If the distraction of a good idea is a problem you need to solve, this will resonate with you. Answer a few questions… 

Do your creative juices flow when you get a good idea? So much that if you talked about it at lunch or heard it on a podcast, you want to go right home and start figuring out how to implement it? 

And possibly, abandon the other 18 lose ends, open loops, projects that need completing and course content that needs to be reviewed and redone? 

Then it’s official, there’s a good chance you’re a serial entrepreneur. Even if this is your first business, or you are only thinking about being a health or fitness professional, this is so important. You also may collect certifications instead of getting one and realizing it’s the business of marketing and selling the service and skills you now have that is all you need. 

Do you love new ideas? Love to create new programs and think about how to deliver them? Do you like to think about the title and the way you’ll create the sales page and how it will look? Do you love to play in Canva? 

Are you constantly creating lists and documents and maybe also losing them? Knowing you had a great idea and wondering where you put it? Do you have tons of journals, notebooks, legal pads with notes and things you just have to remember? 

Confessions, I had an estimated 200 yellow legal pads with notes and ideas and things that were so important that of course I’d come back to.. that I had to sort out before I moved in 2022. After a short time, I’d pull out another drawer of my full size filing cabinet and just start dumping. Twenty-five-year-old manuscripts for children’s books I’d submitted to publishers … notes from mastermind meetings that cost me over 20,000 annually that I felt I couldn’t part with… and potential titles for programs and new series and pitch decks for media… All gone in black garbage bags. I hadn’t looked at them … many of them in a decade, others, you know you get home and you finish that Pilates Reformer cert … and 15 years later still have your notes.. you’re never going back to them.
But every one of them is a good idea … and the distraction of a good idea could kill the full day ahead of you that you have to get Sh#* done!

If you’re an entrepreneur, there’s a good chance you’re a creator. You’re potentially a “quickstart” too. Short attention span for the follow through but a passion for starting and creating. 

And this is not bad. It’s great… to realize it and start using your talent to your advantage in a way that still creates boundaries so you can avoid the distraction of a good idea… another one.

• Dump them into a G-Drive
• Revisit them regularly but infrequently
• Never just kill them or let them die on a post a note or desktop note where you’ll never find them (that mental clutter will drive you nuts)
• Share them with your team members, if one keeps popping up… but do it also to inspire their ideas (many minds!)
• Pull out the ones that are worth discussing in a team meeting and decide what the rewards would be, what the cost would be and what the time investment would be
• Usually ideas are new products, new ways of promoting your business or being seen but a new book … or a podcast… or a new certification …. Usually mean a new long-term commitment to promoting, selling, in order to make it payoff so list all of those things too.

Answer These Three Questions to Evaluate a Good Idea: 
How much will it be worth to you? 
How much will it cost you if you don’t do it? 
How much time and expense will it take to make you money (what it’s worth to you)? 
The dates on all of these are so important. If for instance there is going to be 6 months and thousands of dollars in building it before it’s ever used and there’s no real monetary reason for doing it, you might quickly realize this is not the best idea after all.

Other Episodes You Might Like:

Boost Productivity and Creativity for Your Clients: https://www.fitnessmarketingmastery.com/boost-productivity-and-creativity/

5 Things: Do This Every Monday for Better WorkFlow: https://www.fitnessmarketingmastery.com/do-this-every-monday/

Resources:

Health & Fitness Business Scorecard: https://www.fitnessmarketingmastery.com/scorecard

Marketing to Women Copywriting Course: https://www.fitnessmarketingmastery.com/copywriting-course

You promote health. You promote fitness. And ultimately you do now or will want to promote your own products or services. 

But if you feel salesy, or spammy, it’s going to show in your communications. Consider what’s in it for them. Tell them. Tell them why you trust it and you have proof they trust you if they’re on your email subscribers list! So they DO want to hear your recommendations!

This follow-up to an affiliate promotions podcast gives you some very specific tips that work for me. And affiliate revenue is an amazing way to promote and earn even when you aren’t launching! 

Successful affiliate promotions (where you share something you know, love, and trust will be a benefit your community will love) require just three things.

1. Commit to promoting your affiliate repeatedly on each platform you choose.

Two minimum and three is even better, emails are MUCH MORE EFFECTIVE than 1 email, and 1 social media post. 

People are BUSY. They don't see your posts the way you might imagine in your head! They may skip days of hopping into social media. (Lucky them!?) So.. you want to tap someone on the shoulder several times to get their attention. Use a new image or new Subject Line in your emails each time. 

In the body of your email, the first time you send you can get really detailed about why this is relevant :

My friend and colleague, Debra Atkinson created this event to answer questions you have AND those you may not yet know to ask. She gathered 40 experts... not "influencers" flashing bare bellies, but the in-the-lab experts, the go-to speakers for industry events and education. And you can access it for free! 

