Online training has grown in popularity in recent years, and for good reason. It dramatically increases your ability to help others reach their goals from only those within a 5-mile radius of your gym to people anywhere in the world.
We built out the start of our Champion online training platform over a year ago and recently updated it. We spent the year learning, tweaking, and evolving. Along the way, we learned a bunch. If you want to build an epic online training service that maximizes its effectiveness, retention, and scalability then there are 3 major keys that we feel you have to master.
One of the people we learned a ton from is Jon Goodman. Jon runs the PTDC and the Online Trainer Academy. We sat down with Jon during a recent visit to Boston to discuss these 3 keys, and a bunch more. Check out our interview and read more about our 3 keys below.
Become an Educational Resource
As a coach, if we are to label ourselves experts in the field and expect others to trust us enough to choose us to help them get the results they’re looking for from a training program then we have to do more than send them a list of exercises to perform.
This is one of our core values in everything we do from our social media posts and online training programs to our in-person coaching. It’s not enough to simply tell people ‘what’ to do. Educating your clients on the ‘why’ behind everything in your programming and coaching will empower your clients and make them more likely to succeed and to rave about it to others.
Remember you are not a technician, you are a coach.
A lot of coaches are afraid to show their whole hand and give away too much information. They’re afraid that if they do, then their clients won’t need them anymore and they’ll leave to do it on their own, when in fact it’s often the exact opposite. Helping clients become a better version of themselves by understanding why they’re doing what they are will lead to greater buy-in, results, and longer retention.
Provide Accountability
People need more than a program. In fact, the program is often the easiest part of the process.
Often times, the people coming to you for online programs and coaching have tried numerous other programs in the past. Maybe it wasn’t the right program or didn’t provide enough education, but more often than not, it simply didn’t provide enough of a community of people that supported them, encouraged them, and held them accountable for sticking with it any longer.
Building a community lead by accountability and coaching that provides support for everyone involved will without question foster longer relationships with your clients. Knowing that you have others supporting you, and more importantly, relying on you for their support gives every individual a sense of purpose and ownership over their part of the community.
Assure Scalability
You have to remember, people are coming to you with so many different backgrounds, goals, needs, and experience level. You have to create an option for everyone.
Everyone has a unique starting point and it’s your job to find a way for them to belong.
People fail other programs because they don’t continue to evolve or have options for them once they’ve graduated from a particular plan. If you want to combat this, you have to figure out a way to scale your online training business to the point that it can continue to serve your clients no matter where they’re at in their fitness success path.
There are pros and cons to every style of online training. Individualized coaching can be hyper-specific to a client’s goals and needs, but is limited by the price point and the number of people you have feasibly serve. Training templates have the ability to help an infinite number of people at a low price point but are limited by their generality and lack of customization.
By having a variety of coaching levels to meet people’s goals, needs, and budgets and thinking ahead enough to provide the coaching to answer the potential questions you can maximize your reach and client retention to scale your business.
Want to Learn How to Start Your Own Online Training Program?
My friend Jon Goodman of the PTDC has a really amazing online training certification program. Kiefer and I both went through the material several times, it really helped us when developing our programs. The program is absolutely amazing, not only in how comprehensive it is but also in the quality of all the materials. I have no doubt that this investment will save you a ton of time and help you get started on the right path.
The program opens a couple of times a year, so if it’s not open now, be sure to sign up for the waitlist to be notified next time it’s available:
Want to Join Our Online Training Programs?
If you want to see these principles in action, I encourage you to check out our online programs and “learn by doing.” I think that really helps with your own authenticity when you can say you’ve been through this type of programming yourself.
We really do pride ourselves in the 3 principles above, so I know that you’ll not only get a great training experience for yourself but also a great educational experience as well.
We have a variety of programs depending on your goals, check them out below:
