Care-Coach-Lead

I have a lot of conversations with gym owners regarding the importance of lesson plans. Often times gym owners express hesitation in requiring structured lesson plans, because they feel it takes away from the coach’s ability to bring their own personality, creativity, and unique coaching skill set to the table.

For years, my brother Tony resisted certain elements of organization and structure, because he didn't want to come off as a drill sergeant or like he wasn't a fun coach to be around.  

Whether it's staging the gym, requiring coaches to dress a certain way, or following a structured lesson plan that is consistent from the first class of the day to the last, these elements of organization actually are a gateway to more personality and creativity, not less.

In today’s episode, I sit down with my brother Tony Frezza to discuss all things lesson plans, including why they’re important, and how to keep them fun and avoid over-structuring.

For many years at FitTown, we didn’t have a solid kids program. It was inconsistent and relied on a single passionate coach to keep the program going.  

If we're being honest, it wasn't a part of our core competency, and we usually offered it because a coach suggested it, or a parent asked for it, and we felt like it was something we "should" provide.  

With the FitTown rebrand we did in the summer of 2020, we realized that the impact we want to have in our local community relies on us being able to help the kids and teens in our area build confidence and find a lifelong love of fitness through our programs.  

Now we have a well established program that’s been incredibly successful, with kids ranging from 5-15 years old. 

In this episode, I sit down with Coach Melissa (who runs our 8-12 year old program) to discuss how we created a successful kids program, and how you can launch a great one at your gym.

Have you ever had a client that makes you cringe a little bit when you see their name show up on your class reservations?

Are there clients that you just can't stand coaching or having in your classes?

Do certain clients make coaching a chore for you?

All coaches have clients that they don't connect with as well, and some coaches have clients that they just flat out don't get along with.

In today's episode, Coach Mo is back on the show to discuss how we approach clients that we don't have a great relationship with.  Some of these clients will require you to spend more time building the relationship with them, others will need to have their issues addressed, and some will need to be "fired".

Today’s episode is very different than what I normally do.

We set up a camera and microphone to record a live sales training session we did with our general manager, Melissa, and our front desk manager, Rachel.  

Rachel is going to be taking on more no-sweat intros at FitTown Jupiter, and we wanted to record and share our training with her.  

This episode starts with a mock no-sweat intro with Rachel pretending to be the new client, and myself running the No Sweat Intro.  You’ll get an idea of what it’s like to be in that intro process, and then you'll hear the analysis of how we felt it went.  I believe the most beneficial part of this episode is the feedback that Melissa provides after.  

If you want to improve at sales, get better at your intro process, or if you’re ready to start training your team to take on more of the sales process, this episode is for you.  

When you think of being relentless as a coach, what's the first thing that comes to mind?

For me, I imagine the coach that is doing squat therapy with his client up against the wall.  The client is struggling to hold the bottom of their squat for 30 seconds, as the coach expertly tweaks every joint to get into a perfect squat position.

And I cringe a little bit when I think about this happening with most clients in our group classes.

Being relentless or persistent as a coach is great, but most coaches either aren't relentless enough, or they are relentlessly trying to squeeze out so much from a client today, that they overwhelm the client and make working out feel like a chore.

In today's episode, I share why I think it's valuable to be relentless as a coach, and how coaches can approach being relentless with their clients in a way that will provide the most long term value for clients. 

Once a client has been a member with us for 3, 5 or 10 years, their goals and the type of coaching they need will have to evolve with them.

The typical path for most gyms has been to try to give them more advanced or individualized programming, but for someone who loves being a part of the group setting, this isn't always the best solution.

In our experience, you can continue to provide a ton of value to your veteran members within the context of your normal classes, but it requires you to approach them differently than you would your beginning and intermediate athletes.

You can't just give them the same "knees out" cue that you've given them a thousand times and expect them to not tune you out or ignore you.

In today's episode, FitTown Head Coach Austin Bettigrew is back on the show to discuss 4 ways that we can add value to veteran members within the daily class experience, and how to avoid the 2 most common patterns that veterans coaches get stuck doing.

I often hear from coaches who will share how they despise just being a cheerleader when they are coaching group classes.  They tend to only enjoy classes if there is a lot of technical aspects to coach, and get bored or burnt out when the workouts tend to be simpler or more cardio-based.

I'll be honest, whenever I feel like I am just being a cheerleader in class, I feel the same way.

I haven't dedicated the last decade of my life to health and fitness just to yell "good job" to a group of 15 athletes who just want to break a sweat.

I want to feel like I am giving value to each client, and I want each client to come away from every class feeling like they got their money's worth.

But I also believe that the cheerleader role is a foundational aspect of all great coaches, and that most coaches are just approaching it wrong.

In today's episode, I share how team sports has shaped my view on being a cheerleader with our clients.  Instead of focusing on yelling random encouragements to members, I try to embody the traits of great teammates that I played with in years of baseball, soccer, and basketball growing up.

A couple weekends ago, I went to a local coffee shop, and was surprised to see how in-your-face and aggressive some of their policies and signage was.

There's nothing wrong with having rules or policies that hold your customers to a standard, but we should never get so focused on preventing issues from happening, that it takes us away from creating an experience that ideal clients will love.

Or said another way, we shouldn't allow the issues of 5-10% of our customers, take away from creating an amazing experience for the 95%.

As coaches, sometimes we let the 1 late member, the "competitive" athlete who shaves reps, or the couple that isn't paying attention when you're talking, distract us from helping the group to the best of our abilities.  We speak and act more towards what we are trying to prevent or fix, rather than what we are trying to create.

In today's episode, I share some quick thoughts about how to approach your classes and your business in a way that will create and retain more ideal clients, instead of trying to fix the ones who aren't.

Many gym owners want to help their coaches make a career out of coaching, but struggle to help them build their book of business.

If the gym is solely responsible for selling clients personal training packages and individualized programming, it will be a constant uphill battle for both the coaches and the gym owners to create careers.

Sales is often the missing link, but most coaches have an aversion to anything that appears like selling.

But if coaches can learn just a few basic communication and sales skills, it can mean the difference between being a part-time coach that needs to find a real job, or a coach that gets to make a lifelong career out of doing what they love.

In this episode, Brittany Welk of LadyStrong Fitness is back on the show to discuss ways to get coaches involved in the sales process.  We talk about how to get coaches involved with signing up new members, how to find clients in the class setting that would be a great fit for 1-on-1 training, and how selling is really just an extension of great coaching.

In January of 2020, when the economy was strong and most people didn't know what COVID was, most micro gyms were already underpriced.  Even if these gyms were to fill their facilities to capacity, the numbers wouldn't work for them to pay their coaches what they deserve, and pay themselves a sustainable living.  This is especially true in barbell-based models like CrossFit, where each person requires more space and equipment to be able to work out safely.

Fast forward over a year later, and an estimated 10% of micro gyms have gone out of business.

Those that are still operational have had to increase their cleaning and staffing costs, and are restricted to operating classes at 10-50% LESS than their normal capacities.

If you want your gym to be open and thriving a year from now, it will likely require you to increase your prices sooner rather than later.  And for many gyms, they have decided that having smaller classes with a more personalized experience, is now a part of their long-term vision.

In this episode, my brother and FitTown co-owner Tony Frezza joins the show to share why we believe now is the perfect time for many gym owners to raise prices, and why we just recently increased our rates at FitTown Jupiter.