TLDR: Focus on two things; Finding new clients and keeping them happy. Make an honest effort every day to find new potential clients, don’t wait for them to find you. Stop letting the small day to day stuff bog you down from the key things you need to do.
In speaking to and working with gym owners on a daily basis - both as CEO of PushPress and as an admin on the Facebook Affiliate Owners Forum - it’s become clear to me many of you are missing one thing.
One simple thing that could mean the difference between a smooth sailing, profitable gym and one that’s floundering at break-even.
Focus.
You have two things (and two things only) stopping you from having more revenue than you can stuff your mattress with:
- Finding new clients.
- Keeping them happy.
THAT. IS. IT.
If you get caught up in all the other “noise”, you aren’t focusing on the only two things that affect your bottom line.
What’s Noise? What’s Not?
Well that really depends on your business and your priorities. In order to really determine this, you need to take a moment to self-reflect and decide what your two or three core business values are. Don’t pick more than two or three and make them very granular and relevant.
Here’s an example of some valid core business values:
- Community development.
- Improving the general well being of my locality.
- Helping educate people on health/wellness.
- Developing Competitive/Regionals/Games Athletes
Here’s a list of some things that might be considered a distraction if it’s not at your core set of values:
- Programming.
- Janitorial work.
- Tracking payments and keeping track of members.
- Trying to develop too many “programs” at the gym.
- Your own personal fitness goals/accomplishments.
- Throwing events / parties / etc.
- Coaching.
If you find yourself spending more time doing some of the things on the list above then you spend on finding new clients and keeping existing clients happy, then you’re likely at the helm of a ship that’s merely afloat.
Set Your Intention
Once you decide you want to focus on the two simple things and act upon that focus, you will find yourself working your way towards a much better future.
Most gym owners are pretty miserable at both of these. They sit back, hoping new leads come to them, and once they do the sales process is undefined and sloppy. This makes sense, because most small gyms care more about what happens on the gym floor than they do what happens in the sales office.
Get Help!
There’s only 24 hours in a day for everyone.
If you find yourself doing things that distract you from focusing on finding more clients, helping more people, and making more revenue - get help! There’s many ways you can go about getting others to help you with these things:
- Find friends or gym members who are good at the things you need help with. The second part is key, as you don’t want someone who’s scatterbrained to be your events coordinator.
- Find companies that specialize in these things. Companies like Thrivestry exist to save you the 20 hours or so a month you spend programming (and they likely do a better job with the overall programming - cause it’s ALL they focus on doing). PushPress has been born in the concept of saving our clients time. There’s many companies that can help and likely worth the cost of their service 10 times over.
- Split up tasks amongst owners and coaches. I like the idea of everyone taking one aspect of the primary business focuses as their personal project. Then meet frequently and report back.
PushPress is a gym billing and management system built from the ground up to save our gym owners and their coaches time. If you feel your system isn’t as easy as you would like it, we would love to show you how we can save you time, energy and money. PushPress is owned and operated by gym owners (who actually owned gyms before launching their software)
