Tribefit Online Personal Trainers Workshop - Fitness business 'Health Check'

- Hey guys, Chris here from Tribe Fit, and today I wanted to take you through what I call the PT fitness business health check.  The way to check how healthy your business is.  Whether you're a gym owner, a face-to-face trainer,  or an online trainer, this is the best way to see  how successful you are as a business person.  How successful your marketing and your sales is,  and how strong your foundations are,  in regards to having a longstanding growing business.  

A lot of people, when they talk about, you know,  figure of success, and trying to see  how well their business is going,  they look at revenue, they look at income.  But unfortunately, that is a lag measure  of your marketing and your sales  and how hard you're working to try and boost that income.  The main health check, the best way to you know,  check the pulse of your business  and see how successful you're being,  I like to say is based on how many people,  how many potential clients you said no to in the last month.  It kinda sounds a bit weird, it kinda sounds a bit strange.  But the main point is,  you're literally taking on any potential client.  If you look back over the past month, the past week,  or whatever it might be, and you haven't said no  to one potential prospect, one person coming through  and saying, hey Chris, I'd love you for you to train me,  whether face-to-face, online, whatever it might be.  If you have not said no to at least  one person in the last month,  then, unfortunately, your business probably  isn't the most healthiest.  

What I mean by that, and I'll explain why  I take this as a health check.  When you have a stable business, and you have control  over your lead and your client generation,  and you have that consistency and that predictability  over being able to generate clients,  then you do not need to accept sub-par clients.  People that come along, if you haven't said no  to at least one person this month,  if you haven't had a chat with them  and asked them the right questions,  and made sure that they're a right fit  for you and your business, then unfortunately,  you're taking on everyone and anyone that comes to you.  And generally, business owners that take on  anyone and everyone, it starts to break their business down.  If you're taking on bad clients, unfortunately,  you know, late paying clients,  low paying clients, low motivation clients,  ones that don't really need your services  or want your services, or can't really get a result,  that is gonna hinder the growth of your business.  It's gonna reduce your energy,  and reduce the amount of testimonials we get,  and the proof you get out of there in regards to growing.  Taking on one bad client generally can take away  the energy and the focus of three good clients.  

And basically, like I said, if you take on someone bad  and they're generally taking up too much time,  they're not motivated, they're not paying,  you're chasing them for this and that,  it actually will hinder the growth of your business.  If you do take on these bad clients,  the only reason people take on these bad clients  is 'ause they don't have the consistency,  they don't have the predictability,  and they don't have the confidence to know  that if I say no to this person,  and I don't take their money, then I know tomorrow  when I wake up a fantastic client  is gonna be waiting for me, and away we go.  Generally, people only take on  bad opportunities or bad clients,  and you always know it in your gut  when you're first speaking to someone.  You only take on people when you don't have the ability  to replace them with someone great that next day. 

If you have an overabundance of people  looking to join your business,  if you have an overabundance,  over demand of people looking for your services,  you can be picky, you can be choosy about  who are your perfect fit client.  As a result, if you only get phenomenal clients,  your business will grow,  your clients will get great results,  you will get more testimonials,  and as a result, that proof will continue to grow  again and again and again, and you'll love your business.  Where businesses go wrong is when  they start getting shitty clients.  Shitty clients, crappy clients that come along  and start to break down your energy,  absorb too much of your time and focus,  and like I said, you're chasing payments,  or they don't perfectly fit in with what you actually do.  Do not take this as a selfish format.  If you are taking on every single person  that's coming to you, then you're potentially  taking on clients that you can't help,  or in the back of your mind you're thinking,  you know, I don't know if I'm gonna be able  to get this person a great result.  But I have to take them on, because I have to pay the bills,  and I don't know when the next client is gonna come along.  That's what I mean by taking on bad clients.  It is not selfish to say no to people.  

