| Our industry has gone through several rounds of evolution. In the beginning, the business model was built on the one-on-one, 60-minute training session model. Later, team training and shorter 30-minute training sessions became widely accepted. And most recently, group training and boot camps have become accepted, and in fact, the standard in programing. Having a variety of services gives your potential client more options to choose from, and that could be a good thing. But making your services available to a variety of markets could be the kiss of death for your personal training business. Specialization in the market place is the surest way to getting your fitness business on track for success. If we take a look outside of our industry to industries such as law or medicine, you'll see that the attorneys and doctors who specialize earn the most and are able to more quickly build their businesses. The days of "general practice" are over. Those who specialize and go narrow and deep into a market space grow the quickest. So how do you identify your ideal niche market? You need to ask yourself who is it that you want to train. At the end of the day it's about you working with your ideal clients. Life is much too short for you to not work with the type of client that you are most passionate about. Chasing the money and trying to be the best trainer to everyone is actually the fastest way to frustration and burnout. How do you find your ideal clients? It just makes sense to specialize in a niche market. Rather than spending a lot of money on advertising in many places at once, you can spend half that amount and advertise your business in a few select but highly targeted places. More often than not your ideal client hangs out with other "like-minded" people, which means referral generation and word-of-mouth marketing can really work favorably for you. The key to going narrow and deep into a niche market is knowing your ideal client, such as their age, gender, lifestyle and goals. Identify their fears, frustrations and desires. Position yourself as the local expert and authority to that niche market and prove your expert status to them by demonstrating case studies including testimonials and before-and-after pictures. So what about "going wide?" Now, this is not to say that you can't have multiple niche markets ... in fact you can. However, it's always best to start narrow and deep with one market and then after establishing your expert status to that market, find other markets to position yourself in as the local expert. Get more ideas, tips and strategies for building your fitness business by visiting Bedros Keuilian's blog, www.PTPower.com. |
