Personal Training Business Tips

Biceps and Business

Biceps and Business

Published by on January 30, 2012 | Leave a response

As trainers we never stop learning, you can’t, there is simply too much to know. Even things you’ve done a certain way for years can suddenly take on new meaning, like a normal barbell bicep curl for instance.

This blog post isn’t about business, marketing, lead generations or pushing profits into the stratosphere. Yet if it get’s you thinking and improves your skill as a trainer (or mine, or someone else’s) then it is absolutely about business, clients success, retention and industry longevity. All are inclusive of exactly what the Profitable Personal Trainer is all about.

So let’s have some fun, let’s talk about bicep curls. (And for the record I can’t even mention the word bicep without thinking about Pumping Iron and good old Arnold and Franco training back in the day.)%image_alt%

Barbell bicep curls are for me a product of an era gone by, my bodybuilding days. When I think about bicep curls I can’t help but think about one of my major mentors and role models from my younger days, you might recognize him. When vanity was my primary objective and having those big hanging biceps was part of the job description I did a lot of bicep curls. Over the years as I evolved as a trainer their use faded, as truly for most it’s not a movement that serves for much of a variety of purpose. We know that many of our clients will often present with rounded shoulders, the sign of a deteriorating upper shoulder girth, shortened pecs, internal rotators and quite often shortened biceps.

In its simplest form the bicep curl doesn’t really seem like a logical choice dealing with someone with rounded shoulders and deteriorating posture. In no way am I disputing this but then sometimes the most difficult part of working with a client as actually physically getting them to perform, activate or use the actual muscles that you want them to. I’m sure like I have, you’ve found scapular retraction/manipulation to be one the most common, and often difficult, focal points of improvement for clients.

Recently I’ve taken a keen interest in Serratus Anterior and it’s role. I’ve always found it interesting that if we removed all the muscles from our shoulder blade it’s basically only attached to our skeleton at the end of the collarbone where it meets the sternum. Without the muscles holding it in place it could move all over the place, yet containing the shoulder joint it’s a major stabilization point for our arm and many of its movements as well as our head. It’s easy to see through our life, with most of our life spent moving in front of us, why the muscles of the shoulder girth could become unbalanced and dysfunctional. To me it’s even more frightening to think about how bad it really could get with the only structural anchor point for the shoulder girth to be at the sternum, this creates a broad range of displacement for a lot of muscles involved in a lot of movements.

Anyways, serratus, as you probably know the serratus originates on the back side of the shoulder blade, it wraps around our torso attaching to a number of ribs on the front side of our body. In conjunction with other muscles of the shoulder girth one of the big things it can do is flatten the shoulder blades (scapula) against the rib cage. Because of the convenience generally of our lives this is typical point of dysfunction. Our lives are typically not physically demanding enough to encourage efficient, regular neurological recruitment of the serratus to flatten the shoulder blades.

If you Google or search YouTube for improving serratus function you’ll undoubtedly find modified versions of push ups and presses, all of which I am a fan of and use extensively. However from a pure coaching standpoint recently I have had tremendous success with my clients using a light barbell bicep curl.

When my client is performing the barbell bicep curl I will stand behind them cuing them to flatten the shoulder blades and squeeze the bottom of the scapula together. I ask them to try to maintain this position while performing the bicep curl. I then place my hands on top of the shoulder with my thumbs sitting just below the ridge separating supraspinatus and infraspinatus so I can detect any movement.

Just about everyone moves a little, and this greatly decreases the efficiency of movement of the bicep curl. But what it does do is give them an immediate sense of what their scapula is doing, feeling the activation of lower trapezius and serratus as the attempt to keep the scapula from moving or stabilizing by elevating the traps with their upper fibers. This ineffective bicep curl has proven to be extremely beneficial in establishing the mind to muscle connection for better serratus activation and postural improvement.

The best part is your clients can see and feel an immediate difference. We all know with great results comes great client retention, increased customer referrals, and the development of your brand. Just maybe bicep curls can find a place into your business building strategy afterall.

Posted in ,
Renew, Rebirth, Revitalization

Renew, Rebirth, Revitalization

Published by on December 21, 2011 | Leave a response

%image_alt%Profitable Personal Trainer is almost two years old. It’s been quite an adventure as a part time project aside from our studio.

I’ve cherished the moments and learned as much as I’ve taught, it’s taken some time but I feel I’ve finally found my voice. I’m very excited about 2012. Watch for the evolution of Profitable Personal Trainer, I have big goals as far as providing more resources to fitness professionals throughout North America (and beyond) to become more successful in the industry we love.

There will be an evolution beyond my current focus of marketing and systems.