Your goal is to solve someone's problem.  If you can't solve their problem, you should say, hey look,  I don't think I'm a perfect fit for you,  and point them in the right direction.  Give them a solution, give them a result.  Say, hey, I know of some other trainer  who would be a perfect fit for you,  and is exactly what you're looking for,  I'll give you their number, whatever it might be.  By having that confidence, by having that ability  to turn down the clients that aren't a fit,  like I said, you're not doing it in a selfish format.  It is wrong to take on a client  that you know is not a perfect fit for you.  And you can't specifically get  the ideal result that they're looking for.  It is right both for your own business,  and it is also the right thing to do  by that prospect, by that client.  But once again, it only comes  down to healthy business owners.  Healthy business owners, if you have a healthy,  strong foundational business, and you have  an over demand, oversupply of people coming through,  you can be picky, you can be choosy about your clients.  And you can make sure you only get phenomenal clients  that you wanna work with that are gonna get the results,  they're gonna put in the time,  they're going to value your knowledge, your time as well,  and everything goes around in a circle from there,  and everything grows from there.  Like I said, the one thing that can hinder a growth  of a successful business is taking on sub-par clients.  

Everyone I speak to, when I always talk about this,  they always say, yeah, I know in my gut  when I was initially speaking to someone I felt,  you know, some resistance, or I knew in my gut maybe  they might not have been a good client.  And four, six, eight weeks down the path, you know,  they're chasing that client for the money,  they're getting bad reviews, bad reports, whatever it is.  And it's always in hindsight that you think to yourself,  I knew that person wasn't gonna be a great fit for me.  I should have said no, but unfortunately  I didn't have the confidence,  I didn't have the ability to say no  because I was fearful that there might  not be another client around the corner.  Like I said, a healthy, strong foundational business  has their marketing and their sales on point,  has an oversupply of people coming through,  demanding their services.  Same as an expert, what you do is pre-vet  your clients coming through, you be very choosy  about the people you work with,  and as a result, you'll have more freedom,  you'll have more financial freedom,  your business will grow, you'll get more success,  and as a result, you'll love your business a lot more.  So, make sure you take that on board next time,  when you are in that position of potentially  speaking to a new prospect, and you're saying  I don't know if this person is gonna be a great fit,  they're already talking about trying to reduce prices,  or, can I guarantee this or can I do that,  or can I work it at hours I don't normally work.  Think about how healthy your business is.  

If you don't say no to that person,  if you haven't said no to at least person in the last month,  you need to work on yourself, you need to work on  your marketing component of your business.  Because as a result, your revenue might be okay now.  But if you take on, like I said, this month,  your revenue might be good and you might be thinking  hey, I've got a healthy business.  But if you took on a truckload of bad clients that month,  the following month and the month thereafter,  your revenue is going to dip,  it is not going to have the consistency of growth,  and you're not going to love your business either.  You're going to get frustrated,  and it's not going to be something you're going to enjoy.  So, make sure from a PT health business check,  make sure you're doing that health check  at least once a month in your business.  The more people that you are, you know, straightforward to,  and are saying no, I don't think this is a fit,  still giving a solution and helping them out,  and pointing them in the right direction.  The more people you have of that,  that means your business is becoming more healthy  and is getting a stronger foundation as well.

So keep that in mind, make sure you're not  taking on those bad clients,  and if you are only taking on bad clients  because you're fearful of not being able  to consistently get more, then work on that.  Use that as your first focus, and then, as a result,  once that problem is fixed, you will only get good clients.  And then the problem paying bad clients  will not be there anymore.  It's what I call a lag and a lead measure.  The lead measure is not having the ability  to generate clients on demand, good clients on demand.  But as a result, as a lag, you get bad clients  that affect your business, and later on affect  your cash flow, your time, time with your family,  your energy and all that sort of stuff.  So keep that in mind, if that is you  and you do fall into that bucket,  put a focus, put an energy on fixing  your mandate, your marketing and your sales.  And then you'll go from there.  You'll understand exactly what I mean  once you have that down on track,  and you are only working with those ideal clients,  you'll see how much better it works.