Fit Business Insider » Personal Trainer Marketing

What Can Sunglasses Teach You About Running A Fitness Business?

admin — Sat, 17 Jul 2010 02:19:23 +0000

A couple of days ago I was reading an article about Luxottica, a pretty amazing company that most people have never heard of.

But maybe you’ve heard of some of these companies that offer their own premium brands of sunglasses:

Ray-Ban

Oakley

Bulgari

Dolce & Gabbana

Salvatore Ferragamo

Prada

Burberry

Chanel

Polo Ralph Lauren

Tiffany

Versace

Luxottica makes all of them and about a dozen others. They own Ray-Ban and Oakley and work under license with the rest.

But if that wasn’t’ enough, they also own LensCrafters, Pearle Vision and Sunglass Hut. So their eye doctors are the ones telling you that you need a new pair of glasses, their sales people are ones helping you choose them, and their factories are the ones making the glasses.

Basically, if there’s money to be made in the sunglasses market – they’re getting a piece of the action.

So how can you apply this in your business – here are a few ideas:

Niche Programs – Each of the different brands that Luxottica owns or manufactures for has their own audience. You could create different programs that each target a different group of people. Women’s only camps, mom specific programs, youth programs and corporate programs are just a few of the different options you could offer.

Different Packaging – The common approach is run 2, 3 or 4 day per week programs. What about these 4 ways you could be packaging your expertise:

Fitness Coaching Programs – I’ve talked about these in previous posts, but basically you’re meeting with a group once per week for 4-8 weeks teaching them exercise and nutritional strategies they can do at home. This type of program is a great downsell from semi-private training or bootcamps.
Workshops – You could run a workshop once every month or two that would appeal to both your clients and non-clients. Everything from nutrition to kettlebells are great topics for workshops and can bring you in thousands (or tens of thousands) in additional revenue each year.
Bootcamp To Go – B.J. Gaddour just did a great module teaching Bootcamp Blueprint members how to take what they’re currently doing in their camps and packaging it as a ‘home study’ program for people that either can’t afford the cost of camp or live too far away to attend regularly.
Weekend Camps - This is something we’ve primarily taught in the youth fitness and sports performance market, but it can work for adult programming too. Here’s an easy way to do it: Pick something that would be a great workshop – training with bands or kettlebells are great examples. Turn it into a six week camp and sell it for $99-129. The camp meets for one hour each Saturday or Sunday for six weeks and you teach them a more in depth version of what they’d learn in a one day workshop.

Co-Branded Programs – Other organizations ranging from YMCA’s to Homeowner’s Associations are great targets to create a co-branded program with. You provide the services and give them part of the proceeds for providing a location and marketing it to their audience. I’ve run several camps with YMCAs where they did everything other than me providing the service and kept between 25-40%. I coached and took home 60-75%.

Corporate Programs – I won’t go into them too much as Corporate Guru Greg Justice will be sharing some strategies on running successful corporate programs next week – but this is a great way to add another profit center leveraging your network and expertise.

Information Products – There’s a right way to do this and a wrong way. The right way is how my buddies Eric Cressey and Mike Robertson do it. They simply take the things they’re doing effectively in their businesses and packaging them so people that can’t come work with them in Boston or Indy can still benefit.

I’ve just scratched the surface, but you’re getting the picture. When Luxottica produces sunglasses they are constantly looking for other ways to distribute them, other markets that want what they offer and other ways to add revenue.

When it comes to fitness, fat loss or sports performance – you should do the same.

By the way – if you can think of any ways to get a piece of the action that I missed, do me a favor and share them below.

Dedicated to your success,

Pat

14 Surefire Ways To Grow Your Fitness Business

admin — Thu, 17 Jun 2010 00:59:08 +0000

Tonight we’ll have some of the most successful fitness pros in the industry getting into Louisville for this weekend’s Bootcamp Bootcamp event. If you’re not going to be one of the folks in attendance – no sweat – I wanted to give you some surefire tips that will have your business rockin’ in no time. Here you go:

Be Great At What You Do – If you’re a sh&tty trainer or coach – all the marketing advice in the world won’t make up for it. Think about seeing a great ad for a restaurant. It might get up in the door for one meal, but if your meal was bad, would any amount of advertising ever get you back?
Joint Ventures – Have you ever taken the time to find out how many businesses are there in your area who serve you potential clientele? You should.

