80% of all communication is nonverbal. It doesn’t matter how great your words are, if you are not matching them with your body language, you are not communicating effectively. Improving our body language is something all of us, especially in the personal training business can greatly benefit from. We talk about different body parts such as the feet, legs hips, torso, and arms and how to use each of them from a coaching and sales perspective to improve communication. The legs are a big part of bo...
Apr 22, 2020•38 min•Ep. 33
Listen in as we talk about the Enneagram which is a great tool of communication. We talk about this test, what it entails, how to use it and how it gives you an idea about the different types of people on your team and how they communicate. There are nine different personality types on the Enneagram Test, we go through each of them in detail and how their personality affects their communication and how they relate with other team members. It is important to note that there are no wrong or negati...
Apr 15, 2020•33 min•Ep. 32
The first thing we talk about is working on yourself. You achieve this by planning a routine and organizing your day just like you were going out to the office. Keeping your routine ensures you remain productive. Have some stuff scheduled throughout the day and even the week. This is the time to do those things you have always pushed aside due to lack of time. The second thing you need to do is to look at your business model and why you set up your business. Are you in the right trajectory? Do y...
Apr 08, 2020•27 min•Ep. 31
Listen in as we discuss how virtual/online training is a viable option to many gyms especially as many have been forced to close due to the current pandemic the world is grappling with. It is also a good opportunity to keep your membership engaged. We talk about choosing the best tools to help you run your online program as well as being creative with regards to equipment your clients may have in their homes. Virtual training is more than just fitness. It involves a lot of communication, emotion...
Apr 01, 2020•27 min•Ep. 30
Leadership is important and leaders must do what they set out to do. This is amplified in a time of chaos like now. A leader must step up to the plate. We discuss this and much more in this episode. We look at it from three angles. Leading yourself, leading your team and leading your customers. To lead yourself, you must have your mind right. You must take good care of yourself and the best way to do this is through a routine. You need to control what you feed your brain as this will affect your...
Mar 25, 2020•23 min•Ep. 29
In this episode, we talk about the life of an entrepreneur and the things you must do to be and remain successful. There’s a whole new economy that has allowed numerous opportunities for entrepreneurship. Many people want to be entrepreneurs but do not understand the downsides and challenges there are. As an entrepreneur, you must make time for yourself. This means going away from your business and doing things that make you a better person. If you are an entrepreneur in the fitness world, you c...
Mar 18, 2020•38 min•Ep. 28
In this episode, we talk about how to train and work right even when the job gets monotonous. Landon shares with us his journey from college and how he got into fitness. He tells us about his early days as a coach and how he learned from his mistakes. How he was open to feedback and how that helped overcome challenges. We delve deeper into professional behavior on and off the floor. How to relate to your clients in a friendly manner while still showing them respect without sounding too formal. W...
Mar 11, 2020•36 min•Ep. 27
In this episode, we discuss the rules and tools of Alloy programming for active aging clients. We discuss what are some rules that Alloy believes in or that we adhere to when we were framing out programs for adults. We also discuss how the dynamic warm-up, overhead squat, and functional movement screen fit into the scheme of things. We talk about how important it is to have a balanced approach when it comes to workout - Nobody moves differently from one another. We may have deficiencies, we may ...
Mar 04, 2020•48 min•Ep. 26
In this episode, I sit down with my personal coach, Tim Fulton, to discuss the 5 keys to a successful small business launch. He shares with us his thoughts on having a business plan. Quoting a study that pointed out that there is a larger than expected number of small businesses that have any type of plan, he puts the absence of a plan down to a fear factor - the fear of being held accountable, the fear of this becoming real when it's in writing. He also emphasizes the fact that growth sucks up ...
Feb 26, 2020•31 min•Ep. 25
In this episode, we’ll talk about policies and procedures for personal training businesses. We will zero in on three of them, namely, a 24-hour cancellation policy, medical freeze (or just simply “A freeze”), and rollover sessions.The 24-hour cancellation policy is applicable in situations where a client has booked a training slot and then they cancel, which means that the business will have lost the revenue it would have generated during that time slot. Therefore, the client has to be charged a...
