What You’ll Score From This Guide

1. What type of clients will you coach? In other words, who do you want to work with?

To answer these questions, first answer this: Who do you offer the most value to? This could be anyone from a fitness newbie, to a competitive powerlifter, to an endurance athlete looking for strength training to prevent injuries.

2. What type of training programs will you offer?

Do your programs already exist? Do you need to start brainstorming the programs you want to offer?

3. How will you deliver programming and connect with your clients?

When choosing your creation and delivery method, consider which one(s) your particular clients would prefer the most. Sending your athletes PDFs and Excel spreadsheets certainly isn’t ideal.

Using an online platform such as TrainHeroic makes programming for and connecting with your athletes a breeze.

Take a peek at the snappy program builder in the TrainHeroic platform.

4. Does coaching management software make sense for your biz?

Building an online coaching business is time consuming, and getting started can feel like you’re sailing with no compass. Using a coaching management platform like TrainHeroic saves you time and allows you to scale your business at your own pace.

Top 5 reasons to use coaching management software:

1. It allows you to be more efficient and save time for everything life brings you.

2. Staying organized becomes a breeze, not a headache.

3. With a good software program, you’ll look like a true pro who’s been in the game for years, whether you’re a rookie or a seasoned coach.

4. You’ll provide a better client experience, leading to higher client retention.

5. You’ll be able to coach more athletes in less time, which means higher income potential for you.

Did you know?

TrainHeroic was rated as one of the Top Software Tools to Elevate your Business by Influencer Marketing Hub.

Step 1: Identify Your Target Audience

Before you hit the gas, it’s critical to get clear on this: Who is your ideal client? In the fitness coaching industry, it is vital to have a specialization, or a “niche.”

Not sure what your niche is? Ask yourself these questions:

• What type of client do I like working with most?
• What areas of training do I really love?
• Who really needs my help?
• Who is most likely to get the best results from training with me?
• Which clients tend to gravitate towards me the most?

Answering these questions can help get you started on finding your niche. But remember, it’s possible that your niche is something you haven’t experienced yet. Especially if you’re newer to the game. Keep an open mind to new ideas and different types of clients.

Step 2: Craft Your Value Proposition

Your value prop is a short, one-line statement that will help drive all of your marketing efforts moving forward. When crafted well, this statement can become a powerful weapon in attracting your ideal clients. It should answer one critical question: Why should an athlete choose you as a coach — and buy your training programs — instead of buying programs from any other coach out there?

In other words, your value prop clearly states the value you’ll bring to your clients in exchange for the price tag on your programming. You’re the expert here, so let your inner prowess shine.

Here’s the value prop from a TrainHeroic Marketplace coach with Paragon Training: “Helping you lift more, stay strong, love your body, and LIVE big.”

Step 3: Discover Your ‘Why’

Start by illustrating your top motivations as a coach. To make it extra easy, use these questions for guidance:

• Why did you become a coach?
  • When addressing this, make sure to speak directly to your clients: “I became a coach because I saw the need from clients like you…”
• What irks you most about poor coaching/training solutions?
  • How is your target audience being underserved by other coaches?
• How will your training/coaching solve your clients’ problems?
  • I built my business to provide _______ for ________. Training with me will make you feel _______________.

Once you’ve answered the questions above, use this as a guide to tell your story. This story will become your ‘Why”.

Step 4: Write a Positioning Statement

A positioning statement is a brief description of your product and target market, and how the product fills a particular need of that target market. In other words, it’s a summary of your selling story (see Step 3 above). Your positioning statement should be one to three sentences max.

Step 5: Create a Simple Business Plan

There’s no need to expend your energy on an overly elaborate business plan, but it’s important to address three major aspects:

1. Your Goals

Make sure you’re clear on what you want out of your biz. Your goals should define your desired clientele, your desired income, and the value you’ll bring to your clients.

2. Your Methods to Achieve Your Goals

In this section of your plan, outline the following:

• Marketing and promo tactics you’ll use to grow your clientele.
• Mediums you’ll use to deliver dynamite programming to your clients.
• Tools you’ll use to manage your business moving forward.

3. Your Timeline

Creating a loose timeline can help you stay focused and motivated. Define which benchmarks you’d like to achieve by certain points in time. Again, these can be related to your clientele and income goals:

• 6-month benchmarks
• 1-year benchmarks
• 5-year benchmarks

The U.S. Small Business Administration has great examples of traditional and lean startup business plans.

5 Key Qualities of Winning Online Training:

1. Programming that creates progress on your clients’ specific “job to be done.”

2. Enough variability to keep it interesting and spicy. Now’s not the time to be a purist. A little fun never hurt anyone, so don’t be afraid to mix things up.

