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Add An Online Component To Your Offline Business
Is it just me or is every trainer on the planet trying to become an online trainer!
I get the allure…
...set it and forget it
...fb ads to millions
...no longer constrained by a physical location
...work from the beach
...travel the world
...4 hour work week
...scale
Sexy, isn’t it?
What the “experts” conveniently forget to tell you is building an online business is no different than building an offline business.
You need to…
...show up consistently
...be very niched, even more in the online world
...find ways to set yourself apart in a crowded marketplace
...spend money
...find unique ways to connect and build REAL relationships
...convince someone you have never met to give you their credit card
...and I almost forgot....get people actual results.
This isn’t creating $9 ebook, putting up a landing page, and then driving traffic. This is coaching, the exact same thing we do every day in our offline business.
Coaching is hard, and online coaching isn’t any different.
Your Advantage!
Now, if you have an offline business you have a few unique advantages over the coach who is ONLY going at it online.
Note: This doesn’t require you to post lots of pictures with your shirt off on instagram. But envy is a powerful emotion so if you have your side bicep flex down feel free to post a few but don’t go overboard 🙂
Here are a few reasons as an offline business you have an advantage.
- You are training people in real life. This means you are getting better at your craft every day working face to face with human beings, solving problems and getting results.
- You look people in the eye on a daily basis and help them through their challenges.
- You have built up an audience that knows, likes, and trusts you.
- You intimately understand your target market’s (your offline clients) needs, wants, fears, and challenges which allows you to hit pain points in your copy for your online component.
- Having an offline gym or business gives you instant credibility. Anyone can be an online trainer, not everyone can having a thriving offline business.
The Mistake
The first mistake I see going at it online from an offline business is trying to replicate exactly what you are doing in-person.
You try and create high level training programs with macro specific meal plans and all the bells and whistles that your high-level offline clients get.
In the end, this gets overwhelming for the client and becomes even more work going back and forth via email 50 times so everyone both the coach and client end up giving it up all together.
I think there is place for this high-level stuff but it’s not the place to start.
To start, we need traction.
We need an early win.
And, if you are in the “typical fat loss market” do people really need this perfectly crafted periodized program or can we get them a few easy wins with just getting people to move a little more and eat some more real food.
The Easier Way
I know there is an easier way and we have proven that it works.
To set the backstory in case you have been living under rock for the past few years, challenges have exploded the internet. A little multi-hundred million company has been exploiting this trend to drive loads of sales and help people get started on their journey.
And you know what...they work! They work really really really well.
What can we learn from this as offline business owners looking to add an online component to our business.
Number one, they use the power of their social network.
Guess what?
You have one too! And, you have an even stronger, higher value network - your current and past clients.
Number two, they make it super simple. Follow along exercise videos, drink your shakeology, and eat real food.
No complicated macro schemes, no strict diets, no periodized linear conjugated training programs.
Just a simple, easy to understand program.
Number three, they create a community, interact with participants, coach ‘em up, and hold them accountable.
No matter what your feelings are on network marketing, you cannot argue with results.
What To Do
Do you run challenges in your own gym or with your clients?
If you don’t, you should be.
If you are, how hard would it be to add an online component that runs parallel with your offline challenge.
These challenges could be a…
- Free 7-day detox
- Free 7-Day No Sugar Challenge
- Paid 6-week Clean and Lean Challenge
- Paid 12-week Body Transformation Challenge
- Paid 30-Day Summer Slimdown Challenge
- Free 30 Day Protein Challenge
You get the picture.
Take what you are doing offline and add an online component. Incentivize your offline clients to open up their network of friends all over the world to participate.
Your clients already know, like, and trust you. Your clients have people who like them and value their recommendation. Naturally, your client’s friends are going to trust you if their friend recommends you.
You just took a cold lead and warmed them up real quick. No more cold traffic.
Theory is great, but I want to show you how this is working in the real world. And, how we do it without killing ourselves while creating a live changing experience for our clients.
Here is how we did it with my gym Functional Fitness.