Feb 19, 2020•31 min•Ep. 24
In this episode, we discuss the best practices around creating an effective pricing strategy for your personal training business. We talk about whether you should do per session pricing or EFT. We, at Alloy, have done both. When we opened in 1992, we sold packages of sessions. The cashflow is much easier to manage when you're charging people by the month. And getting into the monthly payment mode landed us into EFT. In EFT model, you simply go to the customer, you have one transactional conversa...
Feb 13, 2020•28 min•Ep. 23
In this episode, we look at a concept from the Harvard Business School that helps us define the true "Job" of our product or service. A Harvard professor presented this concept called job of the product. And basically, what he was challenging us to think about was when someone buys a product, or they do something, they're buying that product to do a job. So there is a job in my life that I need filled and I'm going to hire a service or I'm gonna hire a product to do the said job. Remember, the j...
Feb 05, 2020•17 min•Ep. 22
In this episode, we discuss why high intensity interval training (HIIT) may not be the best type of exercise for your business. We talk about high intensity training - the pros and cons, and how it fits in somebody's program. High intensity interval training just means getting hot and sweaty. And it's super popular right now. It's just really been popular since the explosion of the studio model, which has really been probably eight years or so of the real popular studio models. And because of th...
Jan 29, 2020•32 min•Ep. 21
In this episode, we discuss some guerrilla marketing strategies proven to have worked for fitness businesses. In this day and age, everyone thinks about marketing through the lens of Facebook, Google ads, and things like that, which we would look at as digital marketing. And those are really important. But all that can lend itself to you simply turning on a digital ad and then just sitting inside of your facility, waiting for people to run through the door with their wallets hanging out to buy y...
Jan 22, 2020•32 min•Ep. 20
In this episode, we discuss the importance of core values and how to build them for your business. We talk about what core values are and what they mean to us and our corporation. We then go through ours, one through five. Core values are something that we see thrown around a lot. We read about them - there are business articles on core values. People give a lot of time to core values, but I'm not really sure if everyone understands why you do core values. I look at core values as sort of a comp...
Jan 15, 2020•31 min•Ep. 19
In this episode, we discuss the five things you should consider when considering buying a fitness franchise. Franchising is hot right now. It's a great investment opportunity; it gives you a better return on investment as an entrepreneur. If you go to sell, if you're an independent operator, it gives you systems and a massive shortcut to success. Nonetheless, you’ve got to put the work in and run the systems. It's one thing to have them create it, but you still have to be an entrepreneur. We fel...
Jan 08, 2020•27 min•Ep. 18
In this episode, we discuss our best practices for interviewing and on-boarding personal trainers. Once you identify some candidates, how do you take them through that process and how does it work? How do you attract the right kind of talent? As we discussed in the last episode, interns and existing clients could turn out to be great resources. If you launch an ad, you get a lot of people who aren't serious. If you're truly going out and hiring from the outside, put some things in that ad that s...
Jan 01, 2020•30 min•Ep. 17
In this episode, we discuss how and where to find great personal trainers for your business. And before we dig into that, we talk about what we are looking for in a trainer. When we first opened, we had independent contractors, so we didn't have employees, which is a huge mistake and actually illegal in this day and age. You’ve got to have a systematic approach to what you do. It's your business, it's your risk, you know your money to start this entity. You need to set up a business system so th...
Dec 26, 2019•27 min•Ep. 16
In this episode, we discuss why the active aging (50+ age group) market provides the greatest opportunity for fitness businesses. Matt has pulled some really good data we discuss. We talk about what the metrics, the economic metrics, are showing us. We also talk about what our personal experience has been with this crowd. We've been here 28 years and we've seen some real traction with this particular population for lots of different reasons. Forget about fitness. Like if you're in any business, ...
Dec 18, 2019•25 min•Ep. 15
In this episode, we discuss the history of the Alloy brand and why we decided to move to a franchise model. We share with you our journey from when we started this place, to kind of where we evolved and to where we're at today. It would be pretty impactful for people that are looking to speed up a business or start their own. We turned 27 recently. Back when we started, I was sort of paying my way through school as a personal trainer and personal training was a very new industry. There wasn't a ...