3. Clear instructions that include simple terminology, how to approach the session, what to focus on, and why each exercise is beneficial. TrainHeroic Marketplace seller Max Schmarzo does an excellent job of this!

4. Video demos of individual exercises like this one (when necessary). This can be a game changer in a remote setting. Plus, your clients will be thrilled

5. Awareness of your clients’ space — Are they training at home, in a gym, or at a studio? This can impact the equipment required for training.

Build a Diversified Income Stream with Tiered Programming

If your goal is to give yourself a bigger safety net by broadening your income stream, a pro move you can make is to offer tiered programming to your clients. We’ve outlined a money-making tiered approach below:

Provide a Valuable and Smooth Experience

Consider how you will:

• Deliver your programming (including video components) to clients
• Provide feedback from training sessions
• Communicate clearly and timely with clients throughout their journey

All of these aspects need to be set in place in order to provide the best experience to your paying customers.

Tips for providing a top-notch client experience:

• Be consistent in your program/session delivery methods so your clients know what to expect.
• Set parameters for providing timely feedback. E.g. “I will always provide feedback within 24 hours of a training session.”
• Establish clear communication channels.
  • Pick a platform, and stick to it. Whether it’s Messages, WhatsApp, FaceTime, email, etc., make sure your clients know how you will communicate with them, and how they can reach you.

3 Reasons Why Using a Coaching Software Helps You Retain Clients

1. It’s Seamless — Everything Is in One Place
A smoother experience for your clients, and an easier job for you.

2. Stay Connected
Utilize videos, chats, and advanced communication tools to keep clients engaged and inspired to keep training with you.

3. Look Like a Pro
Your clients will easily see the level of expertise and the value you bring as a coach when you use an advanced tool such as TrainHeroic.

Billing, Insurance and Certifications

It may not be the most exciting part of your business, but the end result (getting paid by your clients) is pretty essential. The trick here is to make billing as simple and painless as possible so it doesn’t become a headache for you or your clients. The best way to do this is to use a billing or accounting software.

Benefits of using a billing software

• It saves you time with automated invoices and instant payments.
• Access and manage your invoices from anywhere in the world.
• Easily manage your biz operations and never miss payments from clients.

Not sure where to start? Here are a few trusted software products we recommend:

• Wave: Free software with invoicing, accounting, and banking features.
• Rerun: Subscription and membership billing made easy.
• Stripe Invoicing: Easily create invoices and collect payments.

Liability Insurance: Do You Need It to Cover Your Tail?

Any fitness pro who provides training plans and/or offers coaching or fitness advice to clients will potentially want to consider obtaining liability insurance. The type of insurance you need can depend on your situation and how you run your business. It’s not so fun to think about, but liability insurance will protect you from any legal actions from a client if something unfortunate happens.

To learn more about this, check out NASM’s guide for personal trainer and coaching insurance. If it sounds like you want to get the ball rolling on this, check out these three trusted resources for fitness coaches:

Looking to get certified?

If you’re looking to gain knowledge, add credentials to your bio, and position yourself more competitively, a certification may be a smart choice for you. We’ve singled out the top certificate programs for strength and conditioning coaches and personal trainers.

Tips to Set Yourself up for Future Growth

Equip yourself with tools that will scale with you.

Tasks that appear simple with five clients become more difficult when that number reaches 30 (or 100). Don’t get caught in a whirlwind of disorganization. Below are a few tools to set in place before you reach the point of no return:

CRM
A Customer Relationship Management tool, or CRM, can help you easily manage and maintain client lists and contact info. Several modern CRM tools on the market today come with a built-in email platform, too.

Billing
Remember that billing software we mentioned? You’ll gain a new appreciation for it once your clientele grows to larger numbers.

Coaching Management Software
If you decide to go with a software tool to manage your business, it’s best to get rolling with this from the beginning. Some of these will eliminate the need for a CRM and/or billing software, as these elements may be integrated within the platform.

Three Ways to Adopt a Growth Mindset for Your Business:

1. Consider how your business and/or programming might evolve as you grow. How might your “niche” change or expand over time? Maybe you hit the nail on the head from the get-go, or, it’s possible (and likely) you’ll discover new strengths and opportunities along the way.

2. Keep your eyes open to any and all possibilities that may pop up related to your coaching business. After all, you became a coach to make a difference in people’s lives. Now is not the time to place limits on the impact you can make.

3. Get moving now. Stop waiting until next week, or next spring, or the New Year. Your future clients are waiting. It’s time to push the pedal to the metal and guide athletes around the world to Be Their Best.