Fitness Industry: Employment and Opportunities

Fitness Industry Employment Landscape

• CPT profession can be traced back to the 1970s
• Bodybuilders and athletes were hired to assist clients in building muscular physiques

Importance of Education and Certification

• Credentials demonstrate an individual's ability to perform tasks required for a specific job category
• Professional certification ensures individuals can perform the tasks required by a specific job category

Employment Opportunities

• Direct employee of an organization
• Independent contractor
• Starting a business working with direct clients in their homes

Commercial Health Clubs

• In 2019, there were between 210,000 facilities with 180 million members
• Health clubs can operate locally, regionally, nationally, or internationally

Types of Health Clubs

• Low-Cost Health Clubs
  • Offer low-price memberships
  • Charge extra for group fitness, small group workouts, or personal training
  • Use 24/7 key card access instead of front-desk staff
• Mid-Market Health Clubs
  • Incorporate all features of low-cost clubs
  • Provide higher-end lockers
  • Offer snack and supplement sales
  • Include group fitness with membership
  • Are accessible in multiple locations
• Premium Health Clubs
  • Feature multiple group-fitness studios
  • Offer complementaries like towels, hygiene products, cafes with post-workout nutrition, and in-house childcare
  • Provide family packages to ensure affordability
• Nonprofit Health Clubs
  • Use revenue from fitness programs and memberships to cover costs
  • Do not generate profits for an owner or cooperation
• Clubs often pay an hourly rate with an additional 40-70% for each personal training session

Independent Professionals

• Professionals often pay a per-client or monthly fee to a facility for location use
• Professionals train at a client’s personal location
• They set their own pay rates and earn the entire amount

Options for Independent Contractors

• Studio or Health Club: Paying rent to use a facility that includes liability insurance and follows operating procedures
• Traveling to Client's Home: Clients may have access to a facility if they have a fitness center
• Online Coaching: Coaching remote clients with similar goals like marathon preparation
• Organized Wellness: May be contracted by employers to help employees stay healthy

Training Under The Table

• Paying a gym membership and offering services to club members
• This is considered theft

Career Development

• Fitness Manager
  • Maintains staffing schedule providing mentorship to fitness professionals
  • Holds regular team meetings and continually provides inquiries to members when necessary
• General Manager
  • Responsible for all business sales and operations
  • Oversees multiple departments and employees
  • Requires advanced education in both fitness and business
• Facility Owner
  • Has relatively low start-up costs
  • Costs include certification exam, liability insurance, business licenses, marketing costs, and transportable exercise equipment
  • Able to work with clients in homes or in public spaces and is eventually able to open a physical location
• Master Instructor
  • Works directly with equipment companies or fitness education to teach workshops
  • Requires a degree in an exercise-related field
  • Participates in a selection process to be trusted as a representative
• Writer or Blogger
  • Writes fitness-related content for specific audiences on online resources or in magazines
  • Can earn money through advertising revenue or per-article payments
  • Requires effective written communication skills for identifying interesting content
  • Requires credibility and a solid professional reputation
• Strength and Conditioning Coach
  • Designs and implements workout programs to improve an athlete’s performance
  • They are typically employed by sports organizations with a wide demographic
  • Requires an internship completion, advanced degree, and fitness industry certification
• Social Media Influencer
  • Represents and promotes products in exchange for sponsorship
  • Requires reputation and the ability to produce interesting content
  • Highly competitive and usually earned from previous achievements in athletics or building a clientele of celebrities
• College or Trade School Instructor
  • Teaches fitness curriculum
  • Requires an advanced degree and additional training or relevant credentials

Resume Writing

• Should be a short, outlined presentation of an individual's ability to contribute to the specific organization
• Should be one to two pages in length
• A new CPT may highlight other valuable skills and job experience
• Show good customer service and a safe sales process
• Highlights: should be creative, organized, unconventional, and exhibits vulnerability

Job Search and Interviewing

• Marketing a candidate's skills to obtain an in-person interview
• Where to look for a job: most online employment agencies, directly visit company website, or visit in person
• A followed process would have a pre-interview to see basic qualifications
• Appropriate attire at interview: avoid revealing muscle shirts or clothes that are too tight, and follow typical dress and professional appearance

Training Tips

• Procedures for selling or marketing personal training
• Identify facilities that attract specific client demographics
• Uncover the business flow
• Think about the daily commute
• Additional Interviewer benefits or information
• Research on company reputation

