How to be a successful Personal Trainer (Part 1)

The Fitness Industry is quite unique in that the career pathway usually looks something like this

Student completes a 3 month course in Fitness which teaches them just enough to get started in the industry.

The student is then left on their own to run a successful fitness business.

No other industry in the world works like this.

Me personally, my background is in Exercise Physiology.

To become an Exercise Physiologist I had to;

Complete a 4 year degree in Exercise Science
Complete 500 hours of work placement under the supervision of an Exercise Physiologist

And at the end of that, I wasn’t expected to know how to run a business. That was just enough to get my foot in the door working for someone else.

And that’s not just me. My best friend was a mechanic. He had to do something like a 4 year apprenticeship. Which consisted of full time work / study load.

I remember doing the Math with him and we worked out he would have been more money working at McDonalds.

So in any other industry it’s a given that you’re going to need 3-4 years of experience (both working AND studying) before you start earning a decent income from it.

So that’s the first thing you need if you want to be a successful trainer.

Accept that for the next 3-4 years, You need to be doing two things;

Working for experience
Completing Continuing Education Courses (CECs)

Don’t even think about it, Just accept it!

Think of it as your apprenticeship.

Now there’s obviously things you can do to speed up the process

Experience: Work as much as you can early on! This is going to be different for everyone.. But let’s simplify it

Trainer A and Trainer B both finish their certifications at the same time.

To gain experience.

Trainer A keeps their full time job and trains 2-3 clients a week after hours

Trainer B quits their full time job and gets a job working on a gym floor for significantly less than their old job.

After 12 months, Trainer B is going to be in a WAY better position than Trainer A!

Trainer B has completed over 2000 hours in the Fitness Industry.

Trainer A has completed 100 hours, maybe 150 hours.

Yeah, Trainer B had to take a bit of a pay cut.

But moving forwards, Trainer B is going to have a successful career in the fitness industry because they did their apprenticeship.

Trainer A will never be successful in the Fitness Industry. They’ll always just be training 2 or 3 clients on the side and think there’s no money in the Fitness Industry.

Upskill as quick as you can!

The current Fitness Australia requirement is to complete 20CECs every 2 years.

Trainer A and Trainer B both finish their certifications at the same time.

Two years later

Trainer A had completed their 20CECs. They did a 10CEC course in Kettlebells and a 10CEC course in PT business.

Trainer B had completed 40CECs. They did a 10CEC course in Kettlebells, a 10CEC course in PT business, a 10CEC course in How to Sell Fitness and a 10CEC course in Online Social Media Marketing for Personal Trainers.

Trainer B is going to be 100 times more successful than Trainer A

Yes, Trainer A may have had to invest a few hundred dollars into a few extra courses but they are going to make it back pretty quickly because they are going to be running a successful fitness business!

Trainer B, may have saved a few dollars by not investing in extra courses but really they’re probably the ones losing because if they had just invested in those few extra courses, they would be doing a lot better financially!

Anyways, to summarise, If you’ve just started in the industry.. Do these two things for the next 3-4 years.