Hi everyone,
I started working as a personal trainer almost a year ago and I would like to share my experience so far.
On this journey I have had my ups and downs and want to be completely transparent for those wishing to start a career as a personal trainer.
I have had the opportunity to work for 2 different gym chains, Pure Gym and The Gym Group and from both places, I have learnt a lot.
I had started my career as a Fitness Instructor in Pure gym, back in October 2020. I was on a 20h p/w contract and at the time, it wasn’t as stressful as being self-employed. I had learnt how to do classes, how to interact with members on the gym floor and how to generate leads, but unfortunately, as a fitness instructor I couldn’t do any personal training sessions and that was a time for me to gain new experiences, qualifications and transfer to a different gym.
In April 2021, I started my personal training career with The Gym Group in a
self-employed position. Starting as a self-employed personal trainer can be quite hard. Fortunately, at The Gym Group you have an option to work 12 hours per week as an employee, in return for "rent" - These shifts are comprised of doing classes and other
gym-floor duties such as maintenance and cleaning. This way you don’t need to pay rent and doing shifts can be very helpful when it comes to socialising and speaking to people.
I learnt a lot about group exercise classes by doing them 3 times per week, my favourites are LBT and Fit-Pump, but the members' favourite seems to be Circuits as this is always full and full of energy! Classes are a great opportunity to start new conversations, speak to members and find about their goals and reasons for attending the gym. I was very nervous and shy when I first started to do group classes, everyone
was telling me to be louder, and I had no idea how to fix it. But everything comes with more practise and experience and sometimes you just need to be patient and give it more time.
For me it took around 3-4 months to be more confident, so you definitely shouldn’t give up if you are not great in the beginning, remember to take your time. I found what works for me and I have noticed how my confidence has improved massively in classes and on the gym floor.
This confidence is the most important thing when it comes to speaking to your
potential clients on the gym floor. It took me a while to come and introduce myself to people in the gym, but practice and consistency made it easier to get to know more people. Even if you don’t get clients just from speaking on the gym floor, just keep speaking to more people they may come back to you because they will
already know you and be more comfortable asking for help, due to these previous conversations.
Other methods that helped me to make more interactions on the gym floor are questionnaires and health checks. It is easier to start a conversation by asking if a person has 5 mins to answer some questions about his/hers fitness journey and from there I could find out about how I could help as a personal trainer. This helped me to build my client base from the gym floor.
Since starting in April, I met a great team of PTs and amazing clients, and I cannot be more grateful for this. Before starting I didn’t know what to expect but I am very happy and grateful that I stepped into the fitness industry. I help my clients every day, I share my knowledge and experience and that is what makes me happy. The biggest thing for me is seeing my clients achieving the results they always wished for and realising that everything is possible.
All that wouldn’t be possible without knowledge and help from other great PTs, but also enlisting the services of a coach / mentor through TherapyFit, who helped me through my first months. They delegated a mentor called Nisha and she helped to build my business from scratch when I didn’t know anything about building a system in my business. I was very overwhelmed at the start of my career but my mentor gave me all the support and tips and without her guidance, it probably would have taken me at least a year to build a client base but with her support, I started signing up clients in my 1st month. The fitness industry and personal training specifically is competitive but I believe there is always an opportunity to bring something new and build your own unique business!
If you'd like more information on how I succeeded as a personal trainer or to follow my journey, please feel free to give me a follow on instagram @foodandiron
For coaching and mentoring, feel free to get in touch with the TherapyFit team, or Nisha directly @nisha_coaching
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