A Day in the Life of a CPT

• Popular times: 5AM-9PM, 12PM-2PM, 4PM-8PM
• Sets guidelines for availability to avoid burnout and poor customer service
• Group workouts are ideal for increasing income while reducing working hours
• Prospect: A potential client

Operations

• Reviewing assessments or intake forms
• Preparing invoices and collecting payments
• Developing/updating exercise programs
• Writing emails and sending texts
• Following up with phone calls
• Circulating fitness floor
• Helping membership teams
• Cleaning and storing fitness equipment
• Working external events

Guidelines for Uncompromising Customer Service

• Members return when they have learned to enjoy exercise and are experiencing their desired results
• Also returning when service is enjoyable and when the facility gives a sense of community
• Adapt to the client's communication preferences and coaching needs

Accountability

• Clients want to be held for their goals and prefer to be contacted, especially if they are missing sessions

Support

• Building a positive environment and building confidence for the client

Feedback and Guidance

• Includes receiving proper instruction for exercises and for making long term progress

Results

• Various assessments gather client’s progress

Sales and Marketing

• Becoming comfortable when doing the sale process
• Presenting prices for session packages and asking potential clients for sales
• Selling a service asking a client to commit to a program that will improve their wellbeing
• Educating clients through their goals

Introduction To The Sale Process

• Stage 1: Identify a customer’s needs
• Stage 2: Communicating solutions for the needs
• Stage 3: Making the sale asking for a financial commitment so they can solve their needs
• Sale professionals educate consumers on how they will benefit from their product or service offered
• Relying on questions that can get them thinking or talking- can learn wants, needs, desires and fears

Vocabulary

• Sale Process: A system to understand the clients questions and to be able to present different solutions
• Open-ended questions: Questions that cannot be answered with a simple yes or no

Prospecting and Lead Generation

• Prospecting is an integral part: if not meeting you will likely struggle later on
• Can be Identified:
  • Asking for referrals from existing clients
  • Working the floor and building rapport
  • Obtaining warm leads by the member or sales department
  • Social media
• Warm Leads Include:
  • Starting with one or more complimentary personal training sessions
  • Additional benefit working in large health clubs
  • Should not be expected or relied on

Vocabulary

• Working the floor: rapport building, walking around talking to members without presenting a sale

Building Rapport

• Building relationships through open communication and trust
• Smiling
• Being outgoing and friendly
• Asking for names and using them in conversation
• Uncover each likes and wants

Successful CPT’s

• Focus on prospects families, goal, and the best way they can lead them to change
• Do not sell but consider how a client wants to make a change

Forecasting

• Financial goal setting and helps determine how many prospects a CPT needs to interact

Marketing

• The method of selling to communicate the benefits of personal training to clients
• It may take up to 3-6 months to develop a full client base schedule
• Focus on detecting and resolve fitness concerns for an entire community

Unique Selling Proposition

• Skills or traits that make a CPT stand out Example: Specialization can focus on athletes, weight loss, and active adults

Building Value and Brand

• The brand tell the customer about their product and services
• Creating a brand makes an emotional connection
• Identity of the brand: Being the “Toughest workout in the city.”

SWOT Analysis

• Analyze Strengths to Build a Brand
• Threats identify issues that can happen in the business

Assessing Weakness

• Create an increase in opportunities

• Unfamiliarity with sale process

• Identify Strengths and advantages with the experience of your population

• Finding ways to develop new professional skills or expanding the business

Four P’s of Marketing

Includes Product, Price, Promotion, and Place

• Product*
• What are the benefits of using
• Price*
• What does the service cost
• Promotion*
• How can the service improve or grow
• Price*
• Where can it be sold

Marketing Plan

• Jane offers personal training to in house women so they know how they can strength train safely
• Price:* Charges flat monthly rate based clients needs and training sessions
• Place:* specific locations in a large city. Apartments and offices.

Requirements for Continuing Educations

• Continuing Education Units (CEU):* .1- for every one contract of training-1.9 needs to be completed every 2 years
• Attending workshops, courses, conferences, and online courses
• Trade shows:* Traditionally multi day events and may have many benefits to get renewed-Workshops: equipment
• Online CEUS and Specializations:* participating in webinars, earnings advanced certification and specialization
• Writing articles to convert into CEUs, public speaking
• Working with Young athletes, active aging adults, and pre/postnatal women

Explore the fitness industry's growth since the 1970s, the importance of certification, and various employment avenues. Discover opportunities as a direct employee, independent contractor, or business owner. Learn about commercial health clubs and their different types, like low-cost models.