This article is written for those personal trainers who want to stand out in the market place, who want to get ahead, rise above the masses, and reap the rewards from doing so.  It’s not an easy task. At least, not if you apply the solutions that most go to in attempts to create their Unique Marketing Position (UMP). It get’s a lot easier if you understand one key thing!

In the US alone, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics,[1] there are over 300,000 personal trainers and gym instructors. And that’s not including the other disciplines within physical preparation e.g. strength and conditioning coaches.

After all, the role of a personal trainer (PT) is the current go-to for anyone not sure of what to do with their life, or waiting for that big acting breakthrough!

So how do you stand out in this incredibly crowded market? And do many succeed?

 

If we were to equate higher income with successfully standing out, you would have to say that few achieve this. Again according to the US BLS[2] only the highest 10 percent earned more than $72,980. That’s not much money, and not many people earning it.

So what are Personal Trainers doing that for the most part is contributing to their failure to stand out in the market, contributing to their inability to rise above their competition.

To sum it up simply – they are failing because their solution is to copy what the majority are doing!!

 

There is a saying in the Australian military about ‘monkey see, monkey do’. In other words, the average ‘grunt’ (infantry soldier) is conditioned to mimic whatever they see their instructors or leaders do.  Safe solution in war preparation, but how does it work out in a competitive capitalistic environment – when every a soldier, every step you take isn’t necessarily the last one you might take on two legs!

In other words whilst we owe so much to the military for it’s contribution to the physical preparation industry (ever wonder why the shoulder press is called a military press?) we are not bound to operate on their solutions. We can and SHOULD look to be different – especially if we want a different outcome!!!

 

Look at it this way. If you do it the way everyone else is doing it – all things being equal, how are you going to be better than everyone else?  Realistically changes do occur (albeit slowly) in sport training – because someone dared to do it differently.  These people gain the advantage, are at the cutting edge.  The sheep follow.  Which do you want to be? [3]

 

So what exactly are the majority doing?

 

Monkey-see Monkey-do Step #1 – Abandon Individualized Program Design

What happens on day one for most personal training clients? They get a workout done.  How does that happen so fast? I mean at the longest most clients are into a workout within an hour.  At most a canned assessment, a generic program (or the more common go to – just make up the exercises as you go!)

I know, some of you want to debate this with me. You claim you and ALL the trainers in your facility go through an extensive program design session with each client! Let me ask it this way and see how respond – how much are and your colleagues being paid for your program design services? Now an honest response for the majority would be nothing, zero, nada. Say no more….

If you were highly competent and experienced (and that’s an if…) it should take you between one to three hours of interview, assessment and program design – all paid for by the client – BEFORE they got near a workout!

 

Monkey-see Monkey-do Step #2 – The 60 minute workout

Now I know there is a program on TV called ’60 minutes’, but why do the majority of personal training client workouts globally take 60 minutes? Is it possible that 99.9% of the clients have the same needs? Ah, I don’t think so!

So why are you using 60 minute workouts? I can only conclude that you are doing this because that is what everyone else is doing (and that is where the monkey see-monkey do cuts in!

And the other reason is because it is convenient for you to plan your billable hours. However it is in the best interests of the client? And how is it possible that all of them have such similar needs that they all end up doing a 60 minute workout?

In the KSI way, we take whatever time is needed for each individual on any given day!

 

Monkey-see Monkey-do Step #3 – The 7 Step Workout! 

Now in addition to every client coincidentally finding  a 60 minute workout ‘optimal’, how amazing it that the majority of the clients have such similar needs that they all end up on the latest dominant trend pumped out in the latest round of fitness industry seminars!

Lately it’s been the 7-step workout! Isn’t it amazing that everyone has the same needs? Now imagine if you as a trainer were to discover that everyone is different, and you were to break out (some would suggest break down!) and provide unique workout components to different clients!

In the KSI Coaching Program we teach you how to do this – train individuals as, well, individuals!

 

Monkey-see Monkey-do Step #4 – Multi-planar, multi-joint, closed kinetic chain exercises

Simplistic thinking where concepts such as ‘all your exercises need to be multi-planar and compound (multi-joint) and closed kinetic chain (feet on the ground) and killing the results for your clients! This subject is worth an article on itself – or maybe more than one!

Leave this simplistic brain dead thinking to the masses. You can and should think for yourself. It’s pretty scary to think that after we released this spoof we actually had viewers contacting us who took the skit seriously!

Now we recognize it may not be easy. After all, the commercial interests that pull the strings in this industry (e.g. equipment manufacturers and distributors) have some strong conforming measures in place!

The KSI Coaching Program aims to teach you to think for yourself!

 

Monkey-see Monkey-do Step #5 – Ban the good stuff!

 Its hard to fathom how anyone who exercised their ability to assess the cause-effect relationship of a certain type of training such as stretching would reach the current dominant paradigm that is so negative about this training method.

It’s no wonder injuries are skyrocketing!

 

But that is what EVERYONE else is doing!  Which makes it so simple for you to get superior results with your clients. Now thankfully they suffer less from conformity than you and the physical preparation community does!

This same ‘brain-dead’ conformity leads trainers to give band exercises out – which provide a form of resistance that outside of someone on a Himalayan trek really shouldn’t be doing!!!

That’s right – ban the good stuff, give them the crappy stuff! That’s how you stay ordinary and maintain the statistical average!

Our goal is to help you use your God given grey matter resulting in greater outcomes for your clients!

It’s so simple, so easy, to rise above your 300,000 colleagues!

 

Your Unique Marketing Position (UMP) or Unique Sales Position (USP)

Many in sales and marketing talk about your UMP or USP, basically what is it about you that stands you out in the market places, allows you to out-perform your competition.

It’s pretty tough to have a UMP (or USP) when you service your clients just like everyone else does!

 

Give you a hint – if what I teach is what the majority do, I would be very concerned. I want to do what few do, to get a competitive advantage. [4]

 

And no, getting your hair dyed, getting more ink, or getting more body piercings is not my idea of a successful UMP!

In the higher levels of the KSI Coaching Program we focus extensively on helping you develop your USP, and tracking the success of this over a multi-year period through markers such as hourly rate, client numbers etc.

One of the key personal development lessons we provide is the willingness to be different, to withstand the peer pressures to conform!

 

Resist the temptation in program design to conform to mainstream paradigms simply for the sake of conforming, no matter how dogmatically they are presented, or how much you may be ridiculed or ostracized for trusting your intuition over conformity. Make our own minds up based on a combination of respect for your intuition, the athlete/client’s intuition, the results, and in respect of the body of knowledge available. [5]

 

Conclusion

I would have liked to have called this article ‘If you want to stop getting paid peanuts, stop acting like a monkey’, but I wasn’t sure if the message would be lost by expressions ‘that’s offensive!’ in this politically correct world!

So if you want to rise above the other 300,000 plus of your colleagues (or whatever the number in your country) then you need to understand this simple concept – the majority receive what the majority receive because they are training their clients just like the majority.

Which is like what exactly? Brain dead. No thinking. Just blind imitation and a burning desire to be like everyone else.

And the importance of this theory? Quite simply, that if you do so little as be different – think for yourself, treat your clients like individuals, make up your own mind about what to do and what is best – you will succeed in rising above the masses, in standing out from your competition!

 

 

[1] https://www.bls.gov/ooh/personal-care-and-service/fitness-trainers-and-instructors.htm

[2] https://www.bls.gov/ooh/personal-care-and-service/fitness-trainers-and-instructors.htm#tab-5

[3] King, I., 1997, Winning and Losing, p. 30

[4] King, I., 2003, Ask the Master, (book) p. 32

[5] King, I.., 2005, The way of the physical preparation coach (book), p. 17