This evolution will take a bit of time, so I may not be posting regularly in the next short while but do stay tuned for some exciting announcements.

You may want to save the dates of April 21-22, 2012 as I’ll be hosting “Profitable Personal Trainer Live” likely in the Edmonton market with my good friend and mentor Bedros Keuilian. We’ll also be featuring other fitness professionals with some killer content on some of the top training techniques, practices and niche markets. (Like specific training for the MMA crazy, or specialized nutritional coaching.)

Watch for these changes and further announcements coming soon, and in the meantime have a very Merry Christmas.

Just one more thing…

I couldn’t post something without giving you something great you can use right now. Below is an image of my most effective facebook ad for generating new “likes.” These likes are funnelled into an immediate lead generation offer that gets them in our door.

%image_alt%This ad leads to our page where ppl are met with a gateway page offering free training if they simply like the page, you can view this at www.facebook.com/personaltrainingreddeer

The easiest way to add one of these pages on your own facebook page is using a free little plugin called WooBox from www.woobox.com.

I just wanted to share this with you because it could be a great tool for last minute New Year’s marketing.

Posted in ,
Quickly Become the Local Expert

Quickly Become the Local Expert

Published by on December 1, 2011 | Leave a response

%image_alt%You may have heard recently that a story flew around how the US Government recently declared pizza to be a vegetable. At least that’s the version of this story that I was told. None the less it’s safe to say this weird situation, likely taken out of context and totally misunderstood, received a lot of publicity, press and exposure very quickly. I wonder if it ever hit the hot trending topics list on Twitter?

As a personal trainer and fitness marketer looking to maximize your fitness marketing strategy you should take note of the industry related topics that are hitting the headlines. One of the fastest ways I know to become the local expert is to simply make sure that you have an opinion on the most current topics. Voice them on Facebook, Twitter and especially in blog posts that are optimized for your primary keywords.

There’s no doubt that thousands of people were searching major search engines to find out just what was going on in this crazy pizza controversy. There’s no doubt that main people with your local area were amongst that group and likely a number of them may be people that fit your target customer profile.

At a local level it’s great if this audience begins to find you or assists in boosting your rankings by visiting and commenting on your posts relating to these hot topics. Just by following the media you have an immediate opportunity to quickly increase your organic traffic and be known as the savvy fitness expert of your area.

This has served me well in my local market in fact it ultimately lead to a regularly running column in both the major local newspapers a relationship, credibility and marketing vehicle that my competitors can’t touch.

Posted in ,
Know Your Customer...No Really

Know Your Customer…No Really

Published by on November 22, 2011 | Leave a response

%image_alt%This last weekend I was out in Vancouver speaking at CanFitPro’s western national conference. I’m always amazed at the responses I get when I ask, “who is your most likely customer?” Maybe I shouldn’t be, after all this might have also been one of the toughest things for me to comprehend.

I can’t stress enough how important is to know your niche or be able to close your eyes and literally see your most likely customer standing before you. Once you have this very complete description you will be amazed at how your ability to communicate and generate interest from your potential audience increases. You will begin to think of ideas on how to reach, meet and recruit clients in ways your competitors will never catch on to. I know that may sound ridiculous so let me try to put it in a simpler more dramatic fashion. Would a gun enthusiast read an opera magazine? Would the language used to describe last night’s performance contain fitting and descriptive adjectives to describe the latest hunting paraphernalia? I think you get my drift.

Here’s a little exercise, begin with the following questions, answer them for who you think your most likely customer is, then try to develop 10 more questions for an even more through description.

(HINT: If you’re uncertain of who your most likely customer is then answer these questions for each the following: 1) Who would you like to train? (ie. Athletes, not recommended but common) 2) Who do you think is most around you population wise? 3) Who do you think is currently shopping for services like yours? Once you’ve answered for all three of these you will generally have one that stands out to you leading you to begin exploring that niche’s viability.)

  1. Are they male or female?
  2. How old are they? (10-15 year range is fine)
  3. What would be their primary goal?
  4. Why would they benefit from working with someone like you? Be specific.
  5. How much income does their household earn annually?
  6. What kinds of careers do they have?
  7. What kinds of hobbies and interests do they have?
  8. What kind of vehicles do they, or would they like to drive?
  9. How do they dress?
  10. Where would they buy clothes?
  11. Where would they go out for dinner?
  12. What organizations might they belong to?

Once you have a big long list of who, what, why, and where you can begin to search your local demographics and guess as to whether a number of these desired people are near by.

From that point forward all of your marketing, content and offers should be targeted to be of interest to these groups of people. You should use language that would make sense if you were conversing with them, you should refer to characteristics or roadblocks of the goals they may be trying to achieve. Your offers should be of high value based on what you think they may be looking for and you want to make sure both you and your marketing materials are present in multiple places they might frequent.