Build a relationship with them so you can eventually have them as a referral source. Start by being nice, offering free training to the owners and at least steep discounts to the staff. Send them some referrals. Eventually you will be able to get referrals in return and more structured lead generation activities like endorsed mailings or emails.

Public Speaking – An incredible business builder. Why sell to one person when you can sell to 20,30, 50, 100 or more at one time while also being positioned as an expert.

And there is no shortage of groups, clubs and organizations looking for speakers – so don’t ignore what is probably the best lead generation opportunity available to you.
Reactivating Former Clients and Old Prospects – These people already know you and have shown an interest in what you offer. Some of them have even worked with you. Go back to them with a special offer and grow your business.
Networking – There is nothing better than face to face marketing. There is no postcard, e-mail or newspaper ad that can compare to talking to someone in person. Make a point of meeting several new people each day and adding them to your personal network. Get out from behind the computer and attend networking events and put yourself in more settings with people outside of your inner circle.
UpSells and Backend Sales – There is NO ONE better to sell to than your current clients. If someone is purchasing a training program from you, make them an offer at the point of sale and upgrade them to a supplement package, nutritional coaching program or an accelerated training program that will compliment what they’ve already purchased.

And don’t hesitate to create new stuff to sell to the same people that have been buying from you for a while. You’d be amazed at some clients ‘appetites’ for new offers.
Hustle – Nothing gets done without hustle. We’re hosting Bootcamp Bootcamp this weekend and many of our star students will be here. They come from different parts of the country (even other parts of the world), some have facilities while others don’t. Each of them have honed in on 2-3 core strategies that have built their businesses – and it’s a different 2-3 for many of them.

But the one thing that is the same about all of them is they Hustle!
Social Proof – You can never have too many testimonials. It’s a great way to recognize someone’s success and you never know which one will resonate with the prospect you’re talking to – so have a lot.
Referrals – You should make referral generation your key marketing strategy. It only takes 4 things to make this happen. 1. A great service that people want to share. 2. You asking EVERYONE for referrals – no exceptions. 3. You making it super-easy to refer prospects to you. 4. You rewarding people for directing prospects to you.

That’s it – and as you noticed, the burden falls squarely on your shoulders – not the client.
Risk Reversal – There should be zero risk for someone to do business with you. 100% or more Money Back Guarantees, free trials, short term entryway programs like my 21 Day Drop a Dress Size program – they’re all great ways to eliminate the risk for the prospect.
Invest In Yourself – Go to events like Perform Better Summits and Bootcamp Bootcamp. Invest in educational products and programs. Get coaching.

In fact – I don’t know any successful fitness pros that haven’t done some form of coaching or belonged to a mastermind group. That’s not an accident.
EFT Billing - You didn’t get into this business to be a bill collector, did you?
Sell Memberships, Not Sessions – Too many trainers sell ‘a series’, blocks, packages – all a bunch of short term offerings that make it tougher to have a sustainable business with steady cash flow.

Don’t be one of them.

Sell your programs as monthly memberships where clients invest a set amount each month for a defined amount of service. Ideally this membership will be for a commitment of several (or more) months – or at least auto-renew every month.
Care About Your People – Your clients. Your network. Your staff. Make it readily apparent that you care about them and their success every chance you get.

If you do that it will make everything you do much, much easier.

What strategies did I miss that are working for you? Let me know below.

Dedicated to your success,

Pat Rigsby

Pat Rigsby is a Co-Owner of the International Youth Conditioning Association & the youth fitness franchise Athletic Revolution as well as a fitness industry consultant serving thousands of personal trainers and fitness entrepreneurs. Sign up for his fitness business free newsletter to discover proven marketing, sales and business strategies, along with blog updates, news, and more! While you’re at it, follow him on Twitter.

7 Hidden Fitness Marketing Tactics

admin — Thu, 03 Jun 2010 02:35:56 +0000

When discussing marketing it’s easy to fall back to the standby stuff like networking, public speaking, direct mail and PPC ads.

But these are not the only ways to grow your business. Here are 7 hidden fitness marketing tactics that will help you grow your business in a hurry.

1. Have a ‘Carrot’- One of the best hidden fitness marketing tactics I know is to build ‘carrots’ into your business. Martial arts does this with the belt system. Most MLM companies have this with different tiers you can ascend through by reaching certain performance benchmarks. We’ve even developed a system for this in Athletic Revolution.

