Leverage Your Time, The Ultimate Fitness Marketing Strategy
What stronger fitness marketing strategy could there be than to leverage your time and do more in less time while providing a better product and experience for your client? I’m surprised how many of my new coaching clients are still offering 60 minute training sessions, or not offering semi-private or group training sessions.
The more your clients can see you the better their results will be, and your technical ability is not usually the deciding factor but rather the frequency of your accountability and support. With that in mind it’s clear there is nothing you can do in 60 minutes that you can’t do in 30 allowing people to be able to afford to see you more often (while giving yourself a raise.)
Watch the video below, it gives you a complete walkthrough on the how and why to move to 30 minute sessions. Isn’t leveraging your time the most effective fitness marketing strategy?
[youtube]http://youtu.be/tTlCsRR04dU[/youtube]
How-to Suck as Many New Leads From Your Website as Possible
Just this morning I was reviewing a website change for one of my coaching clients, a new website offer to generate more leads for their training studio and bootcamp. As I was writing the email response it dawned on me how often I’m discussing this same thing with many fitness professionals, it seemed the ideal topic for today.
We’re all in a position where we need our websites to convert in the best way possible, it has to produce the maximum number of leads there’s no if’s ands or buts about it. The question is what offers are best for your website?
I think the larger your operation (particularly with multiple locations) the answer to this varies slightly, but I think the majority of you are one location owners, a situation where every potential prospect counts.
By now you may have tried free reports and things of that nature to build your list and realize they are dead. You may have tried $1 trials in an effort to get payment information from the get go to ensure conversion, well in most cases as some of you may already know, consumers have figured this out. No one wants to enter their credit card online more than they have to and especially not for a buck, if you doubt this just go look in the mirror and ask yourself about this.
Now higher value trial offers are often used to cross this perception gap with the trial usually for 1-2 weeks or some short term, which makes perfect sense for us but does it for the consumer?
Finally there is the classic request a free consultation opt-in that some are for and many are against. So what should your website opt-ins and offers look like? Well here’s my opinion and the logic as to why.
The Free Consult
Yes it’s old, sure you can say it’s no-obligation, no-risk, no-pressure but of course no one is going to believe you, heck you wouldn’t believe someone if they told you. None the less this is still my go-to offer and here’s why…there are actually people that will visit your website that are just genuinely interested in your service. If you’re like me I know that the best chance I have of helping you become my client is if I can meet you face to face, show you that you will be comfortable, learn about your goals, and explain the program options for you to make it easy. Therefore the consult is my most wanted response and the best option for those that are serious about taking their fitness future in their hands and finding the best available solution.
The Free Option
Next because of all the super SEO tactics many of us now employ (and the understanding that content is king and with all the great information we make available) we’re ending up with a lot of website traffic of people that are just cruising around looking for answers. The answers they’re seeking are not necessarily your services; they’re not there yet.
These individuals are just looking for a solution to a personal problem or pain, they’re not in the shape they want to be in and they don’t know what to do about it. Who’s to say that exercise is the best answer for a woman’s “saddlebags” the latest infomercial might have them believing it’s fat loss cream, pills, supplements or standing on their head!
The best way to convert these visitors is first with information, your flare and opinion hopefully on their matter of pain. These people are not likely ready to jump in the pool and meet with you to discuss spending hundreds or thousands of dollars on training, they don’t trust you (and if they did they’d sign up for the free consult.) This is why we need something free they can access that allows them to get to know you with no risk obligation or worry.
A lot of people are still using free reports, ebooks or something of that nature (in fact even I was until recently.) Truth is I don’t know about you but ebooks and optins of that nature really haven’t seemed to be that effective for growing my list recently.
I encourage you to over deliver, my favourite offer presently is the 3 Week Home Fat Loss course. I can’t take credit for this as it came about as an idea on a coaching call with a client sometime ago. When he first implemented it the response was crazy, more than a dozen opt-ins over night with no promotion and without a huge traffic base, since I’ve seen others successfully apply it as well. But here’s why I think it works so well.
