What My Ideal Business Would Be

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I often talk about the concept of the Ideal Business and even have pulled back the curtain on what my Ideal Business is.

But I wanted to give you a different perspective…

 

More of what my Ideal Business would look like if I trained adults.

 

A business that would allow me to have the impact, income and lifestyle I want.

So I’m going to go through and give you an overview…hopefully you enjoy.

 

My Values / Strengths / Ideals   

So starting with this…

 

The driving force for my decisions would be my personal values, my strengths and what I term my Ideals…call them what you want…core values or whatever.

 

Mine are…

• Family
• Relationships
• Freedom
• Connecting
• Coaching
• Creation
• Marketing
• Selling

So with that in mind I’d build my business and my role around those things.

 

My Model

I’d focus on more of a Team Training / Semi-Private Training Model that was more of a Train Like An Athlete approach and I’d go a bit higher end. I’d have a minimum pricing of $199 for the Team Training (8-15 People)…and I’d be Above $299 for Semi-Private.

I’d run the Team stuff during peak hours and semi-private during a few off peak hours.

 

We’d use athletic terminology, do some performance measurement stuff and track people’s progress religiously so they could measure success in a variety of ways.

 

We’d set a monthly or Challenge goal for each client so they always have something they