The easiest way to build a carrot into your business is to run Transformation Contests so your clients have a short term deadline to shoot for. But don’t limit yourself to this. There are plenty of other ways that you can set intermediate goals for your clients so they can reach certain benchmarks to reinforce their successful behavior.

2. Recognize. Make sure you’re recognizing your clients every chance you get…the loyalty it will build is enormous. Client of the week. Client of the month. Camper of the day. Simple acknowledgments of jobs well done and the occasional card congratulating someone on their accomplishments. All of these will help you build a fiercely loyal client base that will refer people to you over and over.

3. Social proof. People want to see people who’ve been where they want to go. Collect tons of testimonials, before and after pics and success stories. Make them a key part of every website, blog, ad, postcard and showcase them in your facility. This will close more people for you than the best sales script ever will.

4. Continual improvement. If you want to keep your clients excited, continually add new features, offerings and systems. This will keep things fresh and keep your people from looking elsewhere for the ‘better mousetrap.’ Plus these new additions and changes are great for generating publicity and to use as marketing assets.

5. Have a Hook. People want to feel like the person they’re working with is an expert in exactly what they need. If someone wants to become a better cyclist, they want someone who is an expert in coaching cyclists. If they’re a mom, they want a mom’s fitness expert.

Figure our your hook and it will make everything else about marketing easier.

6. Consistently soft selling. You should always be building value in your other offerings. If you sell Prograde – talk about the benefits, share success stories, present it as a solution when the opportunity presents itself. You can do this without ever hard selling someone. You’re just sharing solutions and successes.

7. Over Delivering. It goes without saying, but every day you have the opportunity to keep your clients excited about you and your business…make sure you do. You’re delivering more than results. You’re delivering and experience.

Make sure the atmosphere is energetic and motivating. If you train in groups be sure to give everyone some personal attention. Send personal cards & emails. Make personal calls.

Set yourself apart from every other business your clients interact with. You’re guaranteed growth if you do.

So there are 7 hidden fitness marketing tactics that get overlooked more than they should. Did I miss any? If so, be sure to share them below.

Dedicated to your success,

Pat Rigsby

3 Fitness Sales Keys To Remember

admin — Tue, 18 May 2010 00:01:10 +0000

Selling personal training, bootcamps, youth fitness programs or even health club memberships – that’s the foundation of your business.

No sale – no client, camper or member.

But most fitness pros I know hate selling. But that’s only because they’re not comfortable with it yet.

Here are three tips to change that and make closing sales much, much easier.

Fitness Sales Key #1 – Everything Leads To A Sale

Sometimes I have to remind the trainers we work with that while sending press releases, getting on TV, making blog posts, writing articles, creating product and all the rest are great…they’re all just a means to lead to you selling something.

See, sometimes we have to keep our eyes on the prize. If you don’t have enough clients or campers are you waiting for something to happen…or are you making it happen.

When Holly & I were living in the basement while we were getting our training business and health club ramped up – I was laser focused on selling training. I didn’t leave the gym without getting two new clients. It meant some late nights, like they say – if the want is strong enough you’ll find a way.

Even before that, when I was first running a training department in a Gold’s Gym, the company had a bonus of $250 if you sold 12 deals in a pay period. My goal every pay period was 36 deals and I considered that $750 part of my regular income. I knew I needed 3 deals a day to make it happen – and was relentless on getting my 3.

So keep doing all those things…

Keep blogging, sending press releases, writing articles and the rest. But don’t lose sight of the fact that selling is what pays the bills.

Fitness Sales Key #2 – Proper Framing Leads To Bigger Sales

Want an easy way to selling bigger deals? It’s two simple steps, but I’m not sure you’ll believe me if I tell you.

Here goes:

Step 1: Offer no more than 3 potential options to a prospect. Something like this:

1 Session Per Week

2 Sessions Per Week

3 Sessions Per Week

It could be 2, 3 and 4 or 3, 4 and 5…makes no difference to me. You know what you’re currently selling. Just reduce it to 3 options.

Step 2: If you’re most popular program is 2 sessions per week but you want to sell more 3 session per week packages, add a package bigger than that to your price sheet.

If you already have:

1 Session Per Week

2 Sessions Per Week

3 Sessions Per Week

Then switch to offering:

2 Sessions Per Week

3 Sessions Per Week

4 Sessions Per Week

You’ll immediately sell more 3 session per week programs. It’s all simple psychology. Too many choices have been proven to cause indecision and high priced offerings make offerings priced lower seem more reasonable.

