Just Completed My Qualifications Should I Start Online OR Will More Qualifications Help?

Hey guys. Chris Lynton here from TribeFit. And in this video, I'm going to be talking about, something that I get asked day in and day out from new trainers. Now, what should I do, the question is, Chris, I've just recently done my certification as a personal trainer, or I've just done my university degree as a sports psychologist or sports scientist, or whatever it might be. What's the best next thing to get online? Should I jump into online straight away or should I start doing something else? Should I get more qualifications or whatever it might be.

Now, great question. It's a fantastic question and a very common one from people who are early on in their stages of business. Now, should you jump online straight away after you've first had your certification and you've never trained anyone before? I generally recommend no, and there's a couple of reasons for that. Face to face, getting face to face and getting some face to face clients is the easiest place to start. It's the easiest place to start, and start to cut your teeth as a trainer and learn. Why? Because you can go to a local gym, you can get a job, you can get paid by the hour, you can work with people.

There's people that'll come to the gym. Generally, you'll have to do a couple of free sessions, whatever it might be. It's the best place to start. It's the fastest and the easiest way to start, but if you get trapped there, if you get stuck there, it's not going to be fun. Now, I generally recommend people to have at least six months experience training people, doing programmes or whatever it might be, before jumping online. Why is that? Because you're going to have a better understanding of the type of clients that you enjoy working with, the type of clients that you regularly get results with, which is important.

And also, getting an understand of different people's needs and programming and how to see results. Now, you've got book smarts, you've got the certification, you've got a degree, whatever it might be. You now need to get some actual, versus theory, you need to get some practical experience. And that's going to give you knowledge, it's going to give you experience, which you will then be able to leverage over to online, and get results faster, and move forward faster in your online basis.

Now, as an online trainer, you need to understand who you want to help, what type of clients you're going to attract, and you also have to have at least an understanding of how to put together some programmes. And from a nutrition side of things or potentially a training side of things. So this is really going to help you from there. A lot of people say, well, Chris, I've been training people, myself, my friends, other people way before I got my certification, and now I've just gone and thought, I should get my certifications and I want to move further in that path.

That is a caveat. If you've been doing it for a while, and you're confident and comfortable, whether you're training yourself or family, friends, people you know, people you've met in the gym or whatever it might be, some people have more knowledge than without a certification, and more experience and more expertise without a certification, than someone who does have a certification. So there's always a caveat. If you have that knowledge and you have that expertise, you have been doing it, and you've just gone out and gotten your certification, and you're fresh, you don't have to do the six months.

The six months is just a rule of thumb of me just generally saying, if you don't feel comfortable, you don't feel confident, and you haven't really trained people in the past, it's best to go there first. Why? Because you're going to get better results. You're going to move forward faster, once you do start to get online. Don't get stuck there, because it's going to be frustrating for all of the reasons that I talked about, in terms of free trials, free trainings, training with the wrong people, whatever it might be. But you need to be able to identify that, before you can really narrow in on your niche, your online space, and the type of people that you want to work with and you want to attract, and so on, and so forth.

So the other aspect to that question is, I speak to some trainers who have been in the space for a while, and they've done the certification. They've just done maybe an additional certification in nutrition or strength training or whatever it might be. And there is a vicious cycle or a loop that some people can get caught into, and it's what I like to term, the ongoing student. And it is a vicious cycle where people continually think that more education or more certifications or more pieces of paper with their name on it and certification is going to be this saviour to their problems. It's going to solve their problems.

And unfortunately, I fell into that trap as well in my early stages. I did a certification. I then went on and did a Bachelor of Science, a university degree. From there, I still hadn't solved the problem. I didn't know how to get clients. I thought, I need more degrees. I need to be more of an expert. So I went on and did a Masters degree. I almost went on and did my doctorate, until I stopped there, and someone said to me, Chris, you do not need more degrees. You do not need more education in training or whatever it might be. You need to know how to do sales and marketing to get clients. That was your true problem from the start.

And you didn't realise that. You thought, this degree's going to help. And then as soon as you got the degree, it didn't help. Another degree must help, or a different degree must help, or whatever it might be. And you can get caught in that vicious cycle of endless education, and looking for that next piece of paper, thinking that's going to solve the problem. And everyone's all of a sudden, going to think you're an expert and pay super high prices, and race to you, and solve your problems. Unfortunately, it's not. Having enough information, having enough education to be able to help people, and further that ongoing, is fantastic.

Working with clients, you're going to learn more than ever, and you're going to keep up to date. And I'm not saying, don't further educate yourself. But what I am saying, is don't get caught in that loop where you feel like you must educate yourself more, before getting started. I fell into that trap. It wasn't until I got out of that trap, and now I look back on it, and think to myself, if I did my doctorate, I would have wasted four, five years, a lot of money. And at the end of it, I would have been as helpless and frustrated as I was, when I did my Masters degree and still hadn't solved the problem.

So hopefully, that makes sense. And hopefully that's debunked that myth of education, qualifications is going to be your saviour. And if you are in that loop at the moment, hopefully I've helped you get your mindset around that and change up what you're going to do. And not spend another year or two, going into further debt and further frustrations, and then come out of that, not moved any further forward.