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5 Ways to Motivate Your Personal Training Clients Away From the Gym 

Do you realize your clients have 163+ hours per week to potentially ruin their results?

At most, you’re working with each client 3 hours per week? 4 or 5 tops?

168 hours in a week minus 5 hour-long sessions with you equals 163 hours of opportunity to avoid exercise, inhale pre-packaged junk, and have an extra cocktail or 3 at dinner. The sad truth is a few bad decisions during this time can be detrimental to their health.

If you’ve been in the trenches long enough, you know your clients choices away from the gym make or break results.

And as frustrating as it is, those same choices make or break your business.

Without motivation away from the gym, they will never become jaw-dropping before and after pictures that generate interest, testimonials that convince prospects to purchase packages, or life-changing success stories that give you the sense of pride and accomplishment money can’t buy.

Results require motivation … 168 hours per week.

• • So, how do we help our clients make healthy choices away from the gym?

• • How do we ensure they choose the grocery store over the drive-thru?

• How do we convince them to get moving on their “off” days?

How do we get them to care about what they’re doing outside of sessions?

Keep scrolling to learn 5 Foolproof Methods for Keeping Your Personal Training Clients Motivated Away From the Gym.

Text Your Clients … Regularly.

Reading this on your phone?

Whether you’re in-between sessions, scrolling in the break room, or getting some early-morning or late-night continuing education in, how easy would it be to tap your home button — right now — and shoot a quick text to a client or 2?

• Ask what they had for lunch.
• See how sore they are from yesterday’s workout and suggest a few recovery stretches.
• Give them a reminder to fill out their food journal.

Regardless of the message, you’re instantly top of mind, providing a heaping dose of accountability and motivation they didn’t get from previous trainers.

Your goal is to get to the point that they know they’re going to hear from you. Knowing check-n texts are coming will be incredibly influential on their decision-making process away from the gym.

The best part? The 98-99% text message open rate isn’t too shabby. Whatever you send, they will see … and they’ll see it quick (90% of people read a text message within the first 3 minutes)!

Text a few clients and watch what happens. Regular texts from you will skyrocket their motivation.

Everyone Loves Videos.

Speaking of your phone, mobile video is blowing up. And everyone loves video.

Whether you’re already posting quick clips on social media or are comfortable getting on camera to film personal messages, visuals speak louder than words.

• Repurpose your social media clips into text messages for your clients. Not everyone is on social media, and it’s easy to miss what you’re creating in a cluttered feed.
• Send short, phone-filmed clips to your clients with a motivational message. Just hold your phone up to your face. No editing needed.
• Share some of your favorite videos with them. Send a link and tell them it’s a must-watch.

Or, drop ‘em a little GIF like this one … preferably around lunch time :).

via GIPHY

Create a Free Email List.

You can no longer BCC a bunch of email addresses and hit send from your Gmail account. That is spam. However, you can take advantage of a free e-mail service like MailChimp to quickly craft and send email blasts to your clients.

It’s a little old-school, but if you deliver high-value content, they will open them. And just seeing your name pop up in their inbox is a motivational reminder that you’re thinking of them.

• Email easy-to-digest, educational content you know they’ll enjoy reading. Try sending something that answers a common question your clients ask.
• Create your own content on Medium or share a post from your blog. They’ll love anything created by you.
• Send a tip of the week or a motivational quote to give them something to chew on. Make it a series they can expect.

Bonus points if they forward your email to friends and family for some free word-of-mouth marketing :).

Create Digital Challenge Groups.

Digital challenges are popular vehicles to capture leads and earn money through online training, but they’re also a fantastic way to keep your current clients motivated away from the gym.

The best part? You can create the framework of a challenge once and reuse it over and over again. Since these people are already working with you in person, have your challenges focused on the thing you currently have little control over: their nutrition.

Here are a few examples:

• Clean Week: 7-Day Clean Eating Challenge
• Say Goodbye to Booze: 1-Month Adios Alcohol Challenge
• Sugar Detox: Reboot Your Body In 28 Days
• Food Diary Challenge: Journal Your Way to Transformative Habits

As simple as they sound, challenges are a remarkable motivator thanks to increased touchpoints and ongoing communication. Toss in a little friendly competition and fun, and you’ve got the secret sauce to constant motivation.

How About Some Homework?

Do you ever give your clients “assignments” away from the gym? Rather than talking about what they should / shouldn’t be doing, give them a concrete task to complete. We learn by doing, after all.

Create client-specific homework assignments that match their goals. Things like:

• Complete one yoga class before our next session.
• Drink half of your bodyweight in water each day.  
• Record everything you eat this week in a food journal.  
• Send me a daily picture of your lunch.

While homework isn’t the sexiest word, a tangible task or 2 provides solid motivation away from the gym.

It’s low-hanging fruit that gives them motivation to complete something beyond your scheduled sessions. Just be sure you review their assignments :).

Final Word on Client Motivation Away From the Gym

As a personal trainer, your job doesn’t end the second your clients cool off. In fact, your role is neverending.

Providing round-the-clock motivation and accountability separates average trainers from extraordinary trainers. It separates a quick paycheck from sustained success. And it separates training for fun from training to transform lives.

You now have the blueprint to give your clients the ongoing motivation they need to finally reach their goals … Will you use it?

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We know what you’re thinking: “These strategies are only for young, tech-savvy trainers with a small clientele. Trying to do this with my laundry list of clients will be a time-suck… “

Think again.

Coach Catalyst is an easy-to-use solution to scale these kind of client accountability strategies that unlock more time, more accountability, more motivation, and more results. It was designed for people like you who understand the importance of ongoing accountability and motivation, but don’t have the time or know-how to give this kind of individual attention to all of your clients.

In fact, our solution was tailor-made for you. As trainers, we used to deal with the same problems. Too many clients, not enough time to give them what they need to transform. So, we created the solution. Give us a shout so we can show you why Coach Catalyst is the simple solution you (and your clients) need.