That’s it…two easy steps to more sales bigger packages and programs sold.

Fitness Sales Key #3 – Sell Something

Get small commitments first.

There was a time in my personal training career that I’d average three closed sales a day.

Unfortunately many trainers don’t do 3 a month.

But the trick was to close the ones that weren’t ready to commit to bigger programs on something.

Or, if I was doing a speaking engagement, close the attendees on something small. Get a ‘yes’ first.

Once someone has invested a little with you it’s much, much easier to get them to invest more.

But only if you deliver great service during that initial purchase. So if you’re having trouble getting people to enroll in ‘big ticket’ programs, get them to at least invest in something small first.

Then after you’ve built a little more rapport and have delivered great service and value, present your bigger offerings.

You’ll be pleasantly surprised at how little resistance you get then.

I hope this helped you get a little more confident and comfortable with sales. If it did, leave me a comment below and let me know.

Dedicated to your success,

Pat Rigsby

Fitness Marketing: You Don’t Have To Do Everything

admin — Mon, 03 May 2010 03:15:08 +0000

I just got back from a few days in Dallas at the Dan Kennedy Super Conference where I got to pick up a few ideas on everything from copywriting to franchising. I also got to spend some time with fitness industry colleagues Curtis Mock, Chris Bachelor, Craig Ballantyne and Scott Colby.

But some of my most enjoyable time in Dallas was Saturday morning when I got to spend some time with King Hoover.

King is a long time customer and friend that has been part of our original Trainer’s Inner Circle program and is currently a Bootcamp Blueprint & IYCA member. He’s also one of the most humble and kind gentlemen I’ve met.

King started off our conversation almost apologetically, saying that he was a little upset with himself for not implementing all the great marketing strategies we’ve provided in the Blueprint.

I had to laugh a little.

King’s built a great business in Fort Worth, Texas and he’s had his own syndicated radio show, he’s on TV and he’s about as media friendly as anyone I’ve met.

And he’s probably the best networker I know.

By the time I sat down with King for breakfast he’d already befriended the guy at the next table and knew all about his business and treated our server like she was a Head of State.

King treats EVERYONE that way.

No hidden agenda.

No ‘what can this person do for me attitude.’

He just treats everyone like we all want to be treated –and like we all should treat people.

In every interaction – without exception.

And that’s his go to marketing strategy…being and outgoing, friendly good person.

In fact, a while back King helped a gentleman lose some weight.

This man happened to be a security guard. Not a CEO or the President of a big company.

As with everyone King interacts with – this man saw how genuine King was and how much he cared about his clients.

Over the years they’ve stayed in touch – and recently King received a call from this now former security guard.

The man is now over some community based programs with the Texas Rangers baseball team and has invited King to run fitness camps and programs for kids (as I mentioned, King’s an IYCA member), families and adults.

King gets to use the Rangers stadium, gets his signage around the park and is essentially partnering with a Major League Baseball team (that draws 2 million fans a year) to be their preferred fitness provider.

And it all started with King just building a relationship.

I’m not suggesting that you should drop everything you’re doing and just focus on networking since that’s the foundation of King’s marketing efforts.

That’s his strong suit.

If it’s yours too – maybe you should ramp your efforts there up a bit.

But if not – pick 1 or 2 things that can be your go to marketing strategies and work them to no end.

Ben Warstler got over 100 campers with Transformation Contests.

Steve Krebs got over 100 with fundraisers.

King’s build his business with networking…Donovan Owens too.

It’s better to be great at a couple strategies than mediocre at a bunch.

And King’s living proof that you never know what doors might open if you just keep knocking.

Dedicated to your success,

Pat Rigsby

Marketing Without Spending a Fortune

admin — Mon, 26 Apr 2010 05:23:19 +0000

One of the most common questions I get goes something like this:

“How can I fill up my schedule without spending a fortune on ineffective advertising or direct mail?”

What they really mean is:

I don’t have enough clients. Can you help?

Well, the better question is what did I NOT do in the past few weeks to cause me not to have as many clients as I want? I guess what I’m saying is the answer lies in your own actions. Every day you get to decide whether you’re going to work on your business or just complain about the problems within your business.