It gives the visitor real value and no obligation whatsoever they never have to contact you again and could unsubscribe tomorrow is they wanted, it also allows me to develop a relationship with them over time (especially if you use video which you should) and honestly educate them that the magic is in the accountability and support that comes from our continual service. The result is hopefully that you gain their trust in fully automated way and that you lead them to contact you for the help they will inevitably need.
The Low Cost Trial
Many have tried various forms of a low cost trial, these opt-ins are great because they come with payment information that automates the whole sales process and EFT growth, unfortunately it takes a lot of traffic to really experience the magic of this process. The trial amount is important, and again just simply ask yourself what you fell comfortable with. A $1 trial is useless in my opinion, no one wants to put their credit card information online for a measly buck. A higher amount is likely better for that reason is that it needs to provide significant value to the customer yet warrant or somewhat justify the risk of sharing secure information. Quite often I see 1-2 week trials, but if we’re to consider our own consumer behavior for a moment perhaps a 4 week trial might convert better. We want people to come in, feel the love and sign up, but our consumer’s BS metre picks this up a mile away, in turn the consumer wants an opportunity to buy a ‘kick-start’ time period where they can then proceed and do it on their own. You and I both know people can’t get in shape in 4 weeks, but likely 4 weeks is just enough time for them to feel it would give them the ‘kick-start’ they’re looking for, in turn this should significantly increase the opt-in rate.
These three offers should be represented on your website for every visitor to see, hopefully you understand my logic as to why it should be these 3 offers and how to present them. It won’t always work but it should help to optimize your website leads over time.
The real magic is that the offers are being presented to meet the perception or needs of three distinct visitor groups and each situation provides a specific measure of value for that audience, it’s this synergism that I believe makes these three opt-ins so powerful.
On a final note…
Where these opt-ins are located on your website is equally critical. Two of the three, or all if possible should be located above the fold. They should be placed in the right hand column because of the natural direction our eyes travel when we read a page.
Because most of us use a banner at the top of our page as the visual introduction the Free Home Course opt-in should be located on the right side of the banner. It’s the lowest barrier offer that should be immediately appealing to the largest segment of our audience.
Your Free Consult should come next, it should basically be placed on the right side at the top of what I call the content header. Essentially just below your site header many people will have a content zone (or you should) this is best space for a video but text and the like can be useful. At any rate it’s here that your visitor will first become engaged, if they like what they see their eye’s lead them to your most wanted response.
Finally the low cost trial should be lower on the right side, possibly in part above the fold but it likely doesn’t matter as much. This audience has to make an active decision to purchase they will have spent enough time on your site to validate that decision, as long as this opt-in is clear, stands out and concise they’ll find it.
That’s my take on effectively generating more leads from your website based on the simple logic of how we all think as consumers. Hopefully it makes sense, this is working well for many of my coaching client so I know it can work for you.
Dealing With Competition
It’s normal at first to fear or be frustrated with increased competition. Our immediate reaction to increased competition is one of self-doubt or scarcity. The only way increased competition can hamper your ability to succeed is if you choose to acknowledge or give into these fears and become reactive to them.
If you stay focused on your plan and continue to drive your business forward increased competition almost always enhances your ability to succeed by creating greater awareness and ultimately a larger audience for your products and services.
As many of you may know I own and operate a very successful training studio in a small city (total population under 100,000) but what you may not know is that within a 4 block there are more than 12 fitness related businesses including: 2 training studios, a Crossfit gym, Jazzercise, 2 Pilates studios, 2 weight loss centres, 2 martial arts studios, a public gym and a Kettlebell gym. Additionally there are also more than 6 complimentary businesses including an organic market, physiotherapy clinic, 2 massage clinics, 2 spas and more. In all you could say this is the fitness district.
