What people are usually looking for are tactics.
They think that if they can just learn about a new tactic, that it will finally solve the problem they’ve been struggling with.
I see it a lot in the fitness industry.
Clients want to lose weight so they start a new diet (a tactic). Or they think workouts (a different tactic) are the thing that will help them lose weight so they sign up for your classes. Or they go to their doctor and they give them a prescription for diet pills (yet another tactic).
Any of these tactics can work. For a period of time.
But ultimately they are going to reach a point of frustration when the weight stops shifting because it was the wrong tactic. At which point they’ll go looking for the next tactic that will help them. And the next and so on until they give up.
Unless, they work out a proper a strategy.
A strategy is thinking about things long-term. It’s answering the question ‘Where do I want to be in 10 years?’. A strategy involves unpacking why we’re struggling, why what we’ve done so far isn’t working and understanding what it is we really want to achieve long-term.
Sticking with the example of your client who wants to lose weight, instead of blindly trying the next tactic that’s shown on TV or shared around on social media, they’d get way better results asking themselves the following questions:
- Why do I want to lose weight?
- What have a tried so far and why didn’t it work? What have been the limitations?
- Where do I want my weight to be in 10 years time?
From that they can work out a strategy that will then tell them what kind of tactics to use.
Rather than just trying things at random, it will help them see how the small daily actions (ie. tactics) they take like doing a workout or walking to work will help them achieve what they want long term and help them sustain it.
Without this they will just keep choosing tactics that don’t work for them.
If you’ve been working in the fitness industry for a while you probably know all of this. You might be wondering, ‘Why are you telling me this, Kyle?’
Because one of the biggest struggles trainers email me about is ‘how can they get more clients’ and I’m here to tell you, it’s the exact same thing as your client who is trying to lose weight.
What you’re looking for is for me to share with you some secret tactic that’s going to magically add 20 clients to your sessions.
But without knowing what you’re trying to achieve and your circumstances (ie. your strategy) any tactic I recommend may be completely wrong for you and your business.
What you need to do is take a step back and work out your marketing strategy.
Ask yourself questions like:
- What is your long term goal for your business?
- Who are you trying to help and why do they need help?
- How can I use my strengths to best serve this group of people?
Doing that will make the tactics you need to use obvious. Start with strategy and go from there.
Hat tip to Seth Godin for the idea for this post.
Kyle Wood created Bootcamp Ideas in 2010 when he was hunting around on the internet for workout ideas. He ran a successful bootcamp in Victoria, Australia and spends his spare time managing this site, adventuring (or lazying) with his wife and find new ways to make bootcamps even better.
Leave a Reply