The more razor focused you can be on that one specific customer the easier it becomes to not only attract them but others also. Specialization adds value; people always want to work with the specialist.

Perhaps they may seem like common sense but repeatedly in front of audiences or more when I review this concept only a sparse few hands go up. I can guarantee this little exercise if taken seriously will completely change your business in weeks to months.

Posted in
You Should Be Worried If They Say "No"

You Should Be Worried If They Say “No”

Published by on November 8, 2011 | 1 Response

%image_alt%Are you regularly asking your clients for testimonials? Most trainers are not. This won’t be a long blog post at all but it will be one packed with great purpose.

I’m certain by now you know the benefits of testimonials. Social proof is worth more than just about any pricey, elaborate marketing campaign. It’s worth more than ten certifications and all kinds of post-secondary education. So I’m sure you understand the marketing value of asking for testimonials. But there is a far more important reason to be asking your clients for testimonials on a regular basis.

Let me be blunt, and glaringly obvious.

If you asked your client for a testimonial today and they said NO; what does this say about your service or the value you are providing?

If you are providing the value, results, and service that you both think and say you are, shouldn’t you be 100% comfortable asking your clients for a testimonial? I mean if they say no, shouldn’t you be concerned?

Maybe concerned isn’t the right answer but you should most certainly be asking, “what is missing from my service that you don’t feel comfortable providing me a testimonial?”

Now this isn’t just true of testimonials but also referrals, they go hand in hand. If your clients over the top love your service it’s a natural occurrence that they will want to share and tell their experiences to others, if they don’t something isn’t right.

Start asking, the feedback will catapult your business forward.

Posted in , ,
Be a Ferrari

Be a Ferrari

Published by on October 18, 2011 | 1 Response

%image_alt%This blog post is going to be one of those posts that just comes straight from the hip. You see the fitness industry is undergoing a rapid evolution right now and I fear many trainers are in danger of being left behind.

If you’re NOT making more than $100,000 a year in total revenues, you absolutely need to read and take note of the following:

Know Your Customer

You should be able to close your eyes and see the person you most wish to attract as a client. It should be one specific type or group of people. It doesn’t mean you can’t or won’t service other people with other goals but the specialist is always sought out and looked upon as much more valuable.

Under Promise and Over Deliver

Personal training has caught on, I think in my small city someone recently told me there are more than 26 gyms, personal training centres, bootcamps, etc all competing for customers. Additionally there are the main stream weight loss centres, rec department activities and support groups. If you’re going to not just survive but thrive you better bring something special to the table. Now more than ever service is an opportunity for the small entrepreneur, large business continues to cut corners, pinch pennies and reduce the customers feeling of being valued. They’ve painted themselves into corner they have no other option than to compete on price and push for volume, customer loyalty is at an all time low.

Find ways to increase the feeling of being appreciated and valued, this may even exceed results in the statistics of customer retention.

Be a Ferrari

Since the time I was a boy cars have been a commodity that generally involved price haggling, a commodity that on the right day of the month with the right ability to negotiate you could really save big. As time has went on dealerships have narrowed this ability to haggle more and more, and rightly so, with so much price fluctuation it must have been extremely difficult to really have accurate long term business planning. Now look at high end cars, there’s never been an ability to haggle, there’s never been compromise, they are and always have been expensive and if you didn’t like the price you didn’t buy because they were confident in the value they brought to the table.

Every truly successful personal trainer will find their own way to be like Ferrari, you don’t need to be the cheapest, you don’t need to worry about your competition’s price what you need to be is confident in what you bring to the table. If you can consistently deliver what you say you will you will find people willing to buy your service (within reason of course.)

Create Faster

I forget what book it was that I read an excerpt of a conversation with Ray Kroc. Someone was asking him if he was frustrated by other companies that copied or duplicated McDonalds. He responded, “no we simply create faster.”

I’ve faced everything from people stealing documents, copying my business, copying and pasting my website, marketing campaigns, even my fundraisers. It’s frustrating to say the least, and hard not to become emotional, but the truth is the answer is to be like Ray Kroc. Whether it’s dealing with competition or evolving economic conditions being able to “create faster” or rapidly evolve and adapt will be critical to your long term success. Success as a personal trainer is based on lifelong learning and the ability to create a unique selling proposition for your potential customers. Continually strive to offer something unique and you will never really have any competition.