So, with that in mind, here are several things you can do ASAP to get things rolling – if you’re willing to take ACTION:

1. Evaluate your sales system

Without an effective sales system an increase in leads isn’t going to help you much. You need to have a systematic approach for presenting your offerings to your prospects that will give you the highest possible outcome when it comes to generating clients and increasing revenue. Here are some tips:

Use a script. Every presentation should be the same. Develop your best approach and use it every time.
Use an alternate choice close. Present 2-3 options and ask the prospect which one they want to get started with.
If you’re ideal offering is a 3 session per week bootcamp, make sure there is a 4 or 5 session per week option. This will make the 3 session per week bootcamp look less expensive by comparison.

Bottom line: bad sales system = bad income.

2. An easy way to ask for referrals

While you should have several referral systems in place, this one is probably the easiest. EVERY time someone says anything positive about your services reply with this:

“I’m so glad you’re seeing great results and enjoy working with me. I enjoy working with people like you that are truly motivated to achieve their goals. (Pause) By the way, most of our new clients are referrals from current clients that are enjoying their experience with us – so if you’re pleased with your progress please tell your friends that would like to achieve similar results about us.”

Many will respond by saying that they’ve already told someone about you. Follow up by providing them with a gift card or certificate that they can provide to a referral.

3. An easy way to reactivate former clients

Here is a simple way to reactivate former clients. Go though your database and call your former clients using this simple script:

“Hi ________________, this is ________________ from XYZ Personal Training. I just wanted to give you a call to see how you’ve been doing since your last camp / session?”

If they say they’re doing fine, simply say:

“I am so glad to hear that. If you need anything or want to come back in for a session, please give me a call.”

If the response is something like “I’ve been slacking on my workouts” or “I need to get back on track” follow up with:

“Let’s schedule you to come back in for a free session this week. Which is better for you, Tuesday or Wednesday?”

Remember – if people forget about you they can’t refer

4. Reaching out to local businesses

If you want to fill up your bootcamp with prospects fast, you can do a business call campaign. A business call campaign is probably not in everyone’s comfort zone, but if you’re willing to do it you are guaranteed of generating a bunch of new prospects in a hurry.

The added benefit to something like this is that it makes your camp a lot more energetic with bigger numbers and really expands your network in a hurry. So here is what you do.

Pull out the phone book and turn to the yellow pages. Start with the ‘A’s’ and begin calling all local businesses that might have an employee that fits your target market. Here is a easy script for you to use:

“ Hello, this is __________ from ____________ and in celebration of our ‘Get (Your City) Fit Month’ I wanted to call a few local businesses, and the first person to answer the phone WINS A FREE TWO WEEK COMPLIMENTRAY MEMBERSHIP to my fitness bootcamp………..

AND THAT’S YOU!!!!! CONGRATULATIONS!!!!!

Now all you have to do is RSVP by going to my website and entering your claim number in the next 48 hours (have form or contact page) or by coming to camp orientation this Saturday at 10 a.m. to secure your spot in this month’s camp…… Would you rather attend orientation this SATRURDAY or register through the website and attend the orientation next week??? GREAT!!!! And your first and last name was? And I also need second phone number where you can be reached?

Ok __________, when you come to orientation, ask for (name) and it should take about 10 minutes to get you registered. And if for some reason you cannot make your appointment (DATE/TIME) – can we count on you to give us a call back at (number) with a better time?”

If you commit to making a dozen calls a day you’ll get 3-4 people that want to take you up on your offer. Of those, 1-2 will show up to camp. Five days a week of that means 5-10 new leads a week, or 20-40 new leads per month.

Now, here’s how you turn them into paying clients:

Following orientation or first day of camp, show them that they can trade in the 2 weeks for one month free if they enroll in the next (camp or 2 camps….your choice) if they choose to during their first visit.

Even if you only convert 25%, that’s 5-10 new campers per month. Not bad for a few phone calls.

So there you have it, four ways to add more prospects and more clients without spending a dime. And remember, these are in addition to the things you should be doing on a daily and weekly basis while executing your fitness business growth plan. If you’re working a plan list this you should have no problem filling up your schedule in a hurry – with almost zero out of pocket cost.

If you’d like more tips like these be sure to Test Drive the Fit Business Inner Circle for only $1 by clicking here.

Dedicated to your success,

Pat Rigsby

3 Things You Can Do To Build A Successful Business

admin — Tue, 20 Apr 2010 02:42:10 +0000

This coming weekend I’m headed to Portsmouth, Ohio to visit the University that I coached at. They’re honoring the team I coached that finished 5^th at the World Series 10 years ago so I’ll get to see some of my former players and I’ll throw out the first pitch for their game.

