Personal Training: 6 Secrets of Award Winning Customer Service


Would you believe that your ability to provide quality customer service to your clients is at least as important as your ability to get them results from their training program? Did you even know that customer service was going to be part of your business model? After all, what does personal training have to with customer service?

The answer: everything. Remember that your clients are people first, and their status as one of your clients comes second. Knowing how to tend to the needs of your customers will literally make the difference between a long and prosperous career in the fitness industry, or a short-lived stint that leaves you wondering what career path you should try next!

In order to assist you in walking down the success path, here are six methods that you can use to "WOW" your clients on a regular basis, keeping them happy, loyal to you, and engaging in long-term prosperous business relationships. In no particular order they are: contact, date and event recognition, listening, flexibility, forward thinking, and over-delivering.

Contact

When you get a new personal training client, many people will still second-guess their decision to hire you. After all, a personal trainer can be an expensive asset, and your clients need to believe that they made the right decision. One of the easiest ways for you to ease their mind in the beginning as well as during the course of their training program is by simply staying in contact with them.

Most clients will see you at most 3 times each week, and some clients even less than that. With at least 4 days in each week when your clients don't see you, you are influencing them less than 50% of the time! Many clients hire a personal trainer because they need constant guidance and support, and less than 50% could hardly be considered constant.

An easy solution to this is to send your clients a few emails a week, or mail them an actual snail mail letter once in awhile. Clip an appropriate article from a magazine and make copies of it to mail to your clients, or email them the URL of a great motivational story about weight loss that you found on the Internet. Forward them funny anecdotes about health and fitness, or drop them a postcard congratulating them on their latest progress.

For that matter, pick up the phone! Call Suzie Client on Saturday to let her know that you just got done updating her client record and had reason to again marvel at how great she is doing with her program. You just can't pay for the type of customer feedback you will get from something like that!

Stay in contact with your clients in between training sessions, and the increased attention will remind them on a regular basis that in the beginning you committed to a one on one training program for them, not just to stand there 3 times a week while they exercise.

Date and Event Recognition

Recognizing special dates in your client's lives is another great way to show them that you are thinking about them in between training sessions.

- Send your clients a birthday card, or even a small but thoughtful gift.- Congratulate them on their wedding anniversary, or even send flowers or a card to their house.- Ask them how excited they are about the upcoming graduation of their child from high school or college.- Have a special token of your appreciation sent to their home or office after a set amount of time that they have been training with you - maybe annually or semi-annually.- Give them a special award every time they lose 5 pounds, or drop a percentage of body fat.- Attend the race or other fitness event that you have been training them for.

As you can see, the possibilities are limitless. The lesson that you want to take away from this section is that you went above and beyond the call of duty to recognize a date or an event that was important to your client. They won't forget that when it comes time to decide whether or not to keep working with you!

Listening

The fact that you should listen to your clients should go without saying. If your title is "Personal Trainer", please take a moment at this time to re-read the first word! Too many trainers fall into the familiar trap of just taking their clients through workouts. Your clients aren't paying you to workout with them. They are paying you to give them dedicated one on one service, and the actual workout is only one part of that.

In addition to the exercise programming, you must again think about the fact that your clients are humans before they are clients. As humans, they have as many outside considerations as you do. If you are only seeing them 3 hours per week, that leaves 165 hours each week when you are not around, and the lifestyle events that happen during that time will spill over into the training sessions.

Your clients will talk about their jobs, their spouses, their relatives and in-laws, their children and their neighbors, their gardener and their mailman, etc. Any good personal trainer realizes that although we have no business actually dispensing professional advice on personal or spiritual matters, we are a 3 time per week sounding board for our clients, and that is just part of the job. Listen to what your clients have to say, help out without leaving your professional boundaries, and let your clients know that you care about what happens to them, not just about what happens during the training session.

Flexibility

Although a trainer's day is usually dictated by a preset schedule, if you paint yourself into a corner with your calendar, you will quickly find that some of your clients can't stick with their program because their schedule is just not that black and white. In today's world of the ever-changing landscape of professional as well as personal lifestyle factors, many people have trouble doing the same thing day after day, and week after week. In order to keep your clients happy and on track with their programs, you must "roll with the punches" and exhibit some flexibility when it comes to scheduling and training issues.

