New Website in the works

In progress of launching new website designed for personal trainers, gym managers and owners - a site for people in fitness careers to move from one position to another and the skills required - how to increase your revenue with marketing and sales skills.

The Continuity Summit

The very first event to focus on recurring revenue – The 2009 Continuity Summit.

Muscle Nerd Jeff Anderson - Fitness Atlantic Brian Cannone - Critical Bench Mike Westerdal


Brian Cannone - Ryan Lee - Jeff Anderson





THE marketing event of the year!

Book Review of No Discount Guide to Fitness Marketing

Review of the "No Discount" Guide to Fitness Marketing
By Mike Westerdal of CriticalBench.com


Before I started running CriticalBench.com full-time, in previous lives I have worked both as a gym membership sales consultant and as a personal trainer. And though I was successful, continually selling new memberships and securing new clients was always a never-ending challenge.

After reading The No Discount Guide to Fitness Marketing, I really wish I had run across this resource back in the days when I was selling gym memberships and marketing my services as a personal trainer. The No Discount guide is written by Brian Cannone and he's developed what he calls the five-part Ultimate Health Club Profits Formula. If you're a gym owner, this is definitely a worthwhile read.

The book is divided into 11 chapters outlining Brian's complete strategy in detail. Chapter 1 introduces us to the "formula." Before getting into the formula, Brian talks about the importance of switching from an owner-focused perspective to one that's customer-focused. In this new organizational design, the customer is on top and marketing and sales take on new importance while the role of the CEO is moved off to the side, charged with the task of leading the company in the new customer-focused direction.


Once that's covered, Brian moves on to discussing the formula,
which includes these 5 parts:

Increase the number of promotions;


Increase the size of each new customer purchase;


Increase the response rate of all your advertising;


Increase the number of times you charge your members; and


Increase the number of purchases (other than members' fees) to your current members.
In the rest of this chapter Brian goes on to provide more in-depth information about each of these components.

The next chapter gives us an overview of Brian's thoughts about creating systems (think McDonald's) to keep your gym on "autopilot." This means that the gym's success is not overly dependent on any one person-including you.

The idea is to establish consistent systems that produce the same results regardless of the person performing them.

Chapter 3 is focused on positioning your club in the marketplace and the steps involved in doing so. He includes a good discussion about surveys and even includes a sample. This chapter is followed up by an overview of effective do-it-yourself advertising strategies. Here, Brian provides some easy-to-implement ideas for promoting your gym. The section on how to present your website is top-notch and I also like the fact that he provides examples and resources.

Chapters 5-8 are dedicated to an in-depth explanation of Brian's 7-step system to successfully walk your prospects through the sales cycle. He presents the system in an easy-to-follow format that outlines everything you need to do to successfully implement the system. He also spends some time going over some of the qualities that you should look for in your salespeople before laying out the rest of the steps in the system. And again, like the other chapters Brian uses real-life examples and provides useful tools and resources.

Chapter 7 starts out with some great suggestions for customizing and making the most of gym tours. He closes out this section with an overview of the different types of memberships you should consider. In chapter 8 Brian leads with strategies for overcoming most of the typical objections you're likely to hear from prospects. There's a lot of useful information presented in this chapter-I especially like his thoughts about personal training and how it should be managed.

Brian gives us his thoughts about using the telephone as a sales tool to bring in prospects and sell memberships in chapter 9. Like the other parts of his formula, he lays out a strategy for using the phone as lead-generating and sales closing tool. This is followed up by an excellent presentation about putting it all into action. He really covers everything-laying out the gym, equipment selection, figuring out how many members/memberships you need to turn each month, and more. This section is jam-packed with great examples and lots of resources.

Overall, I'd say that whether you're an experienced gym owner or just starting out this book is a must-have. The concepts and ideas he presents are practical, realistic and doable. By that I mean that the strategies he offers up don't require extraordinary resources that are beyond the reach of ordinary gym owners. I especially like the fact that the book is based on practical experiences that have shown to work. If you're looking to pump up the sales volume at your gym I definitely recommend this book.


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The "No Discount" Guide To Fitness Marketing by Brian Cannone

Behind the scenes fitness expert finally
reveals his secrets…

Discover How To Instantly Create A Stampede Of New Members Into Your Health Club, Fitness Studio, Or Gym…With These “No Discount Street Tactics” Invented By A Connecticut Man Who Created $59,845 in New Billings Out Of Thin Air…And How He Did It Again 4 Years Later...

