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Stronger Sundays

Dominate your fitness business with this weekly collection of strategies, tips, and tricks.
By trainers, for trainers.

03/28/2024

Quote of the week:

“Quick reminder: If somebody is trying to tell you they have a better answer than the majority of experts in a field, you have to ask:

1) Do they have extraordinary evidence to present?

2) Do they have something to sell you if you believe them?”

                                                                    - Artyom Korenevsky (@sciencepharmer) on Twitter
Watch for this newsletter from the Personal Trainer Development Center each Sunday.

In this issue:

  1. The best salesman is the one who understands their market
  2. One weird trick to stop getting triggered on social media
  3. This week on the Online Trainer Show
1. The best salesman is the one who understands their market –Jonathan Goodman (follow him on IG @jonathan_goodman101)

We were rolling along Avenida 18 de Julio in Montevideo, Uruguay, when the Band-Aid salesman got on the bus.

“Tirita!” he yelled, as he walked past the driver without paying. “Tirita!”

Alison and I looked at each other and laughed. Band-Aids? Really?

Just then a woman waved him over and bought a Band-Aid. Another did the same. In less than two minutes, he’d sold single Band-Aids to at least four different women.

He got off at the next stop, walked across the street, and waited for another bus to bring him his next batch of customers.

Of all the things an enterprising person could do, why would anyone choose to sell Band-Aids one at a time?

Because he understood his market.

He understood that women in Uruguay’s capital spent their days in high-heeled shoes that were incompatible with the city’s old-fashioned cobblestone walkways. There were a lot of sore, blistered feet by the end of the day, and a lot of women looking for some way to keep the problem from getting worse.

And he was the guy who had exactly what they needed: the perfect product in the perfect place at the perfect time.

The lesson here is simple: Know your audience.

Read what they read. Go where they go. Walk a few miles in their shoes, metaphorically speaking.

Don’t wait for your audience to tell you they need a Band-Aid. Look at their blisters. Listen to what they tell you about their aches and pains.

And then sell them something to take that pain away.

2. One weird trick to stop getting triggered on social media – John Berardi

John Berardi, PhD, is cofounder of Precision Nutrition. This post originally appeared on his Instagram page (@drjohnberardi).

Most of us overreact to things that make us angry while underreacting to things that make us feel good.

Here's why that’s a problem on social media:

Facebook and Instagram are designed to serve you more of the things you engage with. Not the things you like, but the things you share, comment on, or react to.

It's about attention, not preference.

By reacting to stuff that makes you feel bad, you're explicitly telling the algorithm gods to give you more of the same.

Likewise, by not reacting to stuff that makes you feel good, you're explicitly telling the algorithm gods to give you less of it.

Your next steps are pretty simple.

Unless you want social media to be your own personal outrage machine, stop reacting to stuff that makes you mad. Don't give it any of your attention.

And start reacting to stuff that makes you feel good. Spend more time on the feeds of people who bring positivity into your day. Comment on it. Give it more hearts and thumbs up.

Not only will this save you a ton of time, it turns your social media feed from an outrage generator to a feel-good machine.

Give it a try.
3. This Week on the Online Trainer Show
The Online Trainer Show is proud to be sponsored by PT Distinction. After carefully reviewing all the major software platforms, we recommend PT Distinction because it offers a unique combination of flexibility, coaching tools, and ease of use. That’s why we use it in Online Trainer Coaching, our just-launched personal training business.

Click here to get a full 60-day FREE TRIAL to try PT Distinction with your own clients.

Here’s what podcast cohosts Jonathan Goodman, Carolina Belmares, and Ren Jones talked about this week on the Online Trainer Show:

In Episode 47, The Ethics of Online Training, Ren offers this definition of ethics:

“It’s not a quality in and of itself. It’s the thing that guarantees all the other qualities. It’s doing the right thing when nobody’s looking.”

The fitness industry tests your honesty and ethics with any number of slippery slopes:

  • Sharing content without attribution or authorization.
  • Offering services you aren’t qualified to deliver.
  • Exaggerating or even fabricating evidence to support your claims.
  • Inventing reasons to contact people (for marketing purposes) or to avoid people (because you don’t want to spend time with them, but also don’t want to lose them as a customer or colleague).

These dodges or shortcuts or white lies seem small and harmless in the moment, but they aren’t. They’re habit forming, they add up, and people notice.

Once you’re known as someone who can’t be trusted, there’s almost no way to restore your reputation.

In Episode 48, 13 Steps to Successful Online Training Sales, Jon says the most important step is one that precedes the 13 they discuss in the episode:

“You need to make a good impression before you get on the call. Your brand. Your personality. What do people know about you? How close do they feel to you before they actually speak to you? That’s going to make everything so much easier.”

Among the other tips:

  • Use the client’s name, and use it correctly. That applies to both spelling and pronunciation. Pay special attention to diminutives: Don’t call someone Alex if they introduce themselves as Alexander or Alexandra, and don’t use the full name if they prefer to shorten it.

  • Your job isn’t to speak. It’s to help the future client go deeper into the reasons they want to achieve a goal like weight loss. If you’re talking more than 20 percent of the time, you’re not listening enough.

You’ll find every episode here:

--> The Online Trainer Show

P.S. Whenever you’re ready, here are 3 ways we can help you:

1. Grab a free copy of The Wealthy Fit Pro’s Guide to Online Training
It’s your blueprint to building a fitness or nutrition business online. --> Click here

2. Join the Online Trainers Unite Group and connect with other online trainers  
It’s our Facebook community where fitness and nutrition pros like you can share insights and advice about starting or running a successful coaching business online.
--> Click here

3. Join the Online Trainer Academy
Our world-class certification course is everything you need to responsibly and profitably coach fitness or nutrition online. --> Click here


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