How to generate leads in order to build your personal training business

lead generation

When I hired new trainers they always asked, where do I find new clients? Well the answer to that is lead generation. You don't find clients you find two kinds of people, type one are people interested in training, and type two are those who have not considered a personal trainer before. Now people who are considering purchasing a trainer will usually contact a gym, or a trainer or will ask someone they know for a referral. I will tell you from experience that there are many more people in category two, those that have not thought about hiring a personal trainer yet.

Should you focus only on one group? Certainly not, however those people in group one will be filtered towards you using the methods discussed earlier. When you establish proper protocol for referrals with your clients your immediately focused on group one. So in the initial stages of your career and during slow times group two is where you should put in more effort.

So where do we find these people in group two? The simple answer is that they are everywhere. Every time you have a conversation with someone wherever you are you MUST mention that your a personal fitness trainer. This will lead to a conversation about your career and what you can do for people. This will develop their interest in personal training. The next thing you need to do is offer them a free personal training session. This should feel natural to you by now. Now where most people fail with this is, they hand out their card and tell the person to call them. This will result in zero leads, how can you change this? Very simple, ask for their name and number and tell them you will call on a specific day to set something up.

The next step is to call them when you said you would. Invite them down, I usually say that I love to share my talents with new people and that they will learn a lot. Set an appointment on this initial phone call. Then it's simple you will put them through the sales process like any other potential client.

Another place you can find clients is in the gym. This was covered in an earlier post (approaching prospective clients in the gym) so look back and review those methods. The reason I like to stress that you should approach people in the gym is because it's the best and easiest way to make a sale. They are already interested in fitness and have made it a part of their lives. They also are already in your place of work. So just walk up and introduce yourself.

Another method is asking friends and family to refer their friends to you. This method is not as effective, but if you really need a sale you can usually get one or two this way. I always offer a prize, here is an example.

Send an email to all friends and family:

Dear friends,
This month I am running a special promotion for new clients. If you know anyone that is thinking of hiring a personal trainer please give me their contact information so I can offer them a free session. In return the first person to refer me a client that signs up, will receive free training this month with me.

Very basic but it gets your point across and usually you will end up with a few leads

One of the most popular methods of lead generation is a draw box. These are boxes that offer something free in order to entice people to put their name and contact information into your draw box. In my experience with these, a lead box will give you between 5-20 leads per week. If it's less than that move the box. When you call these leads you simply say that they have not won the grand prize but you would like to offer them 2 free personal training sessions.

Lead generation is so easy, but you should set yourself a goal to reach each month. 20,50 or 100 leads work well as goals. Usually for every 20 leads you have you will get about 5 that show up for the free session. Out of that you should be able to close 1-2 sales. So get out their and practice approaching people and offering free sessions.

Keep checking back, each week I will continue to post new techniques for increasing sales, until my book "The step by step guide to selling personal fitness training" is released. The book will contain information not found in this blog as well as charts and scripts to use to maximize sales.

Train Hard
Jared Roy