Should be fun.

Well, as you’ve heard me mention a number of times before – coaching taught me a lot. And because we were a program with pretty limited resources I had to learn how to achieve success by doing some things differently than the competition since we weren’t going to compete by having more scholarships (we had about 1/10 the number our best competitors had) or a nicer facility (we used a city owned park.)

So I read books on business and marketing as well as the typical coaching fare – looking for an advantage. Here are three strategies that allowed us to become a nationally competitive program in spite of resources that were better suited for a high school team that I have used to help us achieve similar success in business:

Find Opportunity Where Others Don’t – In baseball, coaches typically allocate a lot of their scholarship money for pitches and shortstops. They invest a lot of practice time on things like pickoff plays and obscure bunt defenses.

Not me.

We weren’t going to outspend our competition for the pitches they wanted – so I focused my energies on aggressively going after players with great offensive potential that were undervalued by the competition and just tried to find diamonds in the rough when it came to pitches or shortstops. When it came to practice time – instead of spending much time on things that happen 5% of the time in the game I dedicated our practices to 2 things:

The things that happen most of the time in games. The basics.
Making our players better athletes. We took an approach to strength & conditioning similar to that of football programs while most other teams were still using Nautilus machines.

Sounds kind of obvious, but it’s certainly not the norm in baseball.

Transitioning to the business world – this approach led me to gravitate toward 30 minute 1 on 1 sessions, group based training and EFT billing.

To apply this in your own business – look at what others don’t do or don’t do well. If no one offers youth programs – there’s your opportunity. If no one specifically targets moms – there you go. If no one has a quality service option for $99 – find a way you can help people a lot at that price.

There are undervalued opportunities in EVERY business and EVERY market – it’s your job to find them.

Play To Your Strengths – Once I identified a formula that worked for building our team – I just expanded on it. I worked on recruiting an even better caliber of player that fit the same mold. I kept refining the system. I didn’t try to also do all the things the competitors were doing. I simply wanted to create the best possible version of our organization.

In the business world – this means don’t try to be all things to all people. Pick a couple of things and be extraordinary at them. When it comes to marketing – hone in on 2-3 core systems and work them aggressively every day until your business is where you want.

Strive to be known as the Go To Expert for a couple of niche markets in your community. A little focus and you can own those markets.

Get Personal – My biggest strength as a coach was as a recruiter. And my recruiting was simple:

Create a ‘product’ players would want to be a part of.
Build and cultivate relationships with the players that would be a good fit for what we were trying to do.

So I made a LOT of personal calls. A lot of visits to get to know people. I went to tons of coaching clinics to build relationships with the high school coaches. I took the prospects and their families on tours when they came to campus instead of delegating it. If getting the right players was the most important factor in being successful – then getting personal was my way of doing it.

Business is the same. For our mastermind groups – you don’t ever see sales copy or email promos. We want to get to know the people that are going to be in the groups to make sure they’re a good fit. Personal calls are a perfect way to do that.

If you want to see an immediate uptick in your business – take every interaction you make up one level:

If you normally send a mass email – send a personal one.
If you normally send a personal email – make a call.
If you normally make a call – visit in person.

I guarantee you’ll love the results.

OK – 3 lessons learned from coaching college baseball that have continued to help me time and time again in business. They’ve all worked well for me – now let them work for you.

Dedicated to your success,

Pat Rigsby

11 Ways To Explode Your Fitness Business

admin — Wed, 14 Apr 2010 00:58:35 +0000

We all want business growth. More clients. Different programs. A new facility. The list goes on and on.

It’s just part of being a fitness entrepreneur.

Here are 11 different ways you can absolutely achieve explosive growth in your fitness business. Some, like group training, might be old news to you but can be tweaked a bit to add thousands of dollars to your bottom line – while others like warehouse facilities might be something you’ve given a little thought to but haven’t been certain if it was right for you.

Check them out and tell me in the comments below if you want to hear more about any of them specifically.

Warehouse Facilities – I think warehouse facilities are to our industry now what bootcamps were 2-3 years ago. They offer the best of both worlds – the opportunity to run group training and bootcamps while having your own dedicated space at a low cost.

So I fully expect the trend of these types of gyms to really take off over the next couple of years – and just like with bootcamps or youth training, if you’re at the front of the curve things are way easier. And if you’re a bootcamp owner, I’d still be on the lookout for a low cost space of your own. It will give your people a destination, give you more options to add additional revenue streams and give you more security.