3 times per year we run large challenges that are major lead generators for our offline business. These are the major anchors in our marketing strategy every year. The rest of the year gets planned around them.
Most recently, for our Clean and Lean January Challenge, we created an online components to run parallel with our offline challenge.
We wanted to have an option for our member’s friends who were not local and also an opportunity to downsell someone if they couldn’t afford our normal challenge.
Rarely do we do individual challenges, almost always we include a partner or group component. For this particular one we used partner challenge format.
We charge both members and non-members for our challenge. This gives us leverage to give discounts.
A client could have a partner in one of three ways.
- Partner with a current member (no discount)
- Partner with a non-member ($20 discount on challenge)
- Partner with an online friend ($20 discount on challenge)
Having this online component also gave us a downsell opportunity. If someone couldn’t afford our training, but still wanted to be part of the challenge we had a lower cost option that they could do, our online option.
Running a challenge?
Follow our step by step guide and you’ll have everything you need, from the planning stages through execution, to run an incredible challenge for your clients, new and old.
Upsells
One important point to add is that anytime we run a challenge we ALWAYS give in-house clients an opportunity to invest more with us by running special offerings like kickboxing, yoga, power lifting, or simply adding a day of training.
This extra workout is going to help our clients get better results and also increase our bottom line.
During this time, we give discounts on supplements and other things we sell in-house to maximize this time of heightened buyer awareness.
Logistics
Training people in-house AND online can be a logistical nightmare. We lived that nightmare as we have tried to implement this strategy in the past.
Here is where we went wrong.
We made it too freakin’ complicated.
Being the professionals that we are we wanted to create a custom program for every single person online.
BAD IDEA!
If you only have one online client this works but when you get 20-30 online clients this starts looking like a death sentence.
Even with templates it’s VERY time consuming.
The client has to learn a new software or they don’t know what exercises are or this or that.
Take my word for it, it’s not worth it.
We used Trainerize, and albeit a good software, was way too robust for what we needed.
We were already using Habit Catalyst for our daily accountability and then having to use Trainerize as well just got to be too much for some of our clients.
So, we simplified and used Habit Catalyst for everything. We did some upfront work, took some pictures, made some pdf’s and we were off to the races.
For our most recent challenge we had over 20 distance participants at $79 / client that was an extra $1500+ without too much work.
Here is what our online component looked like.
Each day our distance participants received a lesson that looked like this:
You can see that at the top of the lesson each day it gives the client the workout for the day. They can either choose the home or gym version.
The client then views their workouts either on their smartphone or in their email, whichever they prefer.
The client clicks the link then a pdf pops up (see below). The PDF’s below are specifically branded for my gym.
The education and daily check-ins for every challenge participant, offline or online, was exactly the same. The only difference for our online participants was they got workouts embedded into their lessons.
Everything was set-up in Habit Catalyst so the delivery was smooth.
Honestly, getting started online doesn’t get much easier than this. You don’t have to wield your half naked body all over instagram to get clients, start by leveraging a network you already have, your current clients.
Steps To Success
- Decide on a Challenge
- Pick Your Start Date
- Create a Parallel Online Component (develop workouts)
- Incentivize Your Clients to Recruit Their Friends
- Coach ‘Em Up
It’s that easy.
And, if you want it even easier, you can get the exact Clean and Lean Blueprint I used in my challenge for FREE.
This program sells right now in the Habit Catalyst marketplace for $300.
All you have to do is sign up for a free 30 day trial of Habit Catalyst and we will throw in Clean and Lean local AND distance programs.
Realistically, you could have a challenge up and running in less than a couple hours of work that you could use over and over again.
Just click the button below, sign up for a free 30 day trial and the Clean & Lean codes will show up right in your inbox! Super simple and super effective!
CLEAN AND LEAN CHALLENGE
Click below to sign up for a FREE 30-Day Trial to Habit Catalyst
and get access to the Clean & Lean Challenge!
Right now, challenges are low hanging fruit.
Eat your fill!
-Trevor