Dec 11, 2019•29 min•Ep. 14
In the ongoing four-part series on sales, we took what we call our starting point session, which is our one-hour sales session where someone comes to the gym and they're physically in front of us. In the previous three episodes, we've done step one, which is the meet and greet or the peeling the onion, you've taken them on to the floor, you've done the functional movement screen, and then we've put them through a workout. So now you're sitting down with them and it's the crux move now. In this e...
Dec 04, 2019•25 min•Ep. 13
In this episode, we discuss the initial workout - the sample workout, and why it's so important to the sales process. The key to the sample workout is something that we spoke to in the first two episodes, which is the way that people learn. So you're going to have some people that are auditory learners. Those are the people that you are going to handle with “peeling the onion”. They typically want to spend more time in the office. Maybe they like to see that there's a process to what you do that...
Nov 27, 2019•21 min•Ep. 12
In Part two of a four-part series revolving around sales, we are going to talk about client assessment. We’re essentially going to quantify movement. Our promise to customers is looking good - that's usually weight loss. The second one's feeling great. Now, feeling great, a lot of time, has to do with movement quality. We're going to talk about what we call the functional movement screen (FMS). Now, in case you’re not familiar with the FMS, it's pretty technical. It came out of professional athl...
Nov 20, 2019•23 min•Ep. 11
In this episode, we will be discussing the "meet and greet" portion of the sales process. We're going to be talking about sitting down and getting personal, digging in and finding out why someone's there, and convincing them that we're the place that can help them. If you can't sell, you can't help people. So, of all the things you want to do - Get people in great shape, with you being intrinsically motivated to change lives - None of that's happening if you can't sell. So, you've got to lean in...
Nov 13, 2019•23 min•Ep. 10
In this episode, we discuss the importance of consistency. In fact, many people maybe take it for granted, but it plays out in the customer experience in a big way. You see, if you want to scale your business, you want to then hire another trainer and then another one, you're going to want to make sure that you can turn to those people and say: “This is how we do things.” And that no matter if they're working with you as the original coach or one of the people in your business, there's no lapse ...
Nov 06, 2019•27 min•Ep. 9
In this episode, our guest, Rami Odeh, tells us about his journey of early success, near failure and a return to success with the sale of his training gym. Rami started like a lot of people, in corporate America. He then went back to graduate school to chase his dream of opening his own business. After graduating, he got a fresh start as a personal trainer and loved it for the instant impact it had on lives. This led him to open his own facility and propel a much larger number of people to the h...
Oct 30, 2019•49 min•Ep. 8
In this episode, we speak with Anthony Wilkins, co-owner of Alloy for Women, about his transition from trainer to business owner and the challenges he's overcome. He also lets us in on his background, how the women’s concept gym got to where it is, and the things he’s learned along the way. His experiences can help those of you who are maybe thinking about opening your own gym or maybe changing your personal training model. Anthony also talks about how he dealt with some sort of an identity cris...
Oct 23, 2019•38 min•Ep. 7
In this episode, we will be discussing the KPIs (Key Performance Indicators) that are critical to the success of your business. Learning what to measure and knowing why it's important is all vital stuff. The knowledge, or the lack of it, can make or break your business. You can reverse engineer figures such as the number of leads, how many leads you got, how many of those leads you got to book to come in and see you, and how many you closed, to give your team actionable steps and keep them on tr...
Oct 16, 2019•29 min•Ep. 6
In this episode, we are discussing the most effective ways to evaluate the trainers on your staff. Evaluation time is an opportunity to tell them about the things they are doing well, and what they could start doing to add to that. How often should you review your coaches or your team? Should you do an annual review? Well, waiting a year until you do a sit-down with anybody on your team is way too long. Even in a small environment, people can get a little sideways and start wondering how they fi...
Oct 09, 2019•19 min•Ep. 5
In this episode, we share our seven core tenets for creating a great customer experience around your personal training sessions. Gestures like greeting your clients on their way in, and when they are finished with a session, don’t take much, but go a long way towards creating an awesome customer experience. In the personal training business, things are supposed to be more intimate and more personal by default. And there are situations that call for building a community even within the construct ...
Oct 02, 2019•20 min•Ep. 4