Group Training – I’ve said it a hundred times before and I’ll say it thousands of times more – you need to be offering group training. Bootcamps, small group, clinics, camps, semi-private…they all provide you an opportunity to better leverage your time, allow you to make more money and also permit more people to benefit from what you have to offer due to lower per-person price points.

But here’s the thing – most people are only thinking bootcamps when they think group training. Why not offer groups of 4-8 during some time slots that you couldn’t necessarily fill up a bootcamp. Then you can offer more niche-specific groups like one for moms or one for combat conditioning. Whatever market you want to reach but may not have enough traction in to justify a full camp.

Multiple Streams of Income – I talked about this over the last couple of weeks and have a full webinar on it here (LINK.) If you want to thrive, you almost have to be generating revenue from more than one area. Every really successful fitness professional I know has at least 3-4 different revenue streams adding to their pool of income with many having 10 or more. I’d strongly suggest that you have a minimum of 3 revenue streams going at any time.

Hustle – I know of NO fitness professional that is enjoying business success that doesn’t hustle. If you want to grow your business and your income – you MUST be willing to get on the phone, network, knock on doors and do the things that most people don’t do. While everyone else was sitting around complaining about how bad the economy was over the past couple of years we’ve had Bootcamp Blueprint and Elite Mastermind members killing it during this time.

Tighten Up Your Niche – People want to deal with experts – so don’t be a generalist. If you serve everyone, then you eliminate your best point of differentiation. If you train everyone but the prospect is looking for help with this son that is a baseball player, will they choose you or the fitness pro that specializes in working with baseball players? (That’s a rhetorical question.) Be sure to position yourself as an expert in a niche – or several niches. This will make marketing easier and allow you to price your services higher. Use the approach with smaller group training I mentioned earlier to reach a couple different niche markets for starters.

Offer Corporate Programs – A lot of fitness pros are seeing a ton of success offering fitness programs / bootcamps to businesses. Some are offering full scale wellness programs while others are just making private bootcamps available to the business’ employees. The beauty of this is that you can fill up a group program by marketing to a single business. Corporate programs are a great profit center to add to any fitness business.

Train Young Athletes – I’m biased as a Co-Owner of the IYCA, but the truth is that parents will continue to spend their disposable income on their kids long after they quit spending it on themselves. This is the fastest growing segment of the fitness industry by virtually all accounts and you’d be foolish to ignore it as a profit center for your business.

Add in a couple group offerings focused on the youth (6-18 yrs old) market and you’ll easily see an additional $2000-$4000 in monthly revenue.

Keep Studying – Every successful fitness pro I know is attending seminars, participating in coaching and mastermind groups and reading / listening to information to improve themselves as a professional. Don’t limit yourself to studying what you love. If you’re weak in an area – brush up on it. This goes for training and business. I’ve consistently invested more than $15,000 (and sometimes significantly more than that) per year in continuing education and always received a 10 to 1 ROI for every dollar spent.

Always Be Marketing – While most fitness pros only market when things are slow, you need to be marketing 365 days per year. That doesn’t mean you have to spend an arm and a leg on advertising. Instead, focus on getting at least 4-8 low cost – high return marketing systems in place and keep testing for ways to improve them

Set Goals and Make Them Happen. Set a target and hit it. If you want 5 new clients a month, set it as you goals and create a plan to get them. If you want to earn $100,000 in 2009, you need to make $8333 a month. Develop a plan that gets you there and execute it.

Here’s what I do: I write everything that I want to accomplish down, break it into short term goals and then each day take small actions to accomplish those short term goals. It’s not rocket science, but it’s been responsible for any success that I’ve had.

Be The Anti-Health Club. 99% of health clubs don’t get it. They do nothing more than rent access to equipment to their members. If you want to be successful, go to a big box gym and study everything they do…then do the opposite. Treat your clients like gold. Build relationships. Focus on delivering great results and an outstanding experience. Send cards, recognize accomplishments and treat people they way you like to be treated.

Do that along with implementing the other tips and you’ll be well on your way to a being the dominant fitness business in your market.

OK – there you have it. 11 different ways that you can see some serious business growth.

So do me a favor and tell me below if there are any of them you want to hear more about. If so, I’ll put together some posts based on your interests.

