We get messages like this all the time:
Hey, FitMedia. You’re the best fitness marketing agency in the world. So, tell me: how do I grow my fitness business?
We could talk to you all day about this, but let’s break it down into really easy, manageable chunks. There are only 2* (*ish) ways to grow your fitness business.
1. Get more clients.
This is obvious. Growing your business means you want more customers. Dave down the road might have only 5 clients on the go while Sarah up the road (in the posher bit of town) has 10. All else being equal, Sarah will be earning twice as much as Dave and have twice as much to invest into her business.
That’s probably why Sarah lives in the posh bit of town.
As a leading fitness marketing agency (“the best in the world” - see above), we are experts at helping you find new, high-quality leads to help you expand your clientele.
That said, getting more clients also means more hours, and doesn’t always leave you with the time to take care of all the other parts of your business to help it grow. In the second part of this article, we want to show you how to grow as a business without necessarily growing your client base.
2. Increase the value of your clients.
Increasing the value of your clients simply means that you will earn more from each individual under your coaching.
There are three simple ways to do this.
Firstly, put up your prices. This makes sense particularly as you gain more clients: the higher prices are a result of both your increasing experience and the increasing value of your personal time, without necessarily expanding your offer.
Secondly, expand your offer! For instance, you might already be offering them personal training sessions, sure, but are you offering meal planning? Lifestyle coaching? Nutrition tips? Ebooks? Online courses? Group challenges? Zoom workout classes? Q&As and resources from friendly therapists, psychologists, nutritionists and other experts besides yourself? Doing these things can give clients a more varied and valuable experience, and give you more valuable clients in return.
Finally, focus on your retention. The value of your clients is not simply limited to their value over the course of a given month, but their value over many months or even years. While this partly comes down to the quality of your offer and your ability to deliver on your promises, it also depends on a few other things, too.
Let’s say you’re a weight loss coach. Once that weight is lost, what good are you? Well, between 80 and 95% of people on a weightloss journey will almost immediately regain that weight again! The real art (as you know) is to help them implement healthy lifestyle routines that will make it almost impossible to regain the weight they lost. Develop your offer to include the long-term as well as the short-term, such as low-cost, low-touch ongoing memberships of a community you build up around your brand.
For instance, have an education portal, group coaching calls, or, if you work in person, even a group workout session. This reduces the amount of hands-on time-consuming work you have to do with each client, but retains them in your list of paying customers.
Or, alternatively, say you’re a personal trainer simply looking to help clients in the gym achieve their goals. Developing a real relationship with these clients can be just as important for retention as the value you’re giving them on the gym floor and in their personal lives. Being friendly, approachable, helpful and funny can ensure that they keep coming back.
It may seem silly and a little naive to say that being friendly can help grow your fitness business - but it’s true! Your ability to be personable, relatable and likeable is a huge part of maintaining a loyal client base who keep coming back for more. This is what we call the KLT effect: Know, Like, and Trust.
Increasing the price, quality and breadth of your offer, as well as focusing on strategies for retention, will not only help to future-proof your business against whatever may be thrown your way but also means each client becomes more valuable to you financially - because you become more valuable to them.
In fact, this applies to fitness professionals in all niches.
Growing your fitness business can be as simple as that. If you want to learn more about how to expand your clientele, increase the value of your offer and improve retention, give us a no-strings-attached call later this week by filling out www.fitmedia.net/apply.
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