Working out of a Budget Gym - Good or Bad for PTs

A new trend on the fitness scene is budget gyms, gone are the days of £60 a month membership with a £250 joining fee as more and more of £14.99 a month with no contract gyms spring up.  What we need to know as PTs is does attaching yourself to one of these gyms do your business good or harm...

...Well...

I am resident in such a gym and have come to the following conclusion

- There are members who are members of these gyms because thats all they can afford
- And there are members who are members because its convenient/close to work etc. and can afford your extra fees

So as long as your marketing targets this demographic then it shouldn't make a difference, the strategy I used to get these clients is with an early riser bootcamp, run 3 times a week and I charge £50 per person per month.  So I kind of had a gym inside a gym, use of the facility but with my 12 people paying a premium.  So if you look for them, you can find them

plus, budget gyms will usually have less rent, less competition and have less of a corporate feel to them leaving you with more freedom to build you business in your vision

Tell me to F**k off but...

Its always tough to approach people in the gym, particularly if you are not like me and actually naturally shy (shut it those who know me! :))

If I need to approach lads my own age or maybe younger than me, rather than swagger over with male bravado, I'll say something like

"Mate, tell me to f**k off if you like but you probably best off doing deadlifts rather than hamstring curls..."

And leave it at that, this seems to work to start a good conversation on the level

Just a thought...

Posters and your PT Business

When I first started in Fitness Marketing in 2002, posters worked a little, and they still do work if you have a large number of them placed in strategic places and we are talking about 30 of them...The old adage is that someone has to see a poster 7 times before it sinks in

Heres an example of one thats worked for me, as you can see its bold, clear and wth a clear call to action.  However, I advocate the use of leadboxes over posters.  This is what a leadbox looks like

A lead box requires a prospective client to take the time to fill in their details and post it in the box, hence the quality of the leads you get tend to be of a higher quality, plus you are in control of getting back to the prospective clients, I advertise my Fat Blaster Program and Early Riser Bootcamp Programs via this way and it works very well, just be sure to contact every lead you get and keep hold  of the details for future marketing efforts.  Use both, but lead boxes are cheap, very effective and something that not many PTs seem to have caught onto

What Separates you from the heard?

There are tons of PTs out there now, after the recession hit many retrained as personal trainers and...if the fitness job boards are anything to go by, I don't believe there are very many "employed" personal trainer jobs, only self employed.

Due to supply outstripping demand, we need to ask ourselves why would a potential client come to us over another personal trainer - REPS certification just doesnt cut it, its pretty much the standard and no gym will touch you if you don't have it!

Here's mine

- Password access to the members area of my website with Videos, Meal plans, Articles and a Support forum, you can do one yourself with a digital camera, an adjustable step and a bit of time in an empty fitness studio

- Discounted Physiotherapy

- Discounted Massage Therapy

- Discounted Nutritional Supplements

- Unlimited support via phone/e-mail

And thats without going into the whole "established for..." "experienced in..." there is three things that I give my clients that are tangible and a clear separator from my competition....Whats yours?

10 possible reasons that your fitness business is failing

1.        You are reliant on “pay as you go” rather than monthly billing

2.       You are embarrassed to ask for money

3.       You don’t have systems in place for marketing and sales that you stick to

4.       You don’t look for clients outside the gym

5.       You don’t run group training sessions

6.       You’re  not that competent trainer that you can guarantee results

7.       You take yourself too seriously

8.       You’re not professional enough

9.       You work too much on the wrong things

10.   You don’t know where to start when it comes to marketing and selling your services

 Any more?

The 4 Ps of an effective salesperson (in any industry)

Prospecting

Knowing how to get the product out there in front of potentially interested parties, in our case, we can do this by speaking with people on the gym floor, making cold calls, posting ads, networking etc.

Presentation Skills

It’s no good being the best personal trainer in the world if you can’t verbalise what you do and explain it in clear, benefit laced concise terms to potential clients, this is where a script comes in handy to begin with

Product Knowledge

You have to know your onions, in fitness terms, business terms and marketing terms

Personal Development

You need to read books that develop you, we know that eating too much fast food makes us fat (I hope we do anyway!) but reading too much tabloid nonsense is the same for the brain, I recommend books such as “the elephant and the twig” by Geoff Thompson and any of the Guerilla marketing series by jay Conrad Levinstein

Keeping your venue costs down

Personal Training and fitness instruction has got a fairly low initial financial layout.  One of the main costs is rent, whether it be gym rent or fitness studio/hall rent get this wrong and you could end up making less money than you planned.  So here are a few guidelines to help you along the way

-          Do sessions outside or at the clients home wherever possible, thereby eliminating rent altogether, make sure that your insurance covers this

-          Avoid the sports centre halls for your fitness classes and bootcamp’s, opt for church halls and scout halls.  I halved my rent with this strategy

-          Never take the first price offered to you by hall contacts

-          Don’t hire a bigger space than you need

And for Gym Rent

-          Don’t take the first price quoted by the gym

-          Offer to teach classes or work as a gym instructor in exchange for a reduced or non existing rent, this is a double edged sword as it gets you in front of potential clients, just make sure that this type of arrangement does not clash with prime PT time

-          If you are just starting off, see if you can get a Pay as you Go deal with the gym, where I am, the going rate is £10 per client if you can find a gym that will do this.  By paying for 20 sessions up front, I got it for £5 per client so explore this with the owner

Love to hear your comments