Let me also mention we are the most expensive out of all our competitors by a significant margin, in fact one of my primary competitors tends to focus on this very fact thinking it is an advantage. Personally I’d rather always be the Ferrari than the Ford.
Here are my tips for making competition a non-factor:
1) Always provide more value to your community than anyone else. By this I mean be a star educator. Use your blog, website, lunch and learns and writing for local publications to always be the top expert in your area that gives away as much free information as possible. The more you give and the longer you give the more deep routed your credibility will be in your community. Things like fundraisers and community events also contribute to this positioning.
2) Create systems that allow you to efficiently handle the same situations over and over with great efficiency as you grow. The better and more consistent your customer experience is the more you can stay focused on business growth.
3) Create highly leveraged situations and tremendous additional value. By being more expensive we can afford to provide random and unexpected gifts to our customers. Why not send people meaningful birthday gifts? This can be as simple as asking their favouriote author, store and Starbucks or Tim’s on their initial client info form. Or by using semi-private and group programs you can leverage 1st month and ongoing VIP discounts to create immediate unadvertised value for new prospects.
4) Avoid last minute marketing. Most personal trainers I know are engaged in a constant feast or famine cycle. The don’t promote until they desperately need clients and then freak out when they have too many. Set a calendar even if at first it’s just choosing special dates and holidays (like birthdays, anniversaries and special dates) for set promotions and targets. At first this seems difficult but just think how difficult it would be to train your clients without some sort of goal to work toward.
5) Most importantly take up a Ray Kroc (if you didn’t know he was the founder of McDonalds) mentality, work to always “create faster.” One thing is certain, if you are growing your competition will make the same mistakes you likely did when you started. You will first attempt to copy or duplicate the ideas of someone you believed more successful than you. At some point to truly succeed you will need to find your own voice, when you do stay focused on your own ideas and continually create. Be the leader, followers react which is never as powerful as the person that takes action in the first place.
An Update to an Old Idea to Become the Local Expert
Wouldn’t it be great if you could have all the complimentary businesses in your area acknowledge you as a local expert when it comes to personal training? Wouldn’t it be great if you could borrow their credibility to quickly enhance your own?
Maybe you can. With a little persistence this tidbit of personal trainer marketing Kung Fu might allow you to be elevated to expert status in no time, even in a brand new market.
Step 1: Ask yourself who has my customers? Make a list.
Start by jotting down all the different types of businesses that have customers who might likely also use your services. Some examples might be chiropractors, hair stylists, massage therapists, maybe coffee shops, spas, estheticians and so on.
Step 2: Google these businesses in your area.
For example I might Google ‘Red Deer spa.’ In large cities make sure to narrow it down to your suburb or urban area. You might even ask your list as direct referrals are always easier to work with or approach.
Step 3: Create an interview.
That’s right, we’re going to contact these people and if all goes well we’re going to interview them. Choose only 3-4 meaningful questions and the more these questions allow them to toot their own horn the more successful your interview is going to be. For example if I were interviewing a chiropractor I might ask:
- What are the biggest benefits of chiropractic for a person just starting to exercise?
- Why do you feel chiropractic enhances exercise?
You see where I’m going? These questions not only make the chiropractor sound great but they also lead him to endorse you without even likely realizing it.
Step 4: Contact the community leaders.
Remember the need for nice. Contact the top ranked local businesses for all the categories you’ve chosen. Explain to them how you are a local fitness professional, how you’ve heard great things about them and ask if they could spare 5-10 minutes for a brief interview that you are going to share with many local individuals.
Now a few people may say no, but many will say yes.
The ideal situation is to interview them on camera, a simple Flipcam or even a newer smartphone will do. Make sure and introduce yourself and at the end of the interview I’d mention their website and finally to also check out your website for more information.
