues are common among golfers.

So think about all the populations that you might choose to teach your special sauce to packaging, what do they need to know. So then you’ve got two different revenue streams coming in. That kind of product or service that you can offer to customers. Virtually on any virtual digital platform.

And you’ve got the same type of delivery system, and platforms available to you to teach to trainers, and generally when you’re teaching it to a trainer who will be teaching to multiple consumers, you can charge more. The value of that product is greater. Remember it is now and has always been about the transformation for the client.

So that may be a revenue stream that you want to look into. If you are feeling like other things, other methods of increasing or earning revenue have closed their doors, other doors have opened. You’re just not looking for them. And you got to get to the handle of the door and try to turn again.

Don’t assume that a closed door is locked.

Resources:

Programs

Otter app

Show notes: Fitnessmarketingmastery.com/bs