How to Measure the Success of Your Online Training Business

Gone are the days where you have to work for a gym to provide a personal training session. Now, a trainer or coach can meet with clients virtually. This makes it easier to help busy clients meet their fitness goals. It also expands access to your ideal client since you're not bound by geography.

If you've started offering online personal training sessions, keeping track of how you're doing in certain areas provides a variety of benefits.

Why It's Important to Track Your Progress

One of the very first things we do when working with a new client is to take baseline measurements. We record their weight, body mass index, and the size of their waist, hips, thighs, and more. Why? Because you don't know if your exercise program is working unless you keep track of these measures.

The same is true when it comes to running an online personal training business, or any other fitness business for that matter. Recording and monitoring certain factors make it easier to identify whether your actions are providing the desired results.

If they are, great! Keep doing what you're doing. But if they aren't, it may be time to make changes. See if taking a different path begins to move the needle in the right direction.

Tracking your progress also tells you which actions have the greatest impact on your personal training business. These are the things that are worth your time and effort. Less impactful actions should be modified or eliminated completely.

How to Measure the Success of Your Online Personal Training Business

When we talk about tracking, monitoring, and measuring, which actions or factors are of most importance? There are a few.

Your Personal Trainer Salary

One of the easiest ways to identify your success as an online trainer is to watch your revenues. This provides a big-picture view of the financial health of your fitness business.

Look back at the last six months to a year. Has your salary increased, decreased, or stayed the same? If it has stayed the same or decreased, is this specific to your training business or is it a trend within the fitness industry?

For instance, January is typically a busy month for personal training. People are extra motivated to reach their New Year's fitness resolutions. In November and December, you may notice that your revenues fall a bit as people spend more time celebrating the holidays and are less focused on their goals.

Another way to measure your success in this area is to see how much you earn compared to other fitness trainers. The Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that the average personal trainer salary is $40,700 per year. If you are a new trainer, you may make less. If you've been coaching clients for years, you may make more. But if you're far below this amount, it might be time to take action and grow your personal training business.

The Number of New Training Clients You Get Per Week or Month

For your business to be successful, you have to be able to convert a potential client into a paying client. How often are you able to make this transition happen? How many new training clients do you sign up per week or month?

Keeping track of this number helps you identify whether your marketing efforts are working. It tells you if your advertisements, emails, blog, or social media posts are resonating with your ideal client.

When tracking new training clients, also note which marketing mediums are closing the most deals and which are closing the least. Focus on the avenues that appeal most to your prospective client. This will bring in more leads.

Your Social Media Following

As an online personal trainer, your ability to connect with people over the internet makes or breaks your business. Because you have no face-to-face interaction, you must rely on virtual mediums like social media to build your personal training career.

Measure your progress as an online personal trainer by keeping track of the number of people following and connecting with you on your social media pages. Is this number growing? Are your followers interacting with you more and sharing more of your posts?

Social media can be tricky because there are so many different platforms. You have Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Twitter, and more. Pick the one that your target audience uses the most. Post content and images that establish you as a fitness professional.

Also, provide valuable information that your followers are enticed to share. This gives you more exposure and encourages others to follow you as well. For instance, go live and show them how to do a specific exercise or use a certain piece of gym equipment. Or simply take a moment and encourage them to keep working toward their fitness goals. Give them a reason to keep you in their news feed.

The Results You Provide Your Online Personal Training Clients

Nothing shows your success as an online personal trainer more than having clients who meet or exceed their fitness goals. So, how are yours doing in this area? Are you able to provide dramatic results based on your exercise programs? Do you have a high success rate?

Your ability to provide results will largely speak for themselves. Your clients will likely tell their family and friends how great you are as a coach, increasing your business by way of referrals. However, you should market their results as well.

Results are often shared with before and after photos. Video testimonials are powerful too. When clients talk about how much you as a fitness instructor helped them change their world, it makes others want to sign up too. Just be sure to get their permission first so you don't run into liability issues.