If they won’t make time for a video interview see if they’ll do a phone interview and use a conference line like www.FreeConferenceCall.com or a Skype app to record the call. You can have the audio easily transcribed for the next step at places like www.elance.com or www.odesk.com.
Step 5: Post the interview on YouTube.
Make sure to name the video file on your computer the same as the keywords you searched to find the business. (ex. Red_Deer_Chiropractor.flv) In the description include a link to your website and a description of the video using the keyword string. Enter the keyword string again in the tag field.
If they wouldn’t make time for the video interview but you were able to complete a phone interview or an email interview post this interview on your website with meta tags for the keyword string as mentioned above.
Videos will quickly appear in the search results.
The Big Bang!
So here’s the deal, videos should appear in the search results very quickly, try to send as many people as you can from your Facebook friends and your mailing lists to watch and like the videos so they rise even faster.
Now hopefully in days to a few short weeks when someone searches ‘Red Deer Chiropractor’ your video will appear above, below or near the link for the business you interviewed. Most people will watch a video first and you’ve now done that business a huge favor (and naturally one for yourself also.)
By interviewing them and posting it as a fitness professional you’ve effectively provided them a third party endorsement that should enhance their image with their customers, and at the same time you’ve created an introduction for yourself, and a link to your website for all of their customers to see.
Do this for enough different businesses and soon you will be the talk of the town. Common sense personal trainer marketing domination at it’s finest!
Your USP (Unique Selling Proposition) and Your Personal Training Business
If I asked you, “what do you do?” Could you explain concisely or would you stumble and have to think about it? If I asked you right after, “and how are you different?” Could you explain that equally as effectively?
I mean let’s face it there are lot’s of personal trainers and fitness professionals. Nearly all promise results, promise to personalize things for their clients and offer follow up and accountability. But really what’s different about you?
Being able to identify and communicate what makes you unique will instantly brand you with credibility.
For instance, my private facility One-to-1 Fitness offers one-on-one, semi-private and small group personal training services. Nothing too unique about that, however our USP or unique selling proposition goes more like this:
One-to-1 Fitness is an exclusive private fitness centre, there are no memberships. Our personal training services feature up to 2 hours of specialized assessment and movement screening. This allows us to develop specialized personal programming specifically for you based on the results of the assessment. Additionally One-to-1 offers individualized weight loss coaching through our exclusive branded nutritional coaching system Your NewTrition™.
Both descriptions are true but one is much more descriptive in terms of setting us apart from our competitors in a way that clearly demonstrates how we are different. We’ve even taken further steps to separate ourselves with trademarked and branded programming giving us an even clearer unique selling proposition.
When this USP is targeted toward your customer Avatar it gives you synergistic leverage for attracting new clients. If you were going to hire a coach say for martial arts how would you select one? Wouldn’t you ask people you know for referrals and/or try to learn why one might stand out or appear better than another?
Combined with social proof and a solid risk reversal your USP is your chance to brand yourself to better identify with your customer Avatar, a critical component to the success of your personal training business.
How-to Develop and Use a Customer Avatar to Get More Personal Training Clients
If you want more personal training clients and don’t have a defined customer Avatar this article is absolutely step one for the future success of your personal training business.
When I first started as a personal trainer I would hear from successful business owners all the time that I needed to know my niche but for some reason I really struggled to understand what it really meant. Maybe because I was analytical, methodical and task oriented I insisted on overthinking what it meant to know my niche or my customer avatar, I struggled for a long time as a generalist. Because I didn’t know specifically how to communicate to my Avatar getting more personal training clients was slow, difficult and unpredictable. I seemed to think I needed to understand demographics or that I was looking for people with a certain income and things like that. I didn’t understand why it was important to know where these people hung out, what activities they enjoyed, what items they might purchase, what their hobbies, fears, goals, and favourite thing to do on Sunday was.
Over time I really began to understand that using demographics and local statistics was only a means of validation for confirming my Avatar. You see it’s a very important two-step process and for the longest time I was hung up on step two and had never really completed step one.
