15 Personal Training Business Mistakes

One thing I find myself constantly knockin' my damn head against the wall over is all the little things I try in business that don't work out. I'd say 4 out of 5 new business and marketing systems for my personal training that I try just don't bring back any positive results in terms of R.O.I.

That's why I have to keep reminding myself that whenever I try a new business or personal training marketing system or approach that it's just a test. If I try it, and it doesn't pan out the way I expect it too, I can either continue using it the way I am (horrible option), I can tweak it a little to see if there's another way to get it to work OR I can quit using that system or campaign altogether and chalk it up as a test result.

If it didn't work out it's not actually a failure, it's just something that I learned through TESTING isn't gonna work the way I tried it with my current business model.

When it comes to running a personal training business I've "tested" hundreds of ideas and strategies that didn't work out. If I had to guess I'd say I've probably tried around 500 different things and only about 30 really bring in kick-ass results, but those 30 can bring in a helluva a lot or revenue.

There are a TON of common fitness business mistakes I see personal trainers make. And there are a lot of trainers who aren't willing to change the way they're currently doing things, even when it's not working, because they either aren't willing to get uncomfortable by trying a different approach, their ego gets in the way of them admitting that what they thought would work isn't working, or they just don't pay enough attention to what they're applying to know what's working and what isn't.

Now, in the past I've listed some some fitness business mistakes in this article: Fitness Business Mistakes

Here are a few more mistakes I see a lot of personal trainers make, and a lot of these are mistakes I made myself. The good news is, if these things aren't working in your business just count it as a test result and test a different approach. And if some of things I've listed here do work in your business, then hell, keep on doin' em…

1. Not being willing to master business, marketing, sales and time management… through not only books, dvds and audio courses but by not testing what works.

2. Not charging enough. Most trainers I know compete on price, HUGE DAMN MISTAKE. People are looking for a benefit and are willing to pay for that benefit. The ones who aren't are a pain in the rear to deal with in the first place and shouldn't be touched with a ten foot pole.

There's a number of ways to raise prices, here's a few of my favorites:

• You can actually just raise your prices ( it's funny how much better results you can in selling personal training when you actually CHARGE MORE)
• If you currently train private one on one workouts you can train groups of people instead for almost as much per workout
• You can extend the length of your contracts – Let's say you offer 3 month and 6 month contract, you can easliy get just as many people to sign up for 4 month and 12 month contracts… this greatly raises your lifetime value per client

The key is to think in terms of life time value of a client

3. Doing any and everything thing in the business and not outsourcing and delegating

4. Following what everyone else in the industry is doing. Since most personal trainers have no idea how to market of run a business why would you do what most of them do?

5. Trying to be everything to everybody, and not being niched enough

6. On their website, not only trying sell people on training but trying to sell ebooks, online training programs and supplements as well. It's fine to sell these things, but these should be on completely different websites. Stick to one market, one message, one outcome. Otherwise you risk confusing the hell out of your visitor or losing a high dollar personal training sale to a twenty dollar ebook sale

7. Having a website that looks corporate.

8. Having a website that is all about you and your company and not about solving the problems that keep your prospects up at night.

9. Brand marketing

10. "Me too" marketing…  looking at how other personal trainers are marketing themselves and then just doing the same thing

11. Focused on being a trainer and not a marketer

12. Not willing to spend money on marketing

13. Not testing and tracking marketing to see what's working, what isn't, and constantly improving results.

14. Not having a sales system or sales script in place.

15. Not having clear and defined goals

There you have it… fifteen simple mistakes that most personal trainers make that are killing their bottom line.

Make more and work less,

Chris McCombs

Fitness Marketing and Time Management Renegade