[vuduchyld]

This may not be exactly the kind of reply you're looking for, but I certainly had a few thoughts when I read this post. As it so happens, I do small business consulting for a living, so I work with people EVERY DAY who are asking these kinds of questions. This is what I do, so I'll take a quick shot at this one.

The quick-n-dirty answer is that, yes, plenty of personal trainers make more than $60K per year. Some of your earning power will be directly related to your local market. I live in a small-ish town (pop. 100K) and I would be surprised if trainers here are making $60K unless they own the gym they train in. And of course, that is an option! Ask JP about living that dream! But in your area, there may be trainers working for other people who make $60K per year.

I'm going to GUESS that if you go work for somebody else, though, you're going to work for whatever pittance they pay you....and my guess is that if you go to your local gym, they are going to give you some part time work and pay you about $10 to $15 per hour...about what you're making now, but actually you'll work fewer than 40 hours per week, so you'll make less money.

In order to make a decent go of it as a personal trainer, I would suspect that you'll have your best luck if you start your own business. You don't have to start a gym...you can start a personal training business.

In order to make $60K per year, as Steve-O pointed out, all you need is 4 clients per day paying you $65 per session. That's actually a great way to look at it. You need 4 x 5 x $65...times 48 weeks.

Let's start with that $65 per session. Is that reasonable given the market in your area? You're in Chino Hills, CA? I tried a little google search, but I couldn't really find anything that I thought was an appropriate comparison. You'll probably have to make some telephone calls....or, as we say in my biz...."do some market research". What do other trainers charge? What, exactly, do they offer? Do they have certifications that you don't have....and will you NEED those certifications?

Hell, I can guarantee you that plumbers make $60K per year. I'm kinda fat and you can see the crack of my ass if I bend over too much...but just because I LOOK the part, that doesn't mean I can put a magnet on my truck, hand out business cards saying I'm a plumber, and start charging people $65 per hour. And just because you can train yourself, that doesn't mean you'll be qualified to train others. I don't know much about you, so I'm not tryin' ta dish....I'm just sayin....you are obviously great at training YOU...and that will HELP...but it's not the total picture.

Anyway, it seems that marketplaces for personal training services are LARGELY local (not entirely, but largely) and you will need to understand YOUR local market to know if you have the qualifications to charge $65 per session.

Assuming you CAN charge $65, the next question is this...what will you have to do in order to book FOUR sessions per day on average? (Now we're on the 4 x 5.) If I'm a personal trainer, I would love to have 20 clients that will schedule weekly appointments with me. Easier said than done, I'll wager.

How do you get to that point? Well, I'd suspect that there will be some work involved. How are people going to find out about you? You're going to have to develop some type of marketing communications to let people know that you are available to train them...for a fee, or course. You might go with a myspace page, another web page....you might get some business cards and hand them out to everybody you know. You'll probably develop a little "elevator pitch"...something that you say when you meet people so that they know what you do and that you're accepting clients. Hell, write a weekly column for your local newspaper if they'll let you. Get your name out there! There are a million other ways to market your services, so I won't get too into it here.

The other thing I'd say, though, is that you WILL want to make sure you UNDERSTAND your market position. You WILL want to BRAND yourself, somehow. Most small businesses that I work with make the marketing mistake of trying to cast TOO WIDE of a net....they don't want to DISQUALIFY potential customers. But my experience is that you will be better off trying to appeal to a smaller target of people. Maybe for you, the target market will be...I don't know...20-something men who are working in the corporate world and developing that paunch...and you can convince them that you know how to help them get rid of that belly. Or maybe 40-something women who just want a good-looking younger man to say nice things about them when they are in the gym (get some MILF clients!). You might even serve multiple market segments, but you'd better know how to TARGET the segments you want.

I always tell people to fill in the blank: "We're the ones you call when you REALLY want to __________" When you think about it that way, you learn how to DIFFERENTIATE yourself in your local marketplace. What can you deliver that other trainers in your marketplace can NOT?

Anyway, if you can find WEEKLY clients and you can work around each others' schedules, that is probably a trainer's dream. Of course, you actually probably have some cancellations when people are going out of town....some people maybe get injured and miss some time....you also have some people coming and going. And maybe some bi-weekly folks. So maybe you need more like 25-30 regular clients. Can you make that happen? It doesn't SOUND like a lot, but I'd bet it would take time to develop that clientele. Of course, you'll also have some client turnover and churn (related to the "48 weeks" part of the equation now), so ultimately you will have to be really good at prospecting for potential customers, marketing to them, and converting the interest into SALES (contracts or at least agreements for training services). Don't underestimate the importance of having the ability to close that deal. It's an underrated part of this type of business. All the interest in the world won't generate a PENNY of revenues for you if you can't convert that interest into sales.

Ah, silly me. I've only looked at the Revenues. CAN you generate $60K in revenues??? If so, what about EXPENSES? If you don't own the gym, are you going to have to pay some gym owner a fee to be able to use their gym? (Obviously, if you want to make $60K and gym owners charge you 25% of what you make, you'll have to book $80K in training revenues.) Will you just go to peoples' homes and train there (NOT LIKELY to generate $60K in revenues that way)? Will you need a business phone? Liability insurance? Professional services? Don't forget....some of the benefits that you get working for somebody else can be DAMNED expensive if you go buy them yourself....retirement package, health insurance, disability, etc...Hell, you'd better make sure you think you can clock $90K to $100K in revenues per year if you want to have a $60K lifestyle...maybe MORE.

OF course, if you do it well, you can develop some other revenue streams. MAybe you can write articles for magazines or you can write a book of your experiences. Maybe you can do some consulting or guest speaking. Maybe you can hire some other trainers, book them for $45 per hour and pay them $20...so you make some money every time THEY train a client "using your system". Maybe you have a website with some special content that you've developed that you charge people for. I don't really know a damn thing about the personal training business, but I DO know that you will have more luck by copying successful people in the business (think Berardi, Cressey, or JP) than you are likely to have reinventing the wheel. Think about the things that successful people do. Think about how YOU can ADD VALUE.

Jeez....this is LONG. As you might expect, since this IS what I do for a living, I could ramble on and on for hours. I'll spare you for now! I'm sure there are successful people IN THE BIZ who can help you more, anyway. That's the only PROBLEM with what I do...since I don't specialize in any type of business, usually the people I work with know THEIR OWN BUSINESS better than I do. I just ask questions and they take me along for the ride! As a business major, you probably understand a lot about how all this works, anyway, but I've found that MOST universities do a CRAPPY job of teaching people about SMALL business.

The one other thing I'd point out is that I think you're on the right track. Do what you like, get good at it, be successful, and develop YOUR OWN relationship with the marketplace. If you screw around in the corporate world, you'll make more money faster. But by the time you are 40 and making six figures or more, you'll just get laid off and get to start over!