You need to be able to close your eyes and see your Avatar in front of you, give them a name. The stronger the image the more you can identify with them. Imagine talking to your spouse and a local politician though at times we might debate that both conversations may carry a political tone I can almost certainly guarantee the language used in each conversation will never be similar.
Once you have described and written the story of your Avatar every word, image, offer and idea pertaining to your services should be presented in an effort to speak to them. You might think this sounds ridiculous, I know I did, but it will completely set you apart from your competition. The effectiveness of your marketing will significantly increase and you’ll still continue to attract those outside your Avatar, often with a greater credibility because you are now looked upon as a sought after expert. If this still sounds weird you’ll just have to trust me, but I can guarantee at some point you will realize this is one of the biggest steps to creating a successful personal training business.
Below is one of my favourite examples of a customer Avatar by one of my former coaching clients.
Adam business owner (39) +, +
Name: Adam Age: 39
Single, No Kids, Wants to have a family FAST
Main Problem Area: Belly, Abs, Low Energy Tired
Income: 150 to 250K/year
Training Experience: Beginner, Never consistently
Biggest Fear: He is never going to find a quality women that finds him attractive.
Frustrations: Loneliness, Constantly gets distracted from his diet and training, skips meals.
Biggest Motivator: Become more physically attractive to women, have more Energy so he can make half a million $, No more belly so he can be more confident around women. 6 pack Abs, toned biceps, Ripped Chest
Personality: Social, Talkative, Questions every thing, Leader
Adam is 39 years old, he is single and he has a successful real estate business. He has been working for himself since he was 18 years old.
He lives in _______________________ and usually spends most of his days in front of his computer at his home office or at various coffee shops and clients places.
Adam is single and has been in 3 longer relationships, he wants to have a family as soon as possible. He feels tired and his energy is low especially after lunch and he is not happy with the way he looks in front of the mirror. He wants to look good and wants to get rid of his hanging belly fat.
He is always in rush, He is financially well off and makes an average of 150K per year income and he only has to support himself but he is very motivated to get to a half a million dollar income like some of his friends.
Adam has tried weight training before but always gets too busy to be able to stick to his program, he knows he wants to have a nice body but other things constantly take up his time and other important things always come up. Though he doesn’t remember much about how to weight train, he is confused about what to eat and how to train, how long cardio should be and doesn’t have time to research this topic. He’d like to just hire someone who he can trust to do this for him.
Adam goes out on weekends with his friends to lounges and friends places, he likes hockey.
Adams biggest fear is that he is going to be single for the rest of his life and that he is not going to meet high quality women who will like him for him. Adam Is lonely, he knows he can get rid of his belly he is just looking for an expert to guide him one he can rely on and commit to.
He loves the idea of having more energy so he can do more work, make more money and, to increase his confidence with women.
Adam wants to make sure that his trainer is on time, professional, produces results. He does not want to waste his time or money and most importantly he wants to LOOK GOOD FAST, he wants his results tracked he wants to be shown that this plan is working and that he is becoming fitter, looking better and more girls are starting to notice it.
Are The Things You Say Attracting or Repelling Personal Training Clients?
I have yet to meet a personal trainer that had copywriting listed high on their list of important skills to be a successful personal trainer or fitness professional. However take it from me, the very words you’re using on your website, in your articles, videos and marketing campaigns may be the exact cause of their massive success or epic failures.
Though copywriting does come more naturally to some more than others anyone can become a much more effective copywriter than they currently are.
Until you get the hang of it (and then maybe still even when you do) it helps to have a pattern to follow to write your copy. My favourite pattern to follow comes from a presenters at a previous conference. It’s a blend of styles from Alex Moroko and Frank Kern but it gives me a set and effective pattern that makes sense any time I try to address my audience.
Note that it will be much easier to use this copywriting strategy or any other if you have completed the Most Likely Customer or Customer Avatar exercise first.