The Best Part: He’s put these tactics into a complete step-by-step system anyone can follow to launch a new health club, re-launch an old one, or get a bunch of new members on the cheap. Read this special fitness sales online report to discover more…

Read on at: FitnessSalesTraining.com

What is Your Name?

What's Your Name Again?

By Brian Cannone
http://www.fitnesssalestraining.com


Let me ask you something.

Which do you think is more important – the people whose names you already know, or the members of your health club whose names you don't know yet?

Most people think it's the members names that you already know, but it's not!

If you don't know somebody's name that's a member of your health club, you better learn their name very quickly and start remembering it.

Knowing a person's name is very important and although most people don't even realize it on a conscious level, deep-down they're thinking “wow, he must really care about me – I love that feeling”.

As wishy-washy as that might sound, it's completely true.

Think about it, what other places know them by name? The grocery store doesn't, clothing stores don't, their gas station probably doesn't, nor do 99% of the other places they visit on a regular basis!

So if you start talking to them by name, it creates an instant bond between you and the prospect.

And think about it – if you were the prospect, would you rather stay at a place who already knew your name and you were pretty much friends with, or would you pick the place down the street who might be a few bucks cheaper, but wasn't personal and friendly towards you?

I don't know about you, but I'd pick the place that was personal with me every single time!

Here's what I do to be even more personal with some of my clients. And keep in mind, this doesn't work for ALL clients – you have to get to know them first and see their personality, and make a judgment call.

This is what I do:

When I start to get to know a client that I think has a fun personality, I'll make up kind of a nickname for them. There is an older guy who comes into my health club who kind of resembles George Clooney, so instead of calling him by his real name I'll say “Heyyy George Clooney, how's it goin buddy?”

Do you see how much of a different relationship I have with him as compared to how most business owners treat their clients?

Now you also have to be a little careful when using this approach, so be forewarned.

Although it's extremely effective as a client retention strategy, and will probably even get you a lot more referrals than you're used to seeing, you can't go TOO far with it.

For example if a very attractive girl comes in you can't call her by some porn stars name or say anything specifically about her body. All you have to do is encourage her that she looks great, that's it.

You need to learn the line between encouragement and sexual harassment. Unfortunately in today's society that line is very, very thin – so always be more safe than sorry. Watch the persons face and body language as you give them the compliment and if it's negative even in the least bit, don't ever say anything like that again.

For most people that won't be a problem, I just wanted to let you know that sometimes it is an issue so you need to be careful. But that shouldn't deter you from complimenting your gym members and joking around with them!

What Really Matters

Do You Know What REALLY Matters?

By Brian Cannone
http://www.fitnesssalestraining.com


I'd like you to take a few minutes out of your day today and do something that might radically change the way your business carries out its day to day activities.

What I want you to do is this:

Sit down and write out every single thing your employees (and yourself) are required to do to maintain your business.

This would include dusting, vacuuming the floors, taking care of your clients, and literally every single piece of your day.

Then, think about whether or not you're carrying out the most efficient and time-worthy activities, or if they're useless and really don't contribute.

One of the most important things you'll need to think about is how clean your health club is. A regular gym might not care AS much about how clean it is (obviously it should be clean, but they might not have to be quite as stringent about it) – but with a health club you're trying to show that you're sophisticated and high-quality so cleanliness is a huge factor.

Do you have all the corners of your building cleaned? How about all the air vent covers, baseboards, and small areas that you might not even think about? A lot of times you can find a ton of places where dust seems to accumulate very rapidly. It might not seem like a big deal, but what if one or more of your clients happens to find it? What would they think of your health club after they found huge piles of dust in the corner?

Well, let's just say they wouldn't think very highly of the place, and you might even lose their business.

Another thing to take into consideration is how friendly your place of business in. What is the atmosphere like when a prospect or client walks in the door? Is it warm and friendly, or loud and obnoxious? Are you greeting them on their way in and telling them to have a great day as they're walking out? Are you treating them like royalty during the time they're there?

If not, I suggest you start today.

The third thing to look out for is, well, everything else. The first 2 things need to be taken care of first, then put your time into “everything else”.

Now your health club might be slightly different and that's completely fine. What you need to do is figure out what is most important to your client, and make sure that part of their experience is always at 100%.