Continually Give to Others

This may seem obvious, for without true compassion and giving it will be nearly impossible to consistently help your clients, but you mustn’t stop there. Give to others in your community, share your marketing successes with other businesses, communicate with other fitness professionals outside of your immediate area, form strategic partnerships and most importantly give us much of your wondrous fitness knowledge away as possible. Write articles, blogs and Facebook posts that enrich people’s lives and allow them to learn. Anything you do to improve someone else’s life always has a cumulative affect on your own it’s like being able to invest every dollar you every made in a totally secure high yielding investment.

Maybe if you’ve just finished reading this it all seems obvious but I challenge you to put that to the test, spend the next 30 minutes detailing each of these areas in your own business, what you are doing, how you are doing it, and any new idea on how you can make it better. I guarantee you will come up with one new idea that has the potential to dramatically change your business.

Posted in

The Value of Multiple Mediums

Published by on September 27, 2011 | Leave a response

Ever feel like you get shiny object syndrome? You know what I mean, where this new idea comes along and you jump at it, and then another idea so you jump over there.

It sort of seems to me that a lot of the fitness professionals I’ve met seem to organize their fitness marketing this way. Heck, even I’ve been guilty of this.

If you’re going to make a career in this industry I hope this will help you both acknowledge a flaw in your fitness marketing strategy as well as give you some direction on how to correct it.

Nearly five years ago now, thanks to the wonders of the internet, I started to meet, read and follow some of the most successful marketers in the fitness industry. I learned a lot from them especially about building lists and using email marketing with tools like iContact, 1shoppingcart and FitPro Newsletter (which after failing to keep a newsletter consistently on track for longer than a month I am so thankful for FitPro and it’s done-for-you content.)

Soon email marketing became a really prominent part of my overall fitness marketing strategy, and it was incredibly successful, but ultimately it’s very flawed. You see, most commonly fitness professionals get stuck in what I call the “desperation loop.” The desperation loop is where you realize you need clients (generally because you might be financially strapped or seeing your income decline) so you scramble to create some sort of aggressive, lowcost promotion to attract clients.

If things go well you attract a bunch of clients and life is good, you’re busy so your attention to future marketing wanes and you carry on until again you realize, due to financial distress, you need more clients.

Now, in a city, a solo trainer could likely do this for years. In fact I did. But why would you if you only knew better? Your fitness marketing strategy needs to become just as regimented, calculated and methodical as the training and nutritional habits you are teaching your clients, and for the same reason, synergism.

There is no doubt that when you utilize basic forms of marketing on an ongoing basis (things like classifieds, lead boxes, strategic partnerships, business cards, brochures, posters) and combine that with your focused efforts (high value email, direct mail, addressed mail offers at periodical times) and then wrap them together with branding and awareness efforts (like black signs, sandwich boards, lawn signs, radio campaigns, bus benches and so on) you have a system that generates a predictable, sustainable, profitable, long term business.

Now I know if you’re a solo trainer or perhaps even have a small team or studio the challenges of managing a fitness marketing budget, it’s easy to spend thousands of dollars with little to no return, so start small. If you do a little searching you may find that large corporations will often spend 8-10% of total revenues on marketing, we’ve never done this with One-to-1, and likely never will, however this might give you a place to start, you might set a goal of setting 5% of total revenue aside for marketing.

Start with what costs the least and build a foundation, set a target to create custom lead boxes for your business and have 30 or more placed within your community. This can provide a slow steady trickle of leads to your business as well provide a very inexpensive method of branding.

Use online classified like kijiji or craigslist and just make it a habit to consistently post ads on certain days of the week.

Leave cards and brochures with trusted colleagues and then utilize all this extra awareness with targeted email and addressed mail campaigns. When you can deliver someone an offer that also is exposed to your name and image sometime and somewhere else during their day you increase the chance of them buying, this is what synergistic marketing is all about.

Start small and as revenues grow so will your marketing budget allowing you to utilize more expensive mediums and for a greater overlap of campaigns. Just pull out a calendar and start blocking of days and weeks for ideas that you can run now, this is way easier than you think (it just feels intimidating so don’t think, do.)

Posted in ,

Remember It’s About the Numbers

Published by on August 23, 2011 | Leave a response

%image_alt%So last week I ran an email referral contest to generate new names and leads for my mailing list. I’d avoided this contest for months because I didn’t like the greyness of it in association to privacy (something I take very seriously.)

Now ultimately I opted to run this contest because of the success of colleagues in other areas, some have gained thousands of emails in just a week. It is a given that a number of the emails received won’t be viable customers but even if 10% are, it’s often a very winning venture.

