QUESTION: Pains of running a personal trainer business?

[seanmronan]

As a fitness enthusiast and former college athlete I wanted to reach out to understand some of the painful problems personal trainers have in their businesses.

Gaining some insight will help in my decision to enter the industry, and I'm interested in learning about the troubling tasks personal trainers run into on a day to day basis.

I would appreciate feedback from those already in the field, and thank you in advance for the help.

[KyleAaron]

What I have learned opening and running a fitness business is that new trainers should not open and run a fitness business. It's like an apprentice chef opening a restaurant. Work for a big box gym for at least 2 years, talk to everyone, train a variety of people. Then you'll find out,

1. if you're any good at the job
2. if good, who you work best with, and
3. if you actually like the job

It's best to do that on someone else's dollar rather than your own. And having done so you'll have more of the skills required to succeed in a fitness business.

[Steron99]

I work in a gym as an attendant,but because Bodybuilding ,fitness,etc. is my passion I help people with more than orientations,and how equipment works,people have been coming to me for my throughts,and I help them,and my success rate is higher than the trainers with degrees.Why? One reason because I "look the part",I see far too many trainers who look like they've never worked out [and I've never seen them do so-ever.] The other thing is to encourage members,we had one personal trainer who would belittle & insult every client.Alot of it is common sense people don't stop to see.

[Ronin4help]

As a fitness enthusiast and former college athlete I wanted to reach out to understand some of the painful problems personal trainers have in their businesses.

Gaining some insight will help in my decision to enter the industry, and I'm interested in learning about the troubling tasks personal trainers run into on a day to day basis.

I would appreciate feedback from those already in the field, and thank you in advance for the help.

The number one issue for trainers with issues is client acquisition. You need to understand how... and for how long...you are going to maintain a client base. If you do not have a clear understanding regarding client acquisition... and retention... then you cannot intelligently make a career decision as to whether or not this is something you should do.

[EdgarAllanPoe]

Honestly, the most frustrating thing for me is lack of dedication with gen pop clients.

The no carb trends, the non gmo, the hours of empty stomach cardio, the wanting to lose 40lbs on 4 weeks.... And thinking a personal trainer is going to get them a 6 pack in 8 weeks with no diet changes. Excuses, lots of excuses from gen pop clients. I like my job but it's definitely very frustrating when you check someone's food journal more often than they check their own

I've learned to develop a lot of patience in my 5-6 years of doing g this

[KyleAaron]

Check out habitry.com. Coach Stevo is a guy who after training people a bit decided that in training psychology was as important as physiology, so he went back to uni and studied it. He has useful insights for people like us.

A while back I looked at my numbers from the first two years of PT sessions at a big gym and wrote PT income and the 80/20 rule. When I was finishing up at the place it was 4 years, I looked at the numbers again and it was much the same. 50% of the people I trained provided me with 91% of my PT income. 22% of my clients I called a "headache" and those headaches only gave me 7% of my income.

So basically, you will work well with certain people, and not with others. When you start out you just don't know who those people are, and even if you do know it takes a while to figure it out. So you waste a lot of time. But after a few years you understand who you work well with and you get better at spotting these people early on - often you can tell in the first session. You learn to filter out the headaches.

I could never have trained half the people and only lost 10% of my income. The thing is, I probably wouldn't have lost income at all. That's because your mood and attitude are a key part of growing your business - whether in a big gym or on your own somewhere. Do you find new clients? Do current clients sign up for more sessions? Well, after a good session with a client I'd be out on the gym floor chatting to people and helping them, by talking to lots of people I ended up with more clients. After a crappy session with a client I didn't want to be in the gym and would leave it for a break - you don't sign up new clients sitting in the cafe bitching to your colleagues. And if you're in a good mood, the person doing 1 session a week is more likely to want to spend more time with you and do 2, or the 2pw goes to 3pw - and they're more likely to tell their friends to come and sign up with you. But if you're miserable and pissed off...

So when you learn to spot and filter out the people you won't work well with, you don't actually lose money by not training them. This, by the way, is something I think of every time a newbie trainer complains management doesn't give them clients - you don't want anyone to give you clients, they're much less likely to last than ones you recruit yourself.

Now someone like Coach Stevo seems to be saying "you can help everyone if you do it right." And what I've just said, like what edgar said, sounds like, "you can only help those who want to help themselves." Obviously as in most things the truth is somewhere in between. Around 1 in 6 people are hopeless and will never improve no matter how much help and advice they're given. Around 1 in 6 are solid and will improve whether they get help or not - these, by the way, will be your star clients you boast to everyone about, but if you're honest they were probably going to do alright with or without you. The other 2/3 are those for whom our help can make a difference. And that's where things like habitry.com and experience in filtering out deadbeats can help.

