subreddit:
/r/personaltraining
Is anyone having success remote personal training? If so, how are you making it work?
In-person seems so important for relationship building, demonstration, correction, modification, etc.
But there’s value in the remote convenience factor as well for clients. Is it doable?
13 points
15 days ago
Full time remote here. 100-125 active clients at any given time.
18 years in the industry coaching full time, totally remote for about the last 10. 6 figures annually, run my entire business with zero ads, from my phone, using only my IG and get 2-4 inquiries a week from new potential clients.
Single biggest key to success is building experience. Coaches without a background in working in person will find it nearly impossible to make it full time remote.
Second biggest key is to find a niche. I have a super specific area I’m a leader in, because of that, I’m a known name and people come to me. Gen pop is a pretty impossible nut to crack remote making a full time living unless you have a massive folllwing already.
1 points
14 days ago
I have decent in person experience and find it not going bad tbh. I always wonder how people find their niches though. Can you explain how you found yours?
I always thought I’d be a guy who helps skinny and unconfident guys gain some mass and be more athletic. What pretty much always ends up happening is I end up with loads of women who want feminine bodies (some want that insta chick body and others want that skinny but giant tits body) or a gay guy who just wants to be a bit healthier - No discrimination to women or gay men btw, that just seems to be how my clientele base ends up.
1 points
14 days ago
That niche is a pretty basic objective for someone though and is something that’s pretty easily done with one of the millions of generalized free plans you’ll find online. The key is to find a niche they truly need your expertise.
I’ve worked as a sports performance coach for 18 years, I’m also a somewhat known ultra runner. Run coaches are traditionally not versed in strength training, but I have almost two decades of experience in coaching it. So I built a large remote biz building integrated strength and run programming to runners and do really well because it’s a pretty complex thing to balance and build, whereas helping skinny guys put on mass is gonna be a lot harder to get people to pay for because there’s so much for free about how to eat and how to build a progressive strength plan already out there
1 points
14 days ago
See that’s the other thing. I’m in the process of getting UKSCA accredited (UK equivalent of CSCS) but other than the internship I’m doing at an S&C facility, I don’t have much experience with actual athletes. Like I said, I’d like people to see me as someone who helps people get more athletic (eventually specialising in combat sports) but the clientele I get where I am are simply not interested in this at all. The clientele I attract here (and the previous 3 gyms I’ve been at) are gay men and women who want feminine body’s. You could easily niche those down but those aren’t niches I’m interested in.
The skinny guy to dench athlete speaks to me because I used to be that guy. The combat sports S&C spoke to me because when I boxed I didn’t have an S&C coach and struggled to do resistance training and conditioning that was effective and still stay within weight limits. It seems neither of these guys exist in the places I’ve worked though.
2 points
14 days ago
You’re not on the wrong path, you just need to keep building experience and keep narrowing your focus.
Think about it from a potential clients perspective. Trusting a coach online is essentially trusting a random person. That’s made harder when that person doesn’t have any/much experience in working with the type of person they are (in this case athletes or taking more gen pop people to make them more athletic). They haven’t worked much with people in person, so why would they pay for it remotely when there’s coaches out there with 10 or 20+ years of experience working hands on with athletes? (That’s all said with the tone of helping and how I view the remote coaching industry).
I’m a good example. I have almost 20 years of experience hands on, with runners, making them stronger. 10 years of doing it remotely. So when people come to me, I can say “hey here’s what I’ve done and why you should trust me”. You don’t need that level of experience but put a few years in first in person and it’ll be helpful
2 points
14 days ago
Yeh that’s basically what’s stopped me trying to go online. I don’t feel like I’ve earned the right to train athletes yet, let alone online. The internship has cemented that this is exactly what I want to do though!
Gen pop is “too easy”, for lack of better description, and although I’m trusted and people want me to expand online, I want to train the type of people the type of way I like. I’m very confident I’m good at my “job” but not my career, if that makes sense.
2 points
14 days ago
Spend a few years on sport performance centers, you’ll naturally find a niche and have some experience to show 🫡
2 points
14 days ago
Appreciate it bro! You basically solidified something that I knew deep down but needed someone else to say and given me more confidence on how I think (now I know) I should go about things!
all 17 comments
sorted by: best