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The personal training and fitness industry is strong and continues to grow each year. If you are a personal trainer and want to make the most of this space, strong marketing skills can help you compete and stand out in a crowded, but potentially lucrative, industry.
This guide provides a plan of action that will help you create an effective marketing plan for your personal training or coaching business with tools that can make managing it much easier. Read on to learn how to get personal training clients for your business.
Advertise your personal training business.
One way to attract new clients as a personal trainer is to be authentic. Your marketing will make more sense and be more engaging if you are true to who you are and the strengths you bring to the business.
The way you communicate in advertising, images, or other marketing can be a reflection of who you are and an extension of your personal brand. Use messaging that reflects your business voice and use real images and videos — particularly of you and your clients — rather than stock imagery. Once you have a feel for your personal training brand, be consistent in your marketing. Consider testing various platforms to see where your current and prospective clients are looking for information. When it comes to consistency, it’s important to reflect accurate services and pricing so your customers know what to expect. Don’t make promises that you can’t keep.
Try different mediums for marketing to find the ones that make the most sense for your brand and personal training business. Some of these options may include creating a blog or guest posting on other blogs, engaging actively in social media, investing in paid marketing, or hosting and attending events to get to know potential clients in person.
Stake out your online presence.
Once you have a plan for marketing and advertising, it’s time to think about creating an online presence to help get new personal training clients.
Start with building a personal trainer website for your business. Consider a website platform that has both a marketing capacity and functionality. Square Online integrates with sales features, such as a personalized shopping experience that makes buying on a mobile device easy, subscription sales, or even options to ship items or pick them up at your physical location. Add content to your website to support your business and marketing activities, such as customer testimonials or reviews.
Did you know?
Square Appointments includes the ability to set up a free website for scheduling clients, as well as marketing features such as automated email or text reminders and built-in search optimization.
Use social media to reach new members.
Social media can be a great tool for helping you reach new clients and expand the potential of your personal training business.
Facebook and Instagram are key social media networks to consider when you are trying to market your business. These are the most popular platforms with the largest reach. Create business pages for each and take advantage of hashtags on Instagram to help create greater connection with fitness communities on social media.
The same content you use on your website can be repurposed for social media. Share client testimonials and success stories or show inspiring images of you working with clients. By presenting your business on your website and social media platforms the same way, potential customers can connect the digital extensions of your brand to the in-person one.
Additionally, consider working with social media fitness influencers already established on these platforms to get the word out about your personal training business in front of their online communities. Make sure that you work with influencers that are in your local area so that their reach can impact your physical business location.
Start email campaigns or newsletters.
The process of getting clients as a personal trainer also comes down to nurturing. One of the best ways to get new personal training clients or book more sessions is to start an email newsletter. This direct connection with potential or previous clients can serve as a reminder to engage with your business.
Create a list of existing clients or add an email newsletter signup form to your website or social media that allows anyone with interest to get emails from you. When you are trying to generate signups, remember to entice users with a special offer, such as a coupon or special information.
When you are ready to launch your newsletter, start with a basic welcome campaign that tells subscribers about your business. Mention information about location and services and include a call to action encouraging email subscribers to book an appointment for personal training with you. Use your email newsletter to entice clients with additional upsells or savings in exchange for purchasing classes ahead of time, for example.
Finally, you can use retargeting emails to remind visitors to complete an action — such as checking out after having put an item in their cart — using Square integrations such as Mailchimp.
Launch a personal training blog.
If you have a knack for talking about your personal training business or have a flair for storytelling, host a blog on your personal training website.
The Square Online blog-style stories feature allows you to keep your business and blog on the same website platform and creates a connection between your business and blog.
This type of content has another great benefit for your personal training business website: Relevant content can boost SEO and site rankings, helping your site get seen and visited more often online.
Once you get the first few posts written and published, don’t forget to promote your blog. This content can be utilized for other parts of your marketing campaign, including information you can send via email or content for social media posts.
Use referral programs.
Referral marketing rewards customers for recommending your business to others. You can incentivize referrals in a number of ways:
- Exclusive training retail products
- Free workout perks
- Discounts for new clients (you can add discounts on Square Dashboard or at the point of sale)
Referrals can happen across any of the channels you use for marketing, including mobile app notifications, email, social media, posters or flyers, punch cards, and more. You can connect Square with various partner tools to create an efficient loyalty program for clients that’s easy for you to manage.
Don’t miss out on an opportunity for B2B referrals as well. Consider partnering with other local businesses in the fitness industry to create a referral network. Businesses that are a natural fit include chiropractors, massage therapists, physical therapists, orthopedic clinics, and nutritional stores.
Sweeten your promos.
Supercharge all of your marketing activities and generate more personal training clients with enticing promos.
Ideas for promos include:
- Free training sessions
- eGift cards and physical gift cards
- Giveaways for training retail products
- Participation contests (such as a points-based leaderboard system tracking weight goals or attendance)
- Free meal planning
- Swag giveaways
- Free trial period
Hold events.
Open your location to new clients through events that can generate extra interest. You can also participate as a vendor at fitness-related events in your area.
Many personal trainers will work with running or cycling groups to provide support for races. Offer a corporate wellness option to help businesses who want to encourage healthy activity in the workplace.
You can also create events or challenges that people can sign up for, such as “Get in Shape for Summer” (or any season), and encourage physical activity tracking during a specific time period for prizes or other incentives.
Start a personal training affiliate program.
You can combine the idea of loyalty and programming to help generate new personal training clients through an affiliate program that rewards key ambassadors or employees with a commission. Find fitness experts or other influencers to sell your training retail products or training/coaching services in exchange for a commission. Track sales and payments in Square to ensure accurate payouts for your affiliate marketers.
Once you have all the logistics set, promote the program via email and social to help generate sign-ups among your best clients and supporters. Nothing can help generate new business like a strong word-of-mouth campaign.
Use integrated marketing tools.
Help boost your personal training business and generate new clients with marketing tactics that are manageable for you to do yourself. Consider marketing ideas that integrate with tools you use — such as the marketing tools that connect with Square Appointments — so that everything works together in a more seamless, automated way. Refer to this guide when you need new marketing inspiration to keep your personal training business moving forward.