In the body of your second email - a couple of days later you can refer to the first email:

A few days ago I shared this with you and I know that exercise is an important reason you're here and plays a big part of your success. 

In the 3rd email (maybe the 2nd), I put it at the TOP of the email above the actual greeting and make it short:

Real quick: I don't want you to miss this and know you're busy. I mentioned this FREE event for Women's Exercise Over 40, It's starting NOW... so CLICK HERE to get in. I'll be sharing some of the highlights I'm loving from it with you too! See you there!

2. Come back to the email about the affiliate product you send and later in the day. 

Resend it to unopens. This one is ridiculously easy ... and often OVERLOOKED. So if you're disappointed in the performance of your emails, no matter what you wanted (open rate, click-through, sales) ... you may make FAST improvements by being sure that your busy audience SEES the email. Remember they aren't sitting on their device waiting and hoping for an email from you! So resending brings it up from the buried inbox emails we all get. 

3. Treat Social Media with respect when you Share affiliate promotions!

 Share and share again. 

Know your social media channels! On IG... share in stories and use the LINK so all someone has to do is CLICK. Be prepared with a link when someone DMs you and says, Where do I find that? AND use the link in your bio to go to multiple with a link tree or your custom page on the website where they get right to it. DO NOT put an ugly URL in your post copy. 

Get smart with Facebook too. Stories are hot, news, and clickable. Use them that way! Posts are good.. but buried if you don't nurture them by liking and commenting and sharing with your personal pages. Add to groups or link groups to the post. 

You can easily promote health and fitness and earn revenue without feeling salesy or spammy. If it’s something you believe in, tell them about it with conviction! If it’s not, reconsider sharing it. I’ve had plenty of products or people I once shared and no longer do for one reason or another it just stopped feeling right. 

Other Episodes You May Like:

Promote Affiliate Partners: https://www.fitnessmarketingmastery.com/promote-affiliate-partners 

 Social Media Advice for Fitness & Health Pros #303:

https://www.fitnessmarketingmastery.com/social-media-advice/

Resources: 

Business Scorecard:

 https://www.fitnessmarketingmastery.com/Scorecard 

Marketing to Women Copywriting Course:

https://www.fitnessmarketingmastery.com//Copywriting-course

Menopause Fitness Specialist:

 https://www.flippingfifty.com/specialist 

Is there something you want and can’t afford? Let’s flip the script and talk about ways to generate revenue to make it happen. The question should never be, can you afford it. It should be, how can I make that happen? 

Sometimes you spend money. Sometimes you invest it.

Right now, I’m looking at hiring a new customer service team member, and onboarding an EA after a 90 day trial onboarding period, and my Daily Operations manager is ready to go full time for me and be my Director of Operations. Can I afford this?  Is not the question. Can I afford not to do this, is also really not the question (though it’s better).

The question is how can I make this happen? 

If a course or training is going to make you more money by making you more marketable it’s an investment. I want you to think twice about a certification, especially if it’s another certification. When was the last time you ever had someone ask, are you a certified trainer? And upon your response either hire you or not? I’ll tell you when… never. 

Trainers are a dime a dozen. Health coaches? Are becoming the same. Does it teach you how to support fixing the hormone balances a woman reveals from her signs & symptoms with exercise? Or does it teach you how to coach her to be accountable to changes? 

OR… is what you need something that will teach you how to use the right words, avoid the wrong ones to GET clients in the first place??

I can help with all three. But only if … you know where your biggest challenge is. The degree to which I can get you clarity (and revenue) is in direct relationship with how clear you are on your biggest problem. 

Are You a Health Coach, Trainer, or Consultant? 3 Questions That Tell You

Are you a health coach? Or not? Are you overcharging, undercharging or just right based on the services you provide? 

Do your customers WANT a coach, trainer, or consultant? 

A coach asks questions and helps develop the client’s ability to make decisions. 

A consultant TELLS a client what to do. 

A Trainer, for a minute leave the world of “personal trainer” and think just trainer. A trainer teaches the client to do this for themselves.

You may be doing all three. 

Coach, Consultant, or Trainer?

I would BET; however, you are NOT 100% a coach even if you’re selling your products and services using the title coach. 

What people usually want when they hire a personal trainer is a CONSULTANT (or as I’ll share in next, a trainer – in a different sense of the word).

They say:

Tell me exactly what to do when we’re at our sessions. 

Tell me exactly what to do between sessions.

Based on your experience, is that right? They want to know how to close the gap between where they are and what they want. 

If you are truly a “trainer,” some larger fitness corporations will frown on you doing a really good job. Why? Because your client is no longer dependent on you because you’ve taught them how to do it… how to make decisions about exercise and how to do the exercise correctly and plan it so they can do it on their own.

Let’s face it, when customers buy that 3-session package or meet with you once for free, that’s what they want. They want to know a routine and how to do it so they can use the gym membership or the home equipment they have. They often want a Trainer. 

