Now you don’t have to be a brain surgeon to realise that the more people you train in an hour the more money you make. Get more people, put them together in a session and all of a sudden you’re making $125 an hour and are wondering why everyone complains about this personal training caper.
Life’s a dream….
Well, unfortunately life in personal training world doesn’t always unfold like that (as much as we would like it to). Let me tell you a story about how I (accidentally) discovered training small groups and how much it can bring to your business.
Back when I was new to the PT industry, I hated asking my clients for referrals. I had absolutely no faith in my own training ability and to actually ask my clients for more business was beyond my comprehension. Fear was my friend – every time I tried to start a conversation to ask for a referral, I would choke and then change topics.
But as time went on, I gained faith, built confidence and began approaching people, asking them for what I had thought was beyond me. The growth in my client base showed me the tactic paid off. Big Time.
What I learnt from that experience is that it is BLOODY HARD to be hustling for referrals when you’re just starting out and are not completely comfortable with the service you provide.
So keeping this in mind, when I developed my personal training businesses I wanted to implement a referral process that EVERYONE could feel comfortable doing – not just the ninja salesmen and women. So throughout the last 6 years, every business I have been associated with has run small group personal training sessions for the following reasons:
1) Increased hourly rate per session.
2) Ability to bring more people into your business in peak times.
3) Groups of three people can still be defined as personal training.
4) Provides awesome up-selling potential.
5) UNBELIAVABLY EASY REFERRAL OPPORTUNITIES
6) Affordability for client ($30 or so for a 1:3 is a great rate for quality PT)
So how do you develop referrals and build your business through running small group PT sessions? Luckily, the following 4 step guide will tell you exactly how. Now you can see exactly how it works in my business so you can slap it straight into yours.
Step 1: Convert a lead into a paying client. This is a whole other topic but for today’s exercise, I will assume you have a decent handle on this. Most people make the assumption that personal training is exactly that: personal training or 1:1 sessions. So at this stage make a connection with them, convert them as a 1:1 client and bring them into your business.
Step 2: Over the next 4 weeks, you must do an amazing job in training your new client, sorting out their food, giving them some training homework – whatever it is your service entails. All the while, your relationship with them is growing. It is vitally important that you are finding out more about them (work scenario, wife/husband and kids names, old training buddies etc). If you can’t remember all of those little details, it is a great idea to write it down and refer back to them.
Step 3: By their first assessment, your client will obviously be seeing some changes in their body and life; this is time to have a chat with them. Let them know that at this stage, a lot of your other clients like to bring a friend in and start a 1:2 group, share the cost and add an additional session. More results, more support, more company and more laughs.
This is the time to bring up the wife, training buddy, best friend or anyone else your client has spoken about, and you can offer them as suggestions as training partners. Unless they are completely attached to their one on one time with you, most people will jump at this opportunity, especially now that they are seeing some results and feel comfortable using your service.
Step 4: Simply rinse and repeat the process over the next 4-6 weeks for your group of two aiming to build them into a group of three. Not everyone is going to go for it, but the more people you can bring into your business this way, the quicker you’ll achieve that dream life!
How does this help your bottom line? Let’s look at the math.
Say your pricing structure is as follows:
1: 1 PT: $75
1: 2 PT: $45 per person ($90 per hour)
1: 3 PT: $35 per person ($105 per hour)
So you are the only trainer in your business and you are currently doing 20 hours of personal training but it is all 1:1.
Trainer 1: 20hr x $75 = $1500 per week
Let’s say by two months later, 75% of your clients have brought someone along and you are now doing 5 hours of 1:1 and 15 hours of 1:2 training (still the same amount of hours)
Trainer 1: 5hr x $75 = $375 per week
15hr x $90 = $1350 per week
= $1725 per week
You are now still only working 20 hours a week (nice work if you can get it) but have moved up an extra $250 per week or $1000 per month.
Finally, you have a go at up-selling your 1:2 clients to 1:3 clients but unfortunately you only manage to convert 60% this time. So you now have 5hrs of 1:1, 6 hours of 1:2 and 9 hours of 1:3.
Trainer 1: 5hr x $75 = $375 per week
6hr x $90 = $540 per week
9hr x $105 = $945 per week
= $1860 per week
I’ve tried to show realistic figures because not everyone will want to up-sell into a group, but by convincing just 9 of your 1:2 people you are now generating an extra $360 per week or $1440 per month.
Now you have taken your income from $1500 per week, or $6000 per month, to $1860 per week, or $7440 per month. That is all on a conversion rate of 50-60%. If you can convince more people to do it the better the financial result and the more new people you will see in your business.
For some they might not sounds like massive numbers, but once you have few trainers working for you all implementing this strategy – little numbers turn into big numbers. I know for most, an extra $1500 per month would make the world of difference.
I love this shit because it is a win / win / win for everybody. The client gets cheaper sessions and more of them; the trainer gets an easy opportunity to ask for referrals and the business owner has a systemised way to develop their client base AND develop their revenue without billing more hours. Pure bloody gold.
If you’re not doing this in your business already, have a really good look at why not and if you have any questions about how this works simply post a comment below and I’ll reply.
Cheers
Rick 
PS: If you want to find out more about how to implement this and other cool ways to improve your business, check out The PT Solution