I do and have tracked just about everything in any way I possibly can. A number of things I’ve overcomplicated because of my hunger for understanding and information (and have now eliminated once I’ve gained that understanding.) At one point I could tell exactly how much it cost on average to generate an email address from a radio, newspaper, online classified or a Facebook PPC ad in my area. Without a doubt I can tell you that the results typically achieved with the email referral campaign would be the equivalent of spending thousands of dollars in these other mediums.

Anyways…

I’ve felt August to be an especially great time to run an email referral campaign, often sales are a little better than July but still not up to par with the school months where everyone has regular schedules. Leading into September it only makes sense to expand your list in an effort to have a wider audience to educate in the fall and hopefully if enough value is provided turn them into paying customers.

Now additionally a few of my coaching clients have been running this same contest at the same time. You can’t make an omelette without breaking a few eggs, I always find it interesting when I have a heavy week of emailing, or a campaign that some people don’t like the reaction you sometimes get. You know what I mean the….

STOP %$^KING EMAILING ME

When all they had to do was click the unsubscribe link at the bottom. Now I don’t know about you but I don’t enjoy negative feedback from my audience, for more than seven years I’ve written countless articles for newspapers, websites, blogs, etc trying to educate people to lead a longer, healthier happier life. I receive many great comments like…

“Cabel You continue to selflessly provide some of the best info to your clients and friends. Once again, Thankyou for your e-mails.”

Yet still just like you the occasional hatemail seems to make me doubt it all. Mid way through the contest, I think after my 3rd broadcast for the week (low by internet marketing standards) I’d received about three such hatemails, it honestly made me apprehensive about sending the fourth, I felt bad.

I’ve had coaching clients that shut down promos because one person on a list of a thousand replied with something negatively, or others contact me in worry and question their current marketing objective because of the reaction of a couple of people out of hundreds.

Remember it’s about the numbers, negative constructive feedback is very valuable but negative general feedback is just a distraction don’t let it weaken you. Marketing is about behaviours, we can never really predict them so all we can do is quantify them, if you are ever doubting your initiative check your math to see if your doubts are simply an emotional reaction, if so get over it as quickly as possible and move on.

NOTE: I’m not an expert on privacy laws so I’m not sure where this falls in relation, but I truly believe in being very transparent so if you run a similar contest it’s critical to utilize good practice and send all the emails a welcome email explaining how you received their information and giving them a fair opportunity to opt-out immediately. Additionally bring real value to people, if you are asking for referrals you must truly believe in what you are providing. Recently I offered advice to someone that potentially saved them from a serious health concern, so much so their doctor made a point to thank me, these are the reasons you should be wanting these referrals so you can bring real value to the people that are referred to enrich their life whether they ever buy from you or not.

Below are the exact emails I sent, feel free to use them if you’d like to run a similar contest.

EMAIL #1: Mon

Subject line: hey…

Title: Win an IPAD2 this Friday!

(Consider adding pic of iPad at store with clerk, caption win an iPad this Friday all the details in this email)

Hey, this is Cabel at One-to-1 Fitness, your local fitness expert

You’re getting this because you subscribed to my newsletter that I send out twice a month so you are either a client or a local resident. What I am looking to do is help more local residents get in the best
shape of their life. I realized my One-to1 Fitness Newsletter does that because of the feedback I’ve received from you.

So what I would like to do is help more Red Deer residents have access to my healthy articles, fitness tips and tasty recipes. So I’ve decided to hold a contest; what I want you to do is send me the email addresses of all your local friends, family and co-workers so that I can add them to my newsletter. Twice a month they can get awesome tips to looking and feeling great via their email. Oh, and don’t worry, I don’t ever share anyone’s email addresse, promote bs stuff or fill up their inboxes with junk. This is the same content rich newsletter that you get twice a month. As always, they can unsubscribe with a single click at any time.

Now to make this contest more interesting, I set the end date for this coming Friday, (Insert date) and I’m giving away 2 prizes – to the first and second place winners.

Prize one is an Ipad2 to the person that sends me the most email addresses.

Prize two is 3 months of free group personal training and if you are an existing client we are going to add 3 months to your current Group PT program.

So here’s what I want you to do now. Go to your email contacts, hit reply to this email and send those emails on over to me and I’ll be keeping track to let you know if you win by this Friday.

Thank you so much,
Cabel

Email #2: (Wed)

subject line: Urgent Update!! (Notice the two exclamation marks 🙂

(Consider photo of Ipad again, top caption, Win an iPad this Friday, bottom details in this email, and the top 5 worst Starbucks drinks to order!)

Hey it’s Cabel again,

Wow! It’s been an overwhelming response & a very tight race with about 30 people contributing. Who’s it gonna be? Contest Ends: Friday @ Midnight!

Just wanted to let you know I spent a few minutes on the Starbucks website and I found the top five drinks that have the highest calories and here’s what they are.

1.Peppermint White Hot Chocolate 720 Cal

2.Iced Peppermint White Mocha 700 Cal

3. Mint Chocolatly Chip Frappucino 680 Cal

4.Tazoa Green Tea Frappucino 650 Cal

5. Eggnog Latte 630Cal

And because it should never be all bad news here are the 5 drinks with the lowest number of calories. J

1. Skinny Caramel Macchiato 140 Calories

2. Skinny Latte 130 Calories

3. Caffè Misto 110Cal

4. Frappuccino Light Blended Beverages 110 Cal

5. Unsweetened Brewed Coffee or Tazo Tea 0-5 Cal

If you go to Starbucks (like I know many of you do) you probably want to know if the drinks you choose are in the top fatty ones or the top low calorie ones.

And oh by the way…… Remember I am running that contest for referral emails because I want to help more Red Deer residents. Seriously we get so many positive comments about our free fitness newsletter and our new fitness magazine we know it helps people, please help us reach as many people as possible.

“Keep those emails coming, the best information I’ve seen anywhere and it all makes sense.” -Bob Fournier

So far it’s been overwhelming; a lot of people are sending me emails…the race for the IPad and the 3 months of Group PT is a tight race with about 30 people participating and I bet you are one of them. So if you want to be sure you win the first place iPad, just keep replying to this email and send me the email addresses of local friends, family and co-workers.

Remember to do before midnight on Friday. That’s when I turn into a pumpkin…err I mean is the deadline. I’m keeping score and will let you know who won the IPad and who won the 3 months of boot camp.

Have a great day everyone!

Yours in health,

Cabel McElderry

Director, One-to-1 Fitness

2009 Finalist for Small Business of the Year

Email #3  Thurs

subject line – I screwed up…(but am making good, time sensitive.)

Hey this is Cabel again,

I screwed up and I failed to let you know that I decided to make it 4 months of free Group PT for second place in the referral contest and not three. I made that decision on Wednesday due to the overwhelming response (we just really wanted to say thank you) when I emailed you but I failed to tell you. I raised the stakes from 3 months to 4 months for the second place prize. (We really want to help a lot of Red Deerians (is that even a word?) get access to newsletter for fitness
tips, recipes etc)

Remember they can unsubscribe anytime they want to and the more local residents you can help me reach, the more local residents will get in the best shape of their lives…and by the way it may ensure Red Deer stays of the Men’s Health Magazine’s list of top 10 fattest cities.

Did you know that statistically as many as 3 of 10 people in Alberta are considered obese and Alberta’s obesity rate is almost 20% higher than the national average?

So, here’s what you want to do, hit reply to this email and start helping your local friends and family stay in the 7 of 10 rather than the obese 3 of 10 in our population our totally free newsletter is a great place to start, that and the 100s of articles we publish and send out are really making a difference for some people.

Don’t worry we’ll send them a welcome email and they can unsubscribe with a single click anytime they choose, you have until tomorrow at midnight to do this to win the iPad and Group PT. Help us help Red Deer.

Yours in health,

Cabel McElderry

One-to-1 Fitness

Email #4. (Friday early)
subject line: Holy cow…

Do you love Booster Juice as much as I do? Unfortunately their smoothies can still be loaded with sugar, here are my top 4 personal rules when ordering a smoothie @booster juice below:

1. Ask for No Sorbet
2. Ask for No Fruit Juice
3. Ask for No regular yogurt
4. DO ask for extra berries, water, ice, milk, and maybe an extra
boost (i.e extra protein/energy)

Hope this helps:

100% Committed to your success!

Hey, I also just wanted to give you a heads up, tonight at midnight, Friday, the contest ends. There are over 10 people in the running for first place to win the IPad2 and about 8 people in the second place running to win the 4 months free Group PT. I want to help more Red Deer residents get in the best shape of their life. I want to add your friends, family and co-workers that are local to my fitness newsletter. So please send those email addresses to me and I will let you know this weekend once I do the math (it’s crazy hard when I run out of fingers…and toes…and toothpicks, to count that high 😛 You know personal trainers don’t count so well right?) who won the IPad2 and who won the 4 weeks of Group PT.

Yours in health

Cabel

PS. 1st and 4th place are only separated by 50 emails.

Friday #2)

re. Hey…a welcome email to your referrals

Hey, I had just a couple people raise concerns about sharing their friends emails with us, and you know i understand the way the world is today, so I wanted to send this to you so you know just how polite we are about people’s privacy.

Here’s what your friends and family will receive.

Subject line: Welcome (action required)

Hey, I’m Cabel McElderry from One-to-1 Fitness, Red Deer’s Top Fitness Expert.