Headline – Your headline needs to be exciting, attractive, compelling and on point.
“If you could have an inside, all access pass behind the scenes tour of a multiple six-figure fitness business and receive specific instructions on how to build your personal training business from scratch to six or multiple six figures in as little as 90 days, would you listen?”
Identify the “Big Ass Problem” – As people we are not looking to buy a product or service, we are looking for answers to our seemingly insurmountable problems.
“Most personal training certifications have one measly little chapter on business and marketing. What’s worse is the client attraction strategies are based on outdated corporate strategies that are more likely to leave a trainer broke and looking for a job than with the growing fitness business that they deserve. “
It’s time to “Twist the Knife” – Next validate the big ass problem with third party information if possible and then emotionally identify with your reader why this problem affects them directly, and just how bad it could be.
“More than half the people certified this year will be out of the industry by the time of their first renewal. The industry rate of attrition is more than 50% and at a time when the general public needs fitness professionals more than ever. The obesity epidemic continues to rise, uneducated people are spending billions of dollars on fad weight loss diets and invasive surgeries yet personal trainers struggle to earn an income that often doesn’t even exceed the poverty line. “
Next you need to empathize with your reader in effort to nurture your relationship and earn their trust.
“It’s not your fault; the certification organizations have continually focused on improving the technical knowledge of their students. These are necessary skills and all while the rapid growth of the Internet and the onslaught of social media is radically changing the way large companies and small effectively market and predictably attract new customers on a cost effective basis. Now more than ever there is no set standard as to the “best” way to easily and inexpensively attract new clients. This is both frustrating and encouraging, let me explain.”
Tell your story on how you found the solution.
“Like you I struggled for years to make it as a fitness professional, and then I attended on a whim this crazy conference led by internet marketers. They showed me how social media was evolving and changing the behaviors of people and how they make decisions. I didn’t want to believe it, but as I listened to what they said I could relate to it in the way I acted before I made purchases. This realization lead me an idea, an idea on how I could adapt what they said both online and offline, how I could create tonnes of value and a strong win-win of always making people feel like they were being given a gift or the offer that was too good to be true, but actually was true. This led me to create my super duper client attraction widget.”
Now you want to validate your solution with social proof before you present the offer of your product. Give real examples of the success you’ve had with this product or strategy and of course even better is when you can share testimonials and the results of others. We know that people will say almost anything to get us to buy, but it still feels right if someone else gives us their review of the item or service we’re interested.
Once you’ve validated your product with social proof it’s time to present your offer.
Your offer should always be high value, remember the more you give the more you get! Do you want multiple customers? If I could promise you, absolutely guarantee you any amount of customers you wanted what would you be willing to give in return?
“I’d like to show you how you can attract 10, 20, 30 or even more clients in the next 30 days. I’m going to provide you all the tools and resources that you need, every script and ad necessary all you need to do is commit 1 hour per day to this plan. Do we have a deal? If so click the buy now button below and get your super duper client attraction widget for just $97.”
Now follow it up with a Risk Reversal or Guarantee, after all if you truly believe in what you’re offering what do you have to lose?
“I’m so certain that this super duper client attraction widget will work for you that I absolutely guarantee it. If it lets you down ever simply return the product for a 100% full money back guarantee.”
And last but not least overcome the final bit of consumer procrastination by explaining “why now?”
“Listen if you’ve read this far, looked at all the success stories then you can buy my super duper client attraction widget, worry free and start building the business you want and earning the income you deserve or you can keep doing what your doing. Each week that goes by will be same as the last, if you’ve read this whole page there’s no doubt that you’re frustrated just as I was because the outdated and broken marketing strategies you were taught aren’t working. I don’t want to see you leave the fitness industry; people need you more than ever. What do you have to lose? Either next week is the same as the last and you ask for your money back or you begin to easily attract new clients and together we change people’s lives, what do you say?”