Then figure out what they would care about next, and make sure that's completed. Keep doing this over and over again.

If your clients see that you're willing to put THEM first and make sure everything is done according to what they want, you're going to build loyalty and trust from day one and you'll be one of the most efficient and well-respected health clubs in your entire area.

Can I Get You Later?

Throw Out The Cheapskates

By Brian Cannone
http://www.fitnesssalestraining.com


Do your members take advantage of the fact that you're nice to them and want them to stay at your health club? Odds are, they are in fact doing that and if so you must stop it immediately because they'll keep trying to do it with bigger and bigger things.

Let me give you an example:

In many of the clubs I visit, people grab a water out of the cooler and ask to “pay for it later”. Although this may seem like not a big deal, it really is! Although most people aren't, some people try to get away with anything they can and they'll make excuses like “oh, can I get ya next time? I forgot my wallet”.

Do you honestly ever think you'll see that money? Of course not!

Just like all the other rules you have, you need to have rules that members aren't allowed to buy anything unless they have money with them right at the moment they buy it. And you absolutely cannot make any exceptions, even for outstanding members who you know are telling the truth. Making one just exception for a person is going to create huge problems in the trust and credibility in your company which will eventually hit the “butterfly effect” and make bad ripples throughout your entire organization.

Another reason this is a very bad thing that's happening in your business is because it makes your staff feel uncomfortable. If you have rules set it in place that they can't buy something, ever, if they don't have money, it makes it much easier on your staff because all they really have to say is “you know the rules” and the conversation is over.

You also need to be monitoring things like this as well. Like many other negative things this doesn't happen very often, but it does. People will simply walk over and take a water without even asking. If you don't have rules for this sort of thing, it will go unnoticed and that member will continue to take advantage of you.

You CAN'T let this happen!

Be the “soup nazi” and tell your staff to do the same as well. And this doesn't only apply to water, it applies to all aspects of your business where people are allowed to buy things.

As I mentioned before, the butterfly effect is a huge factor in the success of your business. Letting one or 2 waters go might seem like something small, but it eventually turns into much bigger and more expensive items and over time ruins the credibility of your “soup nazi-ness” and people will assume they can walk all over you and your staff with no further consequences.

Obviously you don't want this happening. Not only does it cost you money that should be going right in your pocket, it's also making you the laughing stock of the club AND your community!

We Are Not For Everyone

The Dangers Of Being “For Everybody”

By Brian Cannone
http://www.fitnesssalestraining.com


Sit back for a minute and figure out who you're trying to market to for your business. Are you trying to get huge volumes of people into your health club at a cheap price, smaller amounts of people at a premium price, or are you simply trying to market to every person you see on the street?

If you're trying to get everybody and anybody into your business, you're setting yourself up for failure!

Being a specialist is one of the absolute best things you can do. There are several levels in being a specialist, but it's usually not necessary to become so specific that you're only catering to a certain income bracket in a certain gender and a certain type of working out.

And yes, I've seen people do this!

All I'm saying is that you should pick – do you want to cater to a volume of people at low prices or a select group of people at higher prices and more of a “high end” kind of health club?

If you land in the middle, you'll be sending mixed messages. People won't be able to really “get” what kind of health club they're about to join, and guess what – they won't join!

But when you specialize, even just a little and pick a specific income bracket, people will notice and they'll be more comfortable knowing the fact that they'll be working out with the same kind of people they are.

And believe it or not, all you have to do is start specializing and the value of your health club goes up instantly. I'm not sure why this happens, but think about this. Who gets paid more, a family doctor or a heart surgeon? The heart surgeon gets paid much more.

Why?

Because they're specializing in a certain area and people trust them more!

And in terms of a health club, this has the same affect.

Trust me, rich people usually don't want to be a part of the same health club as poor people and vice versa. Why do you think some golf clubs are tens of thousands of dollars per year to join? Because people like to be part of the same social group they're used to hanging around with!

There is a major difference between a high-end and low-end health club. You just need to figure out which one yours is closer to, make a few changes, and jump into that category and start marketing to those types of people.

And speaking of marketing, once you specialize it becomes 100% easier. Instead of trying to market to “everybody” you then know you're only trying to reach a specific type of person. Then doing your research and figuring out where to advertise becomes much easier because all you have to do is figure out where those types of people will be looking, and start advertising in those places.

It's really as simple as that – don't make it over complicated!