Obesity is a problem in today’s society because fast food is incredibly cheap and you can find it almost anywhere. More and more people are also realising the importance of a regular fitness or exercise routine. However, most people don’t even know where to start when it comes to planning a fitness regime and they have no idea how to achieve their goals. This is where your fitness business will come in: you will help these people plan and stick to their exercise regimes while making a profit at the same time.
If you know quite a bit about exercise programs and ways to help people achieve their goals, maybe you are already a personal trainer at a gym, you can become an entrepreneur and start your own fitness business.
Below are the steps which you can follow to get you started.
Advice to start a fitness business
Determine what type of fitness business you want to start
You need to decide if you want to become a personal trainer, a Yoga instructor, a gym instructor or a Pilates instructor – there are many other options available. Besides getting a world-class fitness education, you’ll also need to become a master motivator so that you can help your clients achieve their fitness goals.
Get all the necessary licenses to open a fitness business
You will also have to register your company with the Companies and Intellectual Property Commission (CIPC).
Lease or buy a space for your fitness business
Firstly, you need to ensure that the space is large enough to house everything you may need as well as a class of people, unless you will be doing one-on-one training. You could even run the business from your home if it is big enough. Other options include training clients at their homes or training people at a gym. Be warned that you’ll have to pay rent to the gym if you decide to go with the second option.
Purchase fitness equipment
You can choose between new equipment or used equipment, that’s in good condition of course. Used equipment will save you money though.
Promote your fitness business
Nothing can make a business fail faster than poor marketing. You need to promote your business in as many ways you can. Marketing can be very expensive so you need to bear the costs in mind. Social Media is a great way to promote your business for free.
Social media can be extremely confusing as there are so many platforms and loads of different types of content that you could post. The good news is that as a personal trainer, there are certain platforms that you should be sticking to that will bring you the types of clients you want. But – before you do this – you need to make sure that you’re very clear about what you’re offering so that you can define your marketing message correctly.
Explain your service offering
As a personal trainer, you need to be very clear about what you could potentially be offering your clients so that you can structure your marketing message in accordance with what you’re offering.
“For example,” says Lisa Schneider: Managing Director at Trifocus Fitness Academy, “you could decide to do – in addition to your personal training qualification – a nutrition certificate so that you can advise your clients on the best diet they must follow so they can achieve their goals. Alternatively, you could look into getting trained in alternative training routines – such as kettlebells – which will add an extra dimension to your clients’ training.”
Choose your platform well
When choosing the social media platform that you want to have a presence on, think about the decision-making process that your clients will go through when choosing a personal trainer. What will they want to see? What will make them choose you?
An idea is to make a short video clip of you demonstrating an exercise, and talking through it, which you can post on social media. This will give people a glimpse into your training methods. Platforms such as Facebook and Instagram are great for displaying pictures and videos. It’s been shown that people on these platforms are more likely to make purchasing decisions about personal training services than any other social media platform.
Be consistent
Set up a posting schedule for your social media platforms and stick to it. Being present regularly on social media will help people to recognise you and will prompt them to phone you for a quotation.
Social media marketing is a very affordable platform for marketing your business; the only spend you need to make is your time. But make sure that you get your social media presence right. If you don’t, there could be very negative consequences!
Contact Trifocus Fitness Academy
Trifocus Fitness Academy will guide you in the right direction so that you can start your own fitness business. Plus up your CPD points with our Fundamentals of a Fitness Business course or for something more comprehensive – the Entrepreneurship Course .