Did you find this copy compelling? Whether you did or you didn’t hopefully this helps you to improve the effectiveness of all your marketing mediums and at the very least using a consistent pattern will help you identify further how you may yet still communicate more effectively with your audience.
Know Your Audience
Given that today is election day here in Alberta I know many of you will instantly relate to this. Just this last weekend was my third annual Profitable Personal Trainer live workshop and like every event of this kind one of the first, biggest and most important points was to identify your audience. Many interpret this is researching demographics and associated data to determine who they are trying to attract.
This is the wrong approach, in fact applying that data to the equation is the final step, the validation that you have in fact identified your audience and they do in fact reside within your immediate reach.
Last night while unwinding from the whirlwind workshop weekend (I get so jacked up with all the mutual inspiration that I always find it difficult to unwind to sleep the night after) my wife’s cellphone rings…it’s an automated phone call from one of the electoral candidates.
The message was heavily scripted, clearly prompted, lacked any form of emotion and blatantly said I should “not trust” specific candidates. That was the focal point of the message that ultimately became my focal point of the message, except instead of identifying with the caller and his plea it lead me to immediate mistrust the caller.
Clearly a marketing message gone wrong. I suspect I was not the caller’s target audience, I believe he was trying to shop for support from a still older audience but forgive me if you happen to disagree but I think this message will have been even more wrong for that older audience.
Let me explain.
If I was marketing to people of 50+ years of age I would think the following:
1) They like or prefer to read message and evaluate the information to make a decision such as in a medium like a newspaper.
2) Visual messages on television would likely to be effective as long as they meet the basic criteria of a relationship: genuine emotion, passion driven, sympathetic to the needs of the group whom the speaker is wishing to connect with.
3) A spoken message could be effective met with the same criteria as a visual, interaction with a real individual likely to be extremely effective.
4) I anticipate this group of people to be slightly resistant to technology.
5) I would expect this group to have a high barrier of mistrust to which sympathetic language and genuine transference of emotion will be critical to overcome.
6) I would also expect this segment to have some of the best overall understanding of the various political platforms so blatantly telling them to act a certain way without validation of why is likely going to be a major disconnect.
I think you can easily see why an automated, non-emotion, scripted phone call with the focal point of “not trusting” another candidate is likely to back fire. Could you imagine paying thousands of dollars for a campaign that not only perhaps doesn’t work but cripples your potential outcome?
This is why as a successful fitness professional it’s critical you identify your most likely customer. Close your eyes, picture them in your head and describe them to a fault.
What do they look like?
How old are they?
What are their interests?
What are their dislikes?
What are their potential problems or challenges?
What places do they frequent?
What items or services do they use?
Who do they associate with?
Drill down every detail even to the point of giving them a name, it’s so much more than just knowing if a certain segment of people are immediately accessible to you. Every communication you have with your audience you must be writing to ‘them’ using the language that makes sense for that relationship.
Just this weekend I asked, “if you were writing a letter to your member of parliament and your sweetheart would you use the same language?”
Obviously not, so are you using the right language to communicate with your desired audience?
Facebook Foot Soldiers and “Punching” Your Clients
How would you like to create tonnes of social proof, dozens of raving fans, create oodles of referral leads with very little effort?
A short time ago one of my coaching clients was doing something really cool with Facebook that I wanted to share with you. This works especially well for fitness boot camps and group personal training. (Additionally check out my update at the end that can make this work for pretty much any program you offer.)
By now you may have heard of the “human billboard” concept or offering deep discounts to people that can generate referrals for you. Today we’re going to take that a step further with Facebook. We all know just about everyone has a Facebook account, and if they are one of the rare few that don’t, it’s only a matter of time. What my coaching client is doing is having clients “tag” his studio in comments. Each time someone tags his facility in a comment it will also show on his studio fanpage, this makes it easy to hold your foot soldiers accountable.
So how does this help you? Well on average most people have 200 or more friends on Facebook, every time they make a comment that comment get’s shown multiple times on all of their friends news feeds. The more interaction with those impressions the more times it’s shown, it’s that simple. You can quickly see how you can suddenly have a third party endorsement or viral marketing span across 100s of people in a very short time because they’re all on Facebook way too often. (To further validate this the statistics of four fanpage show that with less than 1000 fans our social reach in our community is extending into the tens of thousands on a weekly basis, we are reaching an insane amount of local people on a weekly basis just with our fanpage, imagine how much further you can go if people are tagging and talking about you.)
Now you don’t have to do this for billboards, it’s easy to run challenges, ask people to tag your studio or you in comments, set a goal like the first person to comment on such a day wins a prize…you know what they say early bird get’s the worm. Or the first person to make 3 unique comments, it could be anything really.
Important things to remember:
- Posts don’t need to be (and likely shouldn’t be) sales oriented.
- The best posts are just legitimate comments, like “My workout @PersonalTrainingRedDeer was amazing today!” or even better, “My trainer @PersonalTrainingRedDeer weighed me today, I’ve lost 20lbs!”
- Facebook is about natural conversation, don’t encourage spamming people will just ignore it.
(TIP: If you don’t know how to set your page username go to www.facebook.com/username.)
A little tip that can go a long way for generating massive referrals and creating your tribe, the ideas are endless from referral contests, referral rewards, fan building and much much more. Use your imagination….in fact in the spirit of Facebook here is my latest update.
At One-to-1 we have a very defined marketing funnel. We religiously track our new leads and specifically what we’re offering to people and how many are buying. At any given time I can tell you how many people inquired, were booked, purchased and what they purchased for any month in the last couple years.
If you don’t have a similar system you will want to read this post.
I can now see the patterns of the ebb flow of our business each year. This has allowed me to design and develop promotion and awareness campaigns that allow us to keep leading our market. One of the things that I think is critically important is having a plan for ensuring you meet or exceed what you did the previous year. For instance let’s say last year in February you had 30 new people inquire about your services, and 20 signed up or bought something. But this year it’s already the 15th of February and only 8 people have inquired, what are you going to do?
Ok I'm not actually suggesting you punch your clients.
Here’s a facebook idea to solve this problem. If you have a fanpage (and if you don’t you will have your personal profile which you should be ‘friending’ your clients) if you edit page and review the insights you will see a graph of how many people like, visit your page, etc. On the right side there is a link that allows you to ‘view likes’ or see all your fans.
Click on a fan, you end up on their personal profile, and ultimately quite often can even see their friends and ultimately navigate to a number of their local friends where you could post on their wall…
“Hey it’s Cabel from One-to-1 Fitness, a facebook friend of yours is a fan of ours, we’ve selected you for our BFF friend of a fan award. We have a special (prize/program) just for you, please contact us at ________ to claim before (5-7 day expiry/dedline.)”
The response at first may be low, but be diligent, I bet with copy and past you could do a few hundred of these in an hour, I’m guessing math wise 1-4% should ultimately respond, meaning you could calculate roughly how many people you need to contact to generate your missing inquiries. Your only cost, a couple hours or hours of your assistant.
There are numerous ways you can use or improve this, you can direct them to a private link and explain exactly what you have for them, sweeten the deal with an instant gift of content or videos (give them something of real value, expect nothing in return.) The law of reciprocity will assist you.
You could also post on your fans walls about the ‘BFF Referral Award’ and since they’re a fan any of their friends receive special treatment or a special offer for a very short period of time. (Scarcity is essential.)
This is just one of a number of simple business building ideas I’ll be sharing in express detail at the upcoming www.ProfitablePersonalTrainerLive.com workshop.
I’d love to hear what you think or your results if you use any of these strategies.
Renew, Rebirth, Revitalization
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.
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.
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