Client programming is all about personalizing the experience and service you provide. Members want guidance for fitness and an enjoyable, rewarding experience that gets them there.
You can adopt a client programming system or invent one of your own. Either way, this is a vital dimension that will help to establish your position as a force in the fitness industry.
Everyone Wins With High-Quality Client Programming
Personalizing the experience that you provide to individual members gets right to the very heart of what consumers value about fitness club memberships.
Your members place their hope and trust in you and your fitness team to create change in their lives. Members only need you if they believe that your gym gives them something they can’t do on their own.
So what’s in all of this for you, the gym owner and operator? Presumably, your objective is to have the highest lifetime value from each member of your gym. You want the investment you make to yield a positive return, with membership retention that’s as high as possible.
Personalize for Added Membership Value
Part of what you provide is an insightful framework for fitness. Your members look to you to know what numbers matter and what goals are worth pursuing. When you personalize the program to the person, you add way more value than something that could come out of a box.
When members feel great about their experiences at your fitness club they will hold onto their memberships longer, they will engage with the community within and around your gym more, and they will purchase more premium products and services from you along the way.
Just by supplying a personalized client programming structure of targets to hit and routines to perform you’re adding value. Members gain hope to start and then the powerful psychological reward of seeing a physical transformation in the mirror.
Sources of Programming Inspiration
You might start out with an existing framework for training, there are so many ways to find a system. First, with the right certification, you have a ready-made skill set that you can share.
There is a cornucopia of fitness brands that sell licenses and franchises. You can join franchising brands like Gold’s Gym, Crunch Fitness, and Title Boxing Club.
There are also preformatted programs that fall somewhere between a branded system and the certifications you earn as part of your career development.
Building A Branded System of Your Own
There’s a lonely place out there that only a few intrepid fitness trainers ever go. The reason they bother is they have an idea, a dream, and an original concept that they commit to sharing and building a brand of their own.
If you have the ambition to create a branded programming system, there are a few features to consider. Your client program will succeed through the power of duplication. This is the way that brands in all industries and professions have succeeded before you.
Think about any brand; the look is consistent, the steps and procedures are codified. When you walk into a big brand sandwich shop or coffee house, you notice that the staff always ask the same questions and offer a consistent level of service.
Create Branded Programs for Passive Income
If you have enough success, you can franchise out your system. Even a simple system that doesn’t flourish could be the basis for a preformatted system that you self-publish. Such a client program is just a set of documents, perhaps videos that you sell as an information product.
Considering that you do the work once, earn an income from every sale, and can publish digitally to a global market, you could turn your preformatted client programming system into a steady stream of residual income.
So there are three paths to creating the best client programming experience for your membership. Sign up for a prebuilt system such as a branded programming system, certification, or buy a franchise.
You can make a new system from scratch based on your ideas and what has delivered positive results for your members. Supporting these two, you have to have a base of fitness knowledge that you learn as part of your fitness certifications.
Whether you join a branded system or you create a new program from scratch, this is one of the most important things you can do to build a fitness business and raise your membership. Personalizing the training experience that each member has in your club will give real value to them and maximize the return on investment for you.
Bibliography
Cipolla, Kelsey. Growth of Branded Group Exercise Classes on the Rise. February 1, 2012. https://www.clubindustry.com/group-exercise/growth-branded-group-exercise-classes-rise (accessed January 27, 2018).
Fable, Shannon. Build Your Tribe With a Branded Program. Spring 2017. https://magazine.nasm.org/american-fitness-magazine/issues/american-fitness-magazine-spring-2017/build-your-tribe-with-a-branded-program (accessed January 27, 2018).
Fagan, Lawrence. Is Client Programming Part Of Your Fitness Value Proposition? November 8, 2017. https://blog.gyminsight.com/4730-is-client-programming-part-of-your-fitness-value-proposition/ (accessed January 27, 2018).
FranchiseRankings.com. Best Fitness Franchises – January 2018. January 1, 2018. https://www.franchiserankings.com/reviews-and-ratings-of-best-sports-fitness-franchises (accessed January 27, 2018).
Rideout, Rob. Personal Trainers Succeed When Clients Know Their Numbers. January 7, 2018. https://clubsolutionsmagazine.com/2018/01/personal-trainers-succeed-clients-know-numbers/ (accessed January 27, 2018).