Share your ability to get results on all of your online platforms. Have a dedicated page on your fitness website where you can share your client's success stories. Include these results in your emails or add a "Success" section within your fitness newsletter. Get your current or potential client excited about the things you can help them do.

Also, post your testimonials on social media. Record a 1- or 2-minute clip of your client expressing how happy they are after working with you as their coach. Let their excitement motivate others to want to achieve the same.

Your Level of Personal Fulfillment

When measuring your success as an online personal trainer, it's important to pay attention to whether your career is fulfilling you as a person. Do you still find joy in coaching and training others online? Do you look forward to growing your online fitness business or has it become something you dread?

If you're not happy providing services as an online fitness professional, it doesn't matter how good all of the other numbers look. You will still feel like something is missing. You will long to spend your days doing something else.

Twice a year, take the time to sit down and rate your level of personal fulfillment on a scale of 1 to 10. If you are anything less than a seven or eight, identify what it is about running an online personal training business that prevents you from scoring higher. Can you outsource any of these obstacles to make your training fun again?

For instance, if you like to offer your online fitness classes, but don't like marketing, it may benefit you to hire an agency to take care of this for you. Or maybe you're struggling with your online personal training software. Purchasing a different program may make running your business easier.

Seek to identify how your training business is sapping your energy. Come up with ways to work around these obstacles so you can continue to do what you love without feeling as if you're not having fun.

7 Ways to Improve your Online Personal Training Success

Keeping track of all of these measurements is a great way to monitor the success of your online personal training business. What else can you do if you want to take your business to the next level?

1. Obtain your certification. If you don't currently have your personal training certification, potential clients may not trust that you have the expertise necessary to help them reach their fitness goals. Being certified instills a sense of trust. It says that you know what you're talking about. In addition to getting your personal training certification, an online coaching certification says that have the skills needed to provide results virtually. It gives some reassurance to a new client.

2. Increase the value of your online personal training packages. If you don't have many clients signing up for your exercise packages, try to find ways to make them so valuable that they can't walk away. For example, if you've authored an e-book, include a free copy with each online course purchased. Give each new client a free water bottle when they sign on with you as their trainer. Put your logo on the bottle so they think of you each time they take a drink.

3. Offer a free training session. Some people are hesitant to sign up with an online personal trainer. They don't know if they'll like a virtual program and they aren't sure if they'll like you as a trainer. Ease their concerns by providing a free training session. This enables them to work out with you with no obligations or strings. Once they realize that you're a good online coach, they'll be more inclined to sign up.

4. Ask your current clients for referrals. One of the best ways to grow your online personal training business is to ask your clients to refer you to their family and friends. You may even offer them a discounted rate if they get someone to sign up. Reward them for helping you grow your training business.

5. Ramp up your marketing campaign. You can't grow your personal training business if no one knows you exist. If the reason you're not successful is that you aren't marketing enough, it's time to increase your efforts in this area. Get the word out that you offer online training services. Start to establish your brand.

6. Get more active on social media. The more you post on social media, the easier it is for potential clients to get to know, like, and trust you. Start a conversation with your followers and engage with them regularly. Interact with them and start to build a relationship. The more comfortable they are with you, the more likely it is they'll decide to hire you as their online trainer.

7. Have fun with your online fitness business. Above all, have fun when growing your personal training business. The more you enjoy the process, the more appealing you become to your target market. Let your excitement for fitness shine through. Passion is contagious. The more fun you have helping clients get in better shape, the more your potential clients will want to have fun with you.

Want to learn more about how to become a more successful online fitness coach? The ISSA offers Online Coach certification. This course covers everything from mastering social media to effectively selling your coaching packages to online clients. It also includes access to downloadable tools and templates, as well as 84 how-to videos designed to help you take your virtual fitness business to the next level.

Resources

Bureau of Labor Statistics, U.S. Department of Labor, Occupational Outlook Handbook, Fitness Trainers and Instructors, at https://www.bls.gov/ooh/personal-care-and-service/fitness-trainers-and-instructors.htm (visited April 19, 2022).