You are getting this email because your friend, family or co-worker is either a client or a subscriber of our free fitness newsletter and magazine and cared enough that they suggested we send it to you also. Our newsletter and magazine is bi-monthly and is packed with healthy recipes, fitness tips, and cool fitness articles.

Now we totally respect your privacy which is why I’m sending this welcome email. For whatever reason you decide you don’t want to get this newsletter at the very bottom of this email, and all the emails I send
to you, is an unsubscribe button, just click it and you will never get this email from me again.

Otherwise, enjoy the emails that I send you, I think you’ll find the content very valuable in fact right below,
here is the first one.

Hope this helps you and many others in Red Deer look and feel amazing!

Cabel McElderry

Director, One-to-1 Fitness

Posted in , , Tagged ,

Welcome Alwyn Cosgrove

Published by on August 16, 2011 | Leave a response

As you know things have changed a lot for me in the last four years, thanks to many kind and gracious fitness professionals that have been willing to share their business success secrets with me. I’ve been able to move my career in a direction I never believed possible, in essence that’s what brought Profitable Personal Trainer into existence. My decision to begin writing and coaching was a result of the desire to want to pass on what’s been given to me by other fitness professionals to many more in hopes that we can help still more people live longer, healthier, happier lives.

Let me introduce Alwyn, another giving, well known fitness professional who was kind enough to share some words on just what happened that allowed his own career to change and grow. I know there are a number of people that read this blog that are where I once was, or where Alwyn once was and I remember how motivating it was for me to learn what made the difference for others. I hope this helps you with that next big step.

Committed to your success,

Cabel

Introducing Alwyn Cosgrove,

%image_alt%The turning point in my career came when I realized that everything I needed to know about the fitness profession, training people and running a business was already out there.

All I had to do was read it or listen to it. I then started to invest in myself and I’ve never stopped.

I decided in 1995 that I would take one training session’s worth of income each week and invest it in my own education. At that time I picked up 2 books per week and committed myself to reading them. If there was a seminar or educational event I attended that. At that time there were no Perform Better educational events – really there were only certifications – so in a short time I ended up with I think 17 certifications from various organizations. Every week I disciplined myself to read 2 books or watch a video (there were no DVD’s then!) or listen to an educational audio.

It all started when I read this quote-

“We don’t rise to the level of our expectations – we fall to the level of our training” -Archilochus, Greek Soldier – and believed in it so much that it changed my direction

My goal was to learn one new thing per day — so that in a year I’d know 365 more things. That progressed to one hour of study per day – so I’d spend nine full 40-hour work weeks per year by comparison fully immersed in education.

I also started writing a 100 word summary on every training session I did – results, coaching cues that worked, exercise modifications etc. I averaged around 35 sessions per week at the time – so at the end of one year – I had close to a 200,000 word thesis on training and coaching methodology. Then, different strength coaches and rehab specialists started holding seminars. I attended everyone’s events (and actually started hosting them for additional events).

Around about the time we opened our gym I had a realization. As a trainer, I could get anyone better results with my programming and my instruction than they could on their own. I recognized that I became a black belt martial artist because of my instructors programming and instruction, better than I could on my own.

“All wealthy top achievers have coaches” – James Malinchak

So it hit me – it was time to move beyond self-education and actually hire coaches for my business. All aspects of my business. Coaches who could really fast-track my business progress and get me to the next level faster. And as a direct result of that decision – Results Fitness is one of the most successful fitness businesses in the country.

You see coaches help with a lot of things. Most goal setting programs work something like this (from the book: The Secret Code of Success):

1. Set goals (know what you want)

2. Take action towards your goals

3. Evaluate your progress

4. Adjust the approach based on your evaluation

The problem with that – is that’s not how it works for most people in the real world — here’s pretty much what happens:

1. The Fog (you have no clarity – no idea of what you truly want)

2. Treadmilling (you’re busy – really busy – but you aren’t actually moving forwards)

3. Feel like a failure (as you didn’t get any closer to your goals)

4. Try again (hoping that doing the same thing over and over will somehow lead to different results)

Hiring a coach helps figure out EXACTLY what you want – and provides ACTION steps to get you closer to that.

The biggest piece of advice I can give anyone in this field is to continually invest in yourself. Education is the single biggest difference maker in any field. Investing in yourself never fails to reap big rewards.

Posted in ,
Fitness Marketing Math

Fitness Marketing Math

Published by on July 6, 2011 | 1 Response

Tim Borys shares his success working with Profitable Personal Trainer Marketing.

Tim knows his marketing math, check out his results.