[Ronin4help]

Hey Kyle, Are (were) their a lot of people you find are (were) difficult to work with? I may have had a hand full over a ten year period but I never found this to be an issue. I'm reading a lot about it being one with many trainers though. So much so that they are willing to implement strategies to help reduce the problem.

[KyleAaron]

Speaking for me... mostly the headache client is just disorganised. There have been other things but that's most of it. "Disorganised" describes probably 50% of the people I ever trained at the big box gym, and I guess 10% of those at my garage gym. That's the short version. Late, constantly rescheduling... oy vey, now's the long version.

Usually the headache client is just someone who won't show up and on time. You have a 0600 appointment, they message at 0610 to say, "I've been up all night vomiting." No, you haven't - you just slept in. And this is the person who, having originally booked Tue/Thu 0700, after showing up to 5 of the last 8 sessions, says, "Actually 0630 works better," so you go and ask the 0630 person and they say, "Sure, I'll have a sleep-in!" and you rearrange 2-3 other people and then the disorganised person shows up to 2 of these new 8 session times. It's just a person who is totally disorganised, as you get to know them more you find out they are constantly late or absent at work, with dates and so on. They're just disorganised.

Obviously this disorganisation will carry on to other stuff like food and rest, and any workouts they're supposed to do outside PT sessions. So you're constantly being messed around by them and they don't even get good results. Waste of your time and their money, thanks bye.

That really is probably the source of 90% of all headaches as clients. I used to get lots of them when I worked at the big box gym, I don't get so many now. The sort of person who is that disorganised just won't even find my little garage gym. I've had a few still, they were either people who followed me up from the old gym or referrals from current clients. There's no way they'd have found me on their own, too hopeless.

Really we all look for: likeable, reliable and hardworking.

One out of three won't do. Likeable, but unreliable and lazy? "Let's do coffee some time." Annoying and unreliable, but works hard when they show up? Futile. Worst of all is... annoying, reliable and lazy. You don't get along, they complain all the time about how hard it is... but they always show up. You check your phone five minutes before the session in the desperate hope they'll cancel but... they are always there, ready to whinge. Hoo boy.

Two out of three will do. If you don't really like them, say they're a bit boring to talk to - but hey they're reliable and hardworking, "okay do another set," and they always show up and work hard so they'll get good results. If they're a bit unreliable, but when they do show up they work hard and they're fun to talk to, well you'll put up with them missing sessions or being late; they won't get much results but they'll have fun and will get better than they would on their own. If they're lazy but always show up and likeable, you just tease them a bit for their laziness and push them, since they give at most 50% their results will be limited but a zillion times better than on their own.

Now if they're three out of three... love them! Hold them close. Favour them. Remember their birthdays and give them something, remember when their kid starts school, when their sister is getting married and all that. Whatever our jobs, wouldn't we all prefer to work with people who are all likeable, reliable and hardworking?

Any fisherman will tell you that the wider you cast your net the larger the bycatch, the more of the kind of fish you don't want. Working in a big box gym I got a lot more 0/3 or 1/3 people than I do now. As I said above, now working in a garage gym, just the fact that it's a garage gym will exclude most of the totally hopeless. You don't really need your sht together to find a 4,000 square metre YMCA or Fitness First with a massive sign outside saying "GYM"; you need some amount of initiative, brains and organisation to find your way to a 36 square metre black iron gym with no sign on the road.

As well, I no longer do all those back-to-back half-hour sessions one-on-one. I do individualised programming in a small group setting. People don't pay for a chunk of time, they pay for access - once you've paid, come once a week for half an hour or five times a week for two hours, fine by me - but do make and keep appointments. "Okay Anna we'll see you Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday at 4pm. Bob comes Mondays and Thursdays at 4, and Charlie Sundays and Wednesdays at 5, so you'll see those guys sometimes, too. But Diana is here religiously Sun/Tue/Thu at 4 so basically she'll be a workout partner for you."

So it no longer matters if someone is fifteen minutes late, it doesn't mean you'll have to rush through or cut short your workout and is not cutting into anyone else's time. And there are always others there so most will push themselves a bit harder. Which is to say, I've lowered the bar a bit for "reliable" and the environment will help the "hardworking" part a bit. And because there's 3-6 people there at a time, it lessens the pressure on my individual relationship with that particular client, Kyle and Anna don't have to get along great if Anna can also talk to Bob and Charlie, so "likeable" is less of an issue.

The one-on-one pay by the hour method puts a lot of pressure on trainer and client - you have to get along, you have to show up regularly and on time, and you have to work hard - if you don't, it's miserable and you don't get results. Most people don't actually need one-on-one, but some of them want it. Well, personal and trainer, which do you really want as a client, and which do you want to focus on as a trainer?

Bit of a ramble but there you go.