Dedicated to your success,

Pat Rigsby

April 15th = Fitness Business Opportunity?

admin — Mon, 12 Apr 2010 02:46:02 +0000

One of my Mentorship clients – Justin Yule decided to use his 35th birthday and Tax Season to develop a great little promotion and offer a paid in full discount to his current members and his unconverted prospects.

Here’s what Justin had to say about it:

If you need to make a few extra thousand bucks fast now could be great time.

While most people dread doing their taxes, a lot of people look forward to them because they purposely have more money taken out of their pay throughout the year so they end up with a nice “tax bonus.”

Take advantage of that and tie it to a big sale like “Save Even More with Your Taxes” or “Get the Best ROI on your Tax Return.” Whatever. Create a killer One Year Paid In Full Discount.

Compose a solid marketing email, add a personal twist if you can and send it out to your list.

I’m actually combining this with my Birthday Special. I turned 35 on Saturday, April 3. Here’s how I made it work for me.

- On the day before, I sent this email to my list:

—————————————————————————–

Hey ~Contact.FirstName~!

Tomorrow is my 35th birthday!!

No, the number doesn’t bug me one bit. I’m actually ecstatic. I feel great. I’m in great health and only getting better. Plus, for some reason chicks dig the gray hair ;-b

Janell and I are having an awesome time on vacation in Arizona visiting good friends. I hope your week has been fantastic as well.

I’m celebrating my birthday here in AZ, but I’ve got a little gift for you over at the blog.

(LINK)

I’m looking forward to a great year with you!

Have Faith & Take Action!

Justin

———————————————————————–

The little gift was a downloadable in-home cardio workout.

On my birthday I sent this email:

—————————————————————————

~Contact.FirstName~,

OK. It’s for real now. I’m officially 35 years young!

Yup, YOUNG. Like I said yesterday, I feel great. I’m in awesome health: physically, mentally and emotionally. I’m stronger, faster and more fit than I’ve been in years.

I hope you enjoyed the little workout “gift” I gave you yesterday. If you’re not ready for it yet, don’t worry; you will be when you’re older…if you continue to follow my training and nutrition advice.

Today I’ve got an even BIGGER GIFT for you!

Check it out at (LINK) – I GUARANTEE you won’t see this again.

Can you guess what it is?

Have Faith & Take Action!

Justin

P.S. – I’m heading to the airport in a few minutes to come home from vacation. I’m not sad though, because I’ve got you to get back to. I can’t wait to provide you with awesome content and results producing programs this next year. 35 is gonna be the best year yet for me, and I plan to share it with you. Thanks again for being a reader and a fan.

(LINK)

———————————————————————————

The BIG GIFT was 35% off a one year paid in full boot camp membership.

THE RESULTS:

- 1 purchased immediately – that’s $1537 in my pocket, thank you very much. New camper by the way

- 2 current members committed to purchasing and will pay the balance when they get their tax return. Well since that will be another $3074 in my pocket, I naturally agreed.

AND, that got me thinking. On the 15th, I’ll send out another email with a tax return twist offering a special extension to that sale

If I just get one more – that will be a total of $6148 that I can put to work for me now!

OK – Pat here again.

Justin is a sharp guy. We did a similar promo with our training business a couple of years ago and another tied to the stimulus checks the government sent out a while back.

Both generated us some much appreciated cash

So take a look at Justin’s offer and give some thought to how you might be able to model it for your business – either around Tax Season or your Birthday. Both great opportunities for promos.

But most importantly, Justin saw an opportunity, got creative and took action – and it worked.

It usually does.

Dedicated to your success,

Pat Rigsby

Multiple Streams Of Fitness Income Webinar Transcript

admin — Wed, 07 Apr 2010 02:28:40 +0000

Discover how to take 1 business, 1 revenue stream and zero clients and turn it into 14 businesses, 101 revenue streams and 2.5 million dollars a year.

Last Wednesday I held a exclusive webinar, ‘Multiple Streams Of Fitness Income’, detailing how Nick and I went from a start up training business in Elizabethtown, KY to a multi-million dollar group of 14 different businesses with over 100 separate revenue streams. Just today, we’ve released the 22-page transcript of that webinar.

Download the Multiple Streams of Fitness Income transcript by clicking the money below:

You can also Test Drive our brand new Fit Business Inner Circle membership program for only $1. And as a special bonus gift for trying out the Fit Business Inner Circle I’m also going to give you access to the entire Fast Track To Fitness Millions event on video. Learn more here.
Dedicated to your success,

Pat Rigsby