What a coach does is gives up the “expert” advising. Wearing your coach hat, you would ask a client what she’s willing to commit to doing. When they ask, are you a coach, if you’re doing this you can say yes. 

But you might need more. 

Is Coaching Enough?

They might need you to be a consultant. A consultant to tell them exactly what to do. For instance, I can ask fitness business coaching clients, “What are you willing to commit to between now and next time?”

But if they don’t know how to create that powerful one-liner, and their brand mission statement, or a craft a series of emails that uses the right words based on what motivates their dream customers to buy, that’s keeping them stuck. I would be leaving them guessing. 

The trick here is this: you need to know when you’re being a coach, a consultant, and a trainer. 

And you need to charge accordingly. 

Accountability coaching is the lowest of the rankings as far as coaching goes. 

Training is next – you’re going to empower them to do it themselves. You’re a trade school. 

Consulting is the highest paid and can include coaching to support it. You tell them exactly what to do because you have a proven track record and system for getting results. But they still have to do it. 

This is an example of how you create a program. Here’s what you do on Monday, Tuesday… etc. 

Then you offer the accountability coaching to help them understand why, now that they have the GPS they aren’t using it, they’re resisting it, or don’t believe it will work for them. 

So, back to you. Are you a coach? 

Do you need one? Or do you need a consultant plus coach? 

If you’d like to identify the right words to put in front of your dream female customers, I have a special Marketing to Women copywriting course. Click here for a special rate today. 

If you want the Fast Flip Business coaching to help you eradicate any limiting beliefs you’ve got or nail your personal traits so no one can compete with you… I’ll put a link in the show notes. 

It’s really the best way to help someone… Both you helping your dream clients, and getting help yourself. 

Resources: 

Marketing to Women Copywriting Course: https://www.flippingfifty.com/copywriting-course

Health & Fitness Business Scorecard: https://www.fitnessmarketingmastery.com/scorecard

Interested in Fast Flip Business coaching? Once you check out with any current Fitness Marketing Mastery or Flipping50 program, send a message to support@flippingfifty.com and we’ll respond by personal invitation if Debra currently has a coaching opening. 

Other Episodes You Might Like: 

18 Revenue Generating Strategies | Health & Fitness Professionals: https://www.fitnessmarketingmastery.com/revenue-generating/

5 Ways to Promote Affiliate Products for Passive Revenue: https://www.fitnessmarketingmastery.com/promote-affiliate-products/

Still More Ways to Boost Personal Training Leads, Sales, and Revenue: https://www.fitnessmarketingmastery.com/still-ways-boost-personal-training-leads-sales-revenue/

Five marketing strategies that make or break your customer reach. You may be talking but if they're not listening it's wasting time, energy, and money. Here's out to connect with your customer better. Speak better, answer their questions, give them what they want not what you know they need, and consistently do research.

www.voiceforfitness.com/fitproblog

You can easily get overwhelmed by too much information. Choose one or two things and go for it like your life depends on it. The life of your business does. There is no changing the fact that social media is going to be front and center in the marketing campaigns of successful businesses in the future. Get started now with both the online and face-to-face promotions that cost nothing but time and energy. If you're not full yet, you have a bit of that. 

Connect:

debra@voiceforfitness.com

For the entire 50 (+1 bonus) Ways to Boost Fitness Leads, Sales and Revenue check out the Fit Pro Blog.

Fitness professionals miss the most obvious and the most motivating. When you want to brand think out of the box. Real people do extraordinary things every day and dream about it every night. They are looking for your help. 

Subscribe to the YouTube channel for new videos

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For more fitness professionals marketing and selling without selling tips:

https://www.voiceforfitness.com/fitprosolutions 

Free live weekly fitness marketing class:

https://voiceforfitness.leadpages.net/fitnessmarketingliveclass/

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If ever there was a time to use video marketing it's now. Now as in 2014 and now as in November. It's pre-season foundation building that will get you a head start on soliciting New Year's Resolution makers and haters alike who still come in droves looking for fitness after the first of the year. Yes, your business will be bigger anyway..but will it be as big with more competition for your customer than ever before? Should you wait? Never. But merely doing video and doing it right will make or break the time and energy you put into it.

https://www.voiceforfitness.com/fitprosolutions

Every year about this time everyone else sets New Year's Resolutions. The busy-ness sets in and you are left in the dust. Creating a year that reaches goals professionally is just as much about creating goals that get you the actionable steps and the tracking measures to get there.

If you create a system that you commit to on a daily basis, with goals and tasks you intend to complete before the day is done, you're 100% in charge of your day, week, month and year accomplishments. If you get the calls made, the sessions booked, you go home. If not you stay until you do what you said you were going to do. 

Look back, look at how and look ahead. It's never too late to learn from it, appreciate it or plan for it.