Recently I've had an influx of friends and members of the community asking me how I became a PT, where I got my qualifications, how I pick up clients, how I market myself and approaching difficult subjects with clients. In this post today I'm going to address how I became a PT and different ways to market your own branding and ways to further your career.
It's a hard nut to crack.
Believe me when I say this, you won't get far if you're not passionate about it, you have to be able to make it your life at the start. The hours are long, the pay is awful, client retention can be a very hard point in the first few weeks/months. Your expectations will be to go straight into working and have 10 clients by the end of the week... ERM no that doesn't happen, hard graft, painful hours, taking to as many people as humanly possible and getting the right prices with the right target market. Look at it this way, in my first few months I was working over 70 hours a week and really pushing forward with talking to members and putting my services out there. To get someone, anyone to talk to you about their goals you have to build up a rapport, you can't just go straight into asking them what they want to achieve. I know it sounds stupid as thats what you want to know but you have to stick with the basics of just finding a common ground with them and building from there.
Oooohhhh pricey.
It's REALLY expensive, you either have to have thousands upon thousands of pounds to spend on a single unit to turn into a gym or you have to have money to rent space from an existing gym. To even rent space you have to reach a certain quota of sessions per week to even break even with the rent your are paying weekly/monthly. Sometimes you could have a quiet week where your clients are cancelling or away or something has simply happened to them that puts a halt on their training.
Time to go to market.
To market yourself to the right clientele is really hard and believe me I'm still working at it. If you push yourself to change bodies into that of bodybuilders or CrossFit you will also lose many opportunities to change someones life around, if you can get a range of clientele that you can use different techniques to help them achieve their goals, it also shows you are diverse and have good amount of knowledge.
Back to school.
You have to always be willing to learn new things and test them on yourself. Whether it's another course to help develop you or it's a day watching YouTube channels learning new techniques, all it has to be is something that furthers your knowledge on a subject. All be it useful. I'm currently studying to become a registered Nutritionist to help further myself and my clients. I also do a lot of research into new training techniques and other areas of fitness to help stop sessions getting stale and boring.
Life in the fast lane.
Everyone wants the easy and fast option, you will find that if results aren't happening fast enough for a client they will speak to you. With this you have to approach it subtly, ask them a few questions like how's your motivation to come in without you there guiding them, how's their diet looking, etc... If this happens maybe try a few other techniques with them and change up their routine as change is good, it might be that little bit of umph they need to get their body away from that plateau.
Talking is good.
Get your clients to tell you what they like in their training, also get them to give you advice on how they prefer the mood of their session: whether they want to be motivated by you standing static and shouting, or being bubbly and vibrant with their training. Maybe even go into a studio and blast some music out to help motivate them. Talking is great in your session, you will also become an agony aunt and get to here all sorts of stories and problems (believe me all the juicy gossip comes my way). Sorry client confidentiality I can't tell you any of the good ones, but here have a normal one.... NOT!! By talking during your session you can also build up rapport and use that to your advantage, (Testimonials and all sorts.), it will also help you gauge your clients needs during the session, heavier weights, faster pace, slower pace, more rest, etc...
Good luck in whatever you decide to do, and thanks again for reading. Any other questions feel free to ask.
Cheers then, see ya.
Beth xoxo
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