The fitness professionals I coach ask some damn good fitness business marketing questions, and I often get the same questions from several of my students. I decided to publish a few answers to help every fitness professional out there. Most answers have been shortened to fit the format of an article... Q: What are the fastest fitness business marketing strategies to build a client base when you are first starting out and have a limited budget? A: Honestly, face-to-face, in the trenches action is the best way to pull in new clients. Get out there day after day, offering your program to 20 new people each day. Consider training a few clients for free in exchange for their successful paying client referrals. If the referrals sign up you earn your money for the free session plus more. All 20 people that you talk to a day will not sign up, but if you have a good program at least a couple should become clients most days. I'll put you on the spot right now: promise yourself that you'll talk about your boot camp to 20 new people each day for a month. Any day you don't meet that goal is a day you have failed your business! Just get out there...anywhere you find people will work, such as the malls, food courts, big book stores, other gyms, hair salons, and the local t-ball field. It's called the SARGE.... 30 Days will change your life! SARGE...Reach out to 600 people in a month, face-to-face! SARGE...Watch your client base EXPLODE! SARGE....SARGE...do it TODAY! Q: I remember in your bio you talk about your money-spending strategy where you maxed out your credit cards. Looking back, would you recommend that to others? Money is tight right now and I am considering taking on a little debt to market more aggressively. A: It's true, I did max out credit cards in order to make a load of money, BUT I have also drained a corporate credit line "testing" new strategies and lost out in the end. I do believe it is okay to use some credit if you are certain you've found something that works and you can multiply in the future. That said, if you aren't 100% sure, don't do it! Good Use Example: A marketing campaign for location number one worked, so you utilize your credit to run the same campaign on a bigger scale. They've already proven themselves = good move. Bad Use Example: Someone tells you that it pays off bit time to run ads on a certain radio station or in a particular magazine, so you drain your account to run ads. The Big Lesson: Test something on a small scale and only invest further if the ROI is good. NEVER use your line to "test" the waters on something unproven or new. With that said, I don't know a single successful person who has not taken some risks. They've all made it big...but they've all gone broke at some point as well. Q: Any ideas for building new relationships with the big fitness gurus? A: Try simply asking him something. "What can I do for you?" "What can I help you with? Research?" He might not respond at first, but it never hurts to step up and ask. You'll get better results if you ask specific questions instead of general ones - make sure your questions can't be answered with a "yes" or "no" answer. For instance, you want to offer a guest fresh baked cookies by bringing the plate out and offering them up...rather than just asking "want something to eat?" What are some cool things you can do FOR them? GO DO IT! Take charge. They might respond with a flat out "no," and you have to be okay with that...but you never know what may happen if you never ask. Oh, and do not expect anything in return... just start the relationship off with a giving hand and be pleased with yourself. Q: My website is almost completed. Where do I go next? A: I'll break it down for you: 1. Have your assistant put up 12 Craigslist ads every day using my strategy. Different email accounts. Post 6 in the morning and 6 in the evening. You'll definitely get more clients with these simple instructions. 2. When you get your website up, it's super, super important to get Facebook Ads and Google Adwords directed to it immediately. 3. Register your site in a variety of directories: Yahoo, Botw, Gimpsy, Joe Ant. 4. For all of your main cities and services, have professional quality pages written, optimized for prime keywords. Here are some examples to get you going: (location = your city and/or country), (Location) Boot Camp (use alternates like boot camps, bootcamp, bootcamps), (Location) Personal Trainer (personal training, personal trainers), (Location) Weight Loss (clinic, clinics, center, centers, program, programs). That will get it done for ONE location or service. Continue with the same keywords for ALL cities, suburbs, states that are within a reasonable driving distance from each of your locations. Some additional keywords: * Workout, * Exercise, * Fitness, * Health Club, * Gym. Simply plug in your city or state name to form a complete keyword! 5. With Isnare, Ezine, Squidoo, Hubpages, and other article sites, you can link to these pages. REMEMBER to use your anchor text on every page! Well, that's it for now, but since these fitness business marketing questions seem to apply for so many fitness professionals, I do plan to publish answers to more questions in the future.
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