It is a very good idea to have a running cancellation policy for your business, and it is an equally good idea to educate your clients on the need for regularity in their training program. However, being so inflexible that you charge a client $50 every time they get a flat tire, have to work late, or have a family emergency will quickly eliminate any professional bonding that your clients may have previously felt was a part of your working relationship. Enforce your policies, but be realistic about the fact that life is just not as black and white as it may have been 20 years ago.

Forward Thinking

This is as much of a sales technique as it is a great customer service tool. In a nutshell, it means that you should always be planning for the future when it comes to your clients. Talk to them about how you are going to start running with them once they get their weight down enough for their knees to handle the stress. Explain to them how much fun it will be when you can start taking them through the new training protocol that you put together. Get them excited about how good they are going to look on the beach this summer after several more months of working out with you, or about how their cousin Sally is going to be so envious at Christmas time this year when she sees how much weight your client has lost.

All of these things plant the seed for your clients that you are thinking about their future, and not just taking them through a workout. Let them know that you have great plans for them in the future, and that you can't wait to see their results when they get to a certain point in the program that you have them on. Again, your clients are people, and they want to be made to feel important, needed, and respected.

Over-delivering

Over-delivering value to your clients is probably the most important technique out of any that have been listed so far. It is last in our list of customer service secrets so that it is the one that you remember the most!

Over-delivering is just what it sounds like - giving your clients more value for their money than they originally expected to get. In fact, all of the items listed above are great examples of over-delivery. Do you think that when your clients hired you they expected to be getting gifts on their birthday, expected you to be excited about the graduation of their children, or that they could vent to you about their mother-in-law during training sessions? These are all examples of the infinite number of ways that you can over-deliver value to your clients.

In addition to what has already been listed, you can get much more specific with your over-delivery efforts. Each of your clients has a very well defined fitness goal that they are diligently working towards. As a fitness professional, you should be regularly keeping up with the latest news stories about health and fitness, as well as getting Continuing Education Credits.

Put that information directly to use for your clients! How impressed do you think your client would be if their fitness goal is to be a competitive swimmer, and you take a course on training competitive swimmers? What about if you have picked up some clients who are over the age of 55 and you start reading books and clipping articles on Senior Fitness? How about a bonus training session that you give your client when they reach a goal? What about if you have a client who is on the high school wrestling team, and after working with him for 2 months, you offer to do a free class for his entire team? The teenager becomes a hero because his personal trainer gave up some winning tips before the big meet, and you get a boat load of free publicity!

Conclusion

The pattern developing here is clear, and the above examples are only sketches of things that you might consider. Remember that every successful personal trainer runs a business, he or she doesn't just workout with their clients. Get under the hood of your business, tinker around with the wiring, and find ways to "WOW" your clients everyday!

Aaron Potts is the author and creator of The Ultimate Complete Personal Training Business Kit, a quick-start kit and business guide for new as well as seasoned fitness professionals. Aaron's experience as a Fitness Professional has included management positions with local and nationally known fitness facilities, as well as in-home and outdoor training with clients from all walks of life. Find out more about Aaron's programs at http://www.completepersonaltrainingbusiness.com or his personal training site at http://www.aaronspersonaltraining.com

More Resources

Unable to open RSS Feed $XMLfilename with error HTTP ERROR: 404, exiting

More Building Muscle Information:

Related Articles

The Skinny on Muscle Imbalances - Restoring Order As A Means Of Eliminating Back Pain
There are many causes of back pain. Injury, illness, herniated disks and poor posture are just a few.
How Long Should You Rest Between Muscle Building Sessions?
In an earlier article we concluded that muscles must be worked to failure if an adequate hypertrophic response is to occur. Whether this involves one or more sets is irrelevant as in either scenario the muscles must be worked to failure and beyond.
Debunking the Top Ab Myths
Ab training has been done to death but it's time to take another look. Why? Because people are still training their abs wrong so all that ab training information must not be doing the right job.
New Bodybuilding Study on the Benefits of Deadlifts
Deadlifts are a very potential muscle-building exercise, that will rejuvenate your entire physical condition, to a whole new level -- if executed astutely.Here are some facts, on how Deadlifts can dramatically improve your physical power, to singularly maximized levels:Deadlifts Will Quadruple your Natural Testosterone & Growth Hormone Levels each time your subject yourself into this exercise (performed once / or twice a month.
The Secret Of The Perfect Program!
Another critical factor to be aware of, is the efficient use of time. If a routine is performed in approximately one hour, the muscle gains will be much less than if the exact same routine was performed in half and hour.
How to Gain Weight and Build More Muscle!
For many thin guys around the world, gaining weight without using illegal steroids has been a challenge. For thousands of lean young men, the dream is to gain weight, but no matter how much they eat they remain thin.
Bodybuilding Sins That Cause Back Pain and Missed Workouts: Part 2
Welcome to article number 2 in our series "Bodybuilding Sins That Cause Back Pain and Missed Workouts". In this article we are going to talk about how bodybuilders tend to create massive muscle imbalances and what you can do to not be one of them.
Fitness & Muscle Building Know How for Hard Gainers
Hard gainers are individuals who train equally hard as other people but somehow fail to make any gains comparable to others. They need a lot more than hard training.
Are Prohormones A Safe Alternative To Anabolic Steroids?
Steroid prohormones such as androstenedione and dehydroepiandrosterone (DHEA) have become popular in recent years as safer alternatives to anabolic steroids, but two questions need to be answered: 1. Are they effective in stimulating muscle growth? 2.
Tips to Help You Gain Weight
There are a couple of reasons why most people fail in their attempt to gain more muscle mass:A. Improper diet.
Real Muscle Real Fast!
Adding muscle seems to be a mystery to most, yet if you pick up a copy of any fitness or bodybuilding magazine and you'll almost always see a headline like this: "Gain 15 Pounds of Muscle in 6 Weeks."If it were so easy you'd have millions of muscle-heads running around.
7 Surefire Strategies For Fat Loss!
1. Weight Training.
10 Tips: How to Get in Shape without Sweating
Tip #1: The *Brazilian move*.The good thing about this move is that you don't need to go a gym to do it, you don't even need to find time in your day.
Build More Muscle and Lose More Fat by Discovering the Power of Training Variables!
Everyone will inadvertently hit a frustrating plateau in their training at one time or another. You're cruising along for a while, gaining strength, losing fat, looking better, and then all of the sudden it hits.
The MYTH of Gaining Muscle Without Fat!
Many of you have expressed concerns about gaining too much body fat while on such a high calorie diet, and wonder if you should do some aerobic exercise to offset the weight gain.Absolutely not.
Current Dietary Recommendations in Strength Training
Efforts to expand the limits of human strength and endurance have kept the scientist and the athlete occupied for centuries. The quest for another pound of muscle, or to lift next couple of kilos has been relentlessly pursued in the gym and the laboratory alike.
Focus on Both Consistency and Variability in Your Workouts for the Best Results
In one of my recent articles, I spoke about the fact that you must alter your training variables that make up your workouts if you want to continuously get good results, whether it is losing weight, building muscle, or toning up.While changing your training variables is an integral part of the success of your training program, your workouts shouldn't be drastically different every single time.
The Importance of Maintaining A Weight Training Log
Do you find gyms intimidating? Feel lost while doing your workouts? Tried different programs with no results? Not always sure of want exercises you are supposed to be doing? Or maybe you're burnt out on the exercises your doing. A weight-training log may be exactly what you need.
Know Your Muscle Building Exercises - The Shoulders
Every bodybuilder and weight trainer will have his or her favorite exercises for each body part. That's how it should be - as you progress through the various stages of learning you'll understand what works best for you.
Four Powerful Tricks for Successful Lucid Dreaming
By definition, Lucid Dreaming means "conscious awareness during the dream state." But how can this be? Every book I've ever read on dreaming has described the dream state as being an entry into the unconscious, so how can you possibly be conscious during dreaming, and be able to enter your dreams.