It’s amazing how much has changed in the last 4 years. Going from a struggling solo trainer to owning a 7 figure studio, from training people to training trainers and trying to manage, teach and motivate them to work together to outperform and avoid the pitfalls that seemingly all trainers make.

What I’ve come to realize is that business is continually just one big mathematical equation, today I’m going to try to shed light on this, to share an idea with you that you past, present and future can be evaluated, planned and predicted with simple math.

Eventually if you read enough business books or talk to enough business people you’ll hear the term KPI or Key Performance Indicators. Every business has them, the handful of vital components that statistically and predictably explain your business revenues in the past months or can predict with accuracy what they will be in the future.

Some of the most notable would be the size of our audience, the number of new potential clients each month and the number of actual new clients each month. These are often referred to as prospects, leads and converts. Do you know the number of prospects leads and converts of your own business? If not this should be a top priority for you to learn or track. (Search for sales report, or set, show, close for more information on tracking.)

Based on my own experience I’m going to give you some numbers which you may use as goals and targets or simply at least for a point of illustration. Your audience will vary dependent upon the size of your email list, or the number of pieces for a direct or addressed mail campaign, or the listeners of a radio audience, etc. As for leads you should be striving to generate at least 1-2 per business day or 20-30 people that inquire or ask about your services. From there the question is how many people can you convert to paying customers? If this number is below 50% improving this should be your biggest and top priority as you strive for a benchmark average of 80% conversion.

How big do you want your business to be? How much monthly revenue do you wish to generate? Do the math.

Desired monthly revenue / amount of average monthly purpose = total required # of clients for desired monthly revenue. (Let’s say this works out to 100.)

For easy numbers let’s say you’re closing only 50% of the interested leads or potential clients. This means to reach our desired revenue we need to reach 200 prospects. If we could hit our benchmark of about 1-2 leads per business day we’ll need approximately 6-7 months to reach the required number of leads to achieve our desired income.

So how do we generate the leads?

Well on average most marketing mediums have about a 3-4% response rate. This means if our audience was about 100 people a well designed message and offer should attract on average 3-4 people who will want to know more about our services, or 3-4 leads ultimately becoming 1-2 new clients.

So here’s where we start doing some math. 200 is 4% of 5000, we can safely assume to acquire 100 paying clients at a 50% close ratio we’ll need to reach an audience of approximately 5000-7500 people or about 850-1100 per month to reach our goal in 6-7 months. (Comparatively if we could reach that benchmark average of an 80% close ratio this number drops to 3100-4500 people.)

As we break it down even further we could consider we somehow need to find approximately 200-300 people per week that have any sort of connection to health, wellness, or image consciousness and to somehow get them a message. Does this seem like a daunting task? It doesn’t have to be.

Here are 6 ways you can reach your audience each week:

1)      Do you have an email list? A facebook fanpage? If not now is a great time to start, build a mailing list by sharing quality information with people like blog posts, or an email newsletter like FitPro Newsletter, etc. Ask past and present clients to refer their friends and build this list. You shouldn’t be pitching offers to your email list every time you mail them but after providing about 3-4 items of value it’s time to make an offer. So if you send out 4 blog posts per month you’ve certainly earned the opportunity to give them an offer once per month.

2)      Where can you find a gathering of people you might talk to? Could you talk to 50 people per week? At the mall, farmers market, park, or a lunch and learn? This could easily add up to another 200 people for your required monthly audience.

3)      Those pesky lead boxes. Every 4 names in a lead box you can potentially assume that the equivalent of 100 people of your audience looked at it. How many boxes would you need to get just 4 names per week? This could easily account for almost half of your required monthly audience.

4)      Direct mail or addressed mail. Canada Post allows you to pick postal codes of desired neighbourhoods; you can easily dictate how many pieces you send. This can be a great way to top up your audience reach a few times per year.

5)      Endorsed letters. Who loves you? Would your accountant, lawyer, real estate agent send a letter on your behalf telling their clients how great they think you are? Maybe you should ask them, and here’s a tip, write the letter for them.

6)      Referrals. Your clients love you, when people find good value they like to tell others, encourage them with incentives and deadlines this can easily add up and bolster your audience reach.

My point is when you think about it it’s not that hard to find people to talk to, most of us are just generally way too sensitive to the people that say no leading us to not pursue enough people. Maybe now that you understand the math you will be more resilient and persistent.

The application of this will have a staggering result, I know this because it’s one of the key KPIs in our business, it’s one of the primary ways we do all of our planning and have maintained steady growth through all four of the previous years. With cashflow planning you can see how you can even calculate months in advance how much money you may need to spend on marketing to reach your goals and exactly what you need the results to be.

Posted in ,