Tribefit Review | Interview With Joe D. Gym Owner Moved Online During COVID and Grows Fast!

Chris Lynton: Hey everybody, Chris Lynton here from TribeFit and we are very lucky to have, hopefully I pronounce it correctly, Joe DeRoche from Canada, Ontario. Is that correct and did I pronounce it right mate?

Joe DeRoche: DeRoche.

Chris Lynton: Ah shit.

Joe DeRoche: We were close. We almost nailed it.

Chris Lynton: I think I said exactly what I said a minute ago when I was double checking how to pronounce it and I got it wrong there. DeRoche. I don't know what I said. Anyways let's rip straight in with Joe. Lovely to have you with us. And I guess first and foremost, we'll jump into Joe's background, but Joe's a gym owner. I'm going through the specifics on that, he's obviously jumped online. He's kicked some massive goals in a pretty short time, and it's really good to hear, I guess, from someone especially like deeply in the COVID sort of period as well, but without me trying to tell your whole life story [inaudible 00:01:01] yourself, and maybe you can tell us a little bit about your background and what made you want to go online and what made you actually pull the trigger and start moving forward on it.

Joe DeRoche: Yeah. So I've been in the fitness industry now for kind of, as long as I can remember. A lot of it started back in athletics and sports. I mean, personally, I was playing hockey and then I went through school...

Chris Lynton: We have a bit of a pause there.

Joe DeRoche: ... all the aspects of it and kind of for the past six years now, I've been running... I own and operate two fitness studios, which have been great. I've loved, I grew a fairly big clientele. I mean, between the two studios were up around like 1500 members, which has been great. But going through that side of it, we're very good at the training part of it. But there's that disconnect between the fitness and nutrition component.

So about a year ago, I started kind of looking towards the online stuff to try and find an add-in that missing component because I saw people getting great results in the studio, but controlling what they're doing outside of the studio seemed to be a huge area of opportunity. Not only to help them progress, but also an area for me to potentially make more money because it was just something that we couldn't offer inside our studio under the franchise regulations.

So I started kicking my tyres with that about a year ago and I had assumed, silly me. I had assumed that based on the amount of people that I knew, how well ingrained I was in the fitness industry, I'm also a Lou Lemon brand ambassador so I know a lot of people on that side of the network. And then I knew a tonne of people in sports and athletics. So I just assumed that as soon as I put my name out there that I was offering nutrition and stuff like that that people would just automatically start coming towards me based on my reputation and things like that. And the things that I had achieved because I'm fairly well known in the community here. I was also the young entrepreneur of the year last year from the New Market Chamber of Commerce. So I thought that with all the things that I've accomplished, that people would just, "Oh yeah, let's just go to him."

So I was rudely awaken from that pipe dream, but I kept trying to just do the little things and hounding my network on top of trying to run the studios and I wasn't gaining much traction with it so I kind of just pushed it to the wayside. And that was kind of the end of that. And then once the pandemic hits and I had to close the doors to the studio, I had nothing but time to focus on building a secondary income, I guess, so to speak. But also it was a really huge shock to the system when your one way of earning money ends and you're kind of sitting in the weeds, I guess, trying to find something new and something that is feasible, something that could be scalable and something that can earn some money.

And then that led me to doing some online homework and I came across TribeFit. And I will say the one thing that kind of made me want to pull the trigger with TribeFit was the amount of testimonials that you guys had and then also everyone... I mean, the person that I had initially talked to... everyone just seemed very down to earth and it didn't seem fake or gimmicky. It was real people with real problems and you guys were helping real PTs get from A to B. So that really drew me in and made me want to dive in head first and kind of, I guess here we are.

Chris Lynton: Yeah. I appreciate all the kind words and it is something that we really pride ourselves in first and foremost, nothing is more important than, students and clients results and results speak for themselves. So I guess having one of the biggest testimonial walls and so fast growing is really, really important to us and people can be out there and shout how awesome they are, but I truly believe that nothing's more powerful than what other people say about you. So I appreciate the kind words on that.

But going back to your point about COVID is that yeah, the amount of people I've spoken to that were like, Oh, I had all these plans and wanting to do all these things and it was just kind of just too busy to do and that came along and it kind of forced you into going, all right, now I've got time and the, I guess the kick up the butt to get moving forward in that stuff is like that rude awakening of, Oh, damn, like everything's shut down, I've got to build other opportunities, I've got to build other structures and as... a book I was reading early this week, when they researched average millionaire, multimillionaire, or billionaire, each one had a, an average of seven different revenue streams on average and having different revenue streams in different capacity, I guess, sets you up for a strong foundation for if one does close down that you've got other opportunities rather than kind of freaking out.

But that's awesome. In terms of, I guess, going back. So you're now soon to be, or slowly opening the doors to your physical location. How are you going to kind of integrate what you've learned from the online space to boost up your face to face stuff as well?

Joe DeRoche: Sorry, you just kind of cut out there at the end. Can you just repeat your question for me?

Chris Lynton: Yeah, no worries. So now that you've done the online, you've got purely online clients with your physical location in person stuff, what or how are you going to try and link the two together to make your physical business stronger?

Joe DeRoche: Yeah, no, it's a great question. It's not something that I've been [inaudible 00:07:44]. I mean, through this whole time working through the modules, the big thing was putting the systems in place so that you can scale the business without having to be hands on 24/7. So I've been trying to spend a lot of time to not just automate the certain features that normally I'd have to sit there and do over and over again, but really understand the processes behind everything so that it doesn't take me two to four hours to do a task anymore. So I think I've been moving through the programme a little bit slower, a little bit more monotonously I would say, because I wanted to definitely understand how to operate the online business seamlessly and I'd be able to kind of transition that when I do become busy again, still allotting X amount of hours a day that I can still grow it.

But I think the cool thing is is that I can perfectly tie it into what I'm doing when I open because now that I have the systems and procedures in place, I have such a volume of clients that I know need this service, that I'll be able to take network and either market this new service to them, or just simply organically reach them and have something new and exciting for them to offer, which is going to be cool.

But I think that was my initial fear going before starting with TribeFit was how I don't have the time to do both. I don't have the time to do this properly and I'm kind of one of those people that if you're going to do something, you got to do it right. You got to be able to put 100% into it. But now having done it, having seen the small amount of success that I've seen in a month and a half, I know that it's realistic to say that I can do both now and I can hopefully scale them both at the same time and put 100% of effort into two to three hours a day and still get where I need to be. =.

Chris Lynton: Of course, of course. Perfect, man. And you pretty much came out of the gates... Off the top of my head, I can't remember. You came out of the gates pretty quick and picked up your long clients pretty fast as soon as you got into it. So I guess how many clients did you pick up in like the first couple of weeks?

Joe DeRoche: In the first couple of weeks? So in the first month I had done just over six and a half K and under your advice, the minimum that we were offering for the product was a thousand dollars Canadian. So I had, I think it was at least six new clients, and then I had one of my relatives, because I was just blasting everybody who I gave a little bit of a discount to. But yeah, so in the first four weeks I had six new high ticket clients, which was awesome because that was more than I had in all the months kind of before. I would have people here and there, but again, when you don't know how to package your offering, don't know how to do it right, you're selling yourself for a hundred dollars here and there, just to say you have a client and it wasn't ideal.

And then I will say the kicker was after, right near the end of those kind of around the fourth, fifth week, I did a word of mouth explosion and I could not believe the response. It was absolutely wild and just had another influx of... I mean, there was probably 30 plus people that had submitted to work. So it was another influx of five to ten more clients. So it's been pretty cool to say I've been as high as 15, 16 clients and just under, it's been what, six and a half, almost seven weeks, I guess. So yeah, it's been a wild ride.

Chris Lynton: Yeah, man, hats off and congratulations. You've done the work and I guess the awesome part is is that come COVID, a lot of facility and physical location owners were like staring down the barrel of a gun and shutting everything down and having no income and having outgoings of staff and lease and equipment and so on and os forth and to go from that stage... Though, I know there was a lot of people who at that stage kind of froze in fear, but for yourself, like hats off for going, okay, here's where I am. I need to do something about it, pulling the trigger on something and getting the results and I guess being able to be in that position of, well, I've got all this cash coming in, helping all these clients rather than just sitting on my hands and worrying about, and just going deeper and deeper, I guess, into the costs, debts and all that sort of stuff. So massive shout out to you for that.

In terms of, I guess, where have you seen the biggest change in what you were doing that wasn't getting results to, to what you're kind of doing now that's getting that traction?

Joe DeRoche: I would have to say it was just... Like originally I was just relying on my own network. And again, I had just assumed that people would come to me.

Chris Lynton: Of course, of course.

Joe DeRoche: You post on your Facebook, hear it, you post on your Instagram and you just assume that people are going to flock to you right? But the more homework I did and the more I kind of understood what was going on online... There's so much noise and initially that was my biggest fear was how am I going to break through the noise? But it was finding ways to, like you say, hone in on one specific niche, get out of the general population and then bring people to you. Don't sit in wait. Like it's not Noah's Ark, right? It's not build it and they will come, you have to go out and get them. So that was probably the biggest thing, was I had to find ways to strategically go and get the exact people that I was looking for and the Facebook group also adding into that was pretty cool, like building your own little community within your bigger community of like-minded, committed people who are all kind of your exact avatar of similar problems that you can solve. So those are probably the two biggest things.

And then obviously the Facebook ads, I always had used an agency for my studio. I had no idea how it worked. All I knew is that I was giving them X amount of dollars a month to spend, and they were sending me leads. And that was that. So actually sitting there and going through the process of figuring out and learning how to do it on your own has been really eye opening and that has obviously found... Is the scalable success, which is awesome. That kind of really fired me up understanding that and then being able to take that to the next level was really cool.

Chris Lynton: Yeah. Yeah, man. And I say to everyone who pays an agency to do that, their ads like... yeah it's easier, but I guess from a results perspective, like you kind of giving the keys to your future to someone else, and like they've got the total control of where you're going to go, how fast you're going to go, how much profit you're going to make, how many clients and impact you're going to have. And that's a pretty dangerous thing to be putting your future in someone else's hands who potentially doesn't really care too much because it's not... You're just a number to them. So I guess from the here and the now, so let's just say, roundabouts, you've had 15 clients, thousand dollars a package, 15K, six weeks. So where to from here? What's the, I guess the next six weeks we'll go up to for Joe?

Joe DeRoche: Yeah. I mean, my initial goal was to do 9K a month. So I just want to be able to consistently do that. And then my biggest thing right from the beginning is something that you guys said was you have to spend money to make money. So figuring out where that balance is on the ad spend and time to continually drive in the right amount of traffic in order to get those sales. I think if I can continually do nine new clients a month, I'll be a very happy person. And I know it's manageable for me to do and then I know that it'll bring in the right amount of money, and then also if I'm consistently doing that, hopefully up the price and then kind of keep going from there.

But I've learned throughout these six and a half, seven weeks that it's just to do it and then tweak it as you go. So that's been, I'm sure I'm going to learn a lot more in the coming weeks about how to do things better, more effectively and more efficiently. But yeah, if I can consistently do nine a month, I'll be happy guy.

Chris Lynton: Beautiful, man. We'll get you there for sure and, doing nine a month and running your other business at the same time. Phenomenal and very doable, especially as you mentioned with ads just being so leverageable once they're all firing and rolling. So I guess...

Joe DeRoche: I appreciate it.

Chris Lynton: Man, if you could jump in a time machine, as I'm sure we all wish we had, if you jumped in a time machine and go back a year when you said you were kind of looking into the online space and dabbling here and there, what... Like if there's someone listening today who is where you were a year ago, what, just to wrap up, is there any advice that you'd give them that we would be able to kind of fast track the process for them?

Joe DeRoche: Yeah. I mean, everyone's... What I found when I was looking for online help and support, it was in the back of my mind. It was "oh my God, that's expensive. That's expensive. How can you justify spending that amount of money on a coach here? You're smart enough. You can do it on your own," but I've learned from experience that you can not. You can do it on your own, but it's going to take you a heck of a lot of time and you're going to waste more money than you earn trying to figure out how to do it properly and probably lose a lot of hair along the way. So I would just say, just commit, you'll be happy that you started and you'll make your money back faster than you dreamed you would. It's money well spent. The best investment you can make is in yourself and you'll make it back within the first month. So I would say just dive in head first, commit to the programme and you're guaranteed to find success along the way.

Chris Lynton: Beautiful mate, beautiful. Well, I appreciate your time. I know you're a busy guy and I know that, as we were talking about before, the restrictions are starting to lift there in Canada and where you are specifically and mate, for a lot of facility and physical location owners, it's, it's been a tough time. And like I said before, it's really, I guess, a credit to yourself on being able to go, no, I'm not going to sit on my hands and kind of just pretend nothing's happening. I'm going to go out there and pull the trigger and make shit happen and you've done it. So congrats yourself, hats off to you, man. And I guess you deserve all the results you're getting.

Joe DeRoche: Yeah. Well, thank you. I appreciate it. It's been a fun journey. I appreciate all the support and guidance and I'm looking forward to the future. That's for sure.

Chris Lynton: Awesome. Joe, appreciate your time. Hopefully anyone listening in has taken a lot of information and sort of inspiration, I guess, from the story as well, but mate we'll speak soon and that's it from us. Bye for now.

Joe DeRoche: All right. See you later.