Personal Trainer Business Development Idea

How to Make Your Personal Trainer Business Development Idea Work Effectively

Most trainers that I’ve met usually approach their job with one personal trainer business development idea. They often have visions of the type of client they’d like to train. They sometimes have a vision of what they’d like their schedule to be (if not enforced by the company they work for). They rarely have an idea of how to develop their personal trainer business plan to make their vision a reality.

In the process of figuring out how to become a personal trainer, a top of mind personal trainer, at least for now, we’ll focus on that one personal trainer business development idea of the type of personal training client or niche market that some trainers wrap their arms around.

One of my lessons as an instructor to Personal Trainers for many years was an exercise in choosing clients. I would gather a group of my students and we would look out over the balcony at the fitness floor, which included a cardiovascular section, a free weight area, an area of selectorized and plate-loaded equipment, and a swimming pool.

We were fortunate to be in a large scale health club with rarely fewer than 40 people working out at once in the given area and oftentimes closer to 150 people.

“What do you see?” was usually my first question.

The answers were often what I expected:

My second question, “Who do you want to train?” gathered more expected answers:

The majority of my new students would usually lock in on the men and women, who appeared to be between 30-50 years of age, performing exercises with decent form, but who still looked as though they hadn’t quite achieved their fitness goals yet.

A smaller portion of the group would often not pick out specific people on the floor, but would say, “I only want to train with athletes.”

What always interested me was that each person in almost the entire group, without realizing it immediately, had just eliminated at least 50% of their potential personal training business. It was as if they had just put on blinders creating their own tunnel vision.

With this being the current mindset of most fledgling Personal Trainers (unnecessarily so), it is no wonder that we have such a high turnover rate in the fitness industry, and that in and of itself a reason why the profession is often not taken as seriously as it should be.

Here’s an example:

During my tenure as a fitness manager, a Personal Trainer on my staff had, at the time, an insatiable desire to work solely with athletes. It didn’t matter what sport they played, as long as they moved athletically, could pick up and perform new exercises quickly, and basically looked the part of the athlete.

Guess what? Athletes, like everyone else, get hurt.

Once they are injured, they don’t move as athletically, can’t perform those same exercises as efficiently, and are often out of the gym and spending time at physical therapy clinics.

So, when we think of that Personal Trainer business development idea or even a personal trainer business plan, most of that gets thrown out the window.

What this trainer and I did was to look at specialty certifications. She decided upon a post-rehabilitation specialty certification. Now, she had a better understanding of what each of her clients was going through in the physical therapy setting and a better understanding of how to design safe and efficient fitness programs for their return to the health club.

Something else important happened too.

Her new knowledge wasn’t only applicable to her returning athletes, but to everyone at the gym; men, women, seniors, children, athletes, non-athletes, those looking to lose weight, runners, weekend warriors. The list goes on.

Within a month of completing that specialty certification, her number of Personal Training clients had doubled.

Thinking back to your personal trainer business development idea, wouldn’t you like to find yourself in a similar successful situation? Hopefully yes.

The take home lesson here is to learn how to apply your knowledge base to the widest group of people possible. If you really do find enjoyment from training only one type of client, the potential is there for you to become successful enough to be that picky, but I think you’ll realize how much fun it is to surround yourself with people from all walks of life.

Committed to your fitness success,
Boh

David I. Bohmiller, BS, NSCA-CSCS
President/Owner
My Personal Trainer School LLC

P.S. If you are interested in growing the success of your personal training practice consider our Personal Trainer Course e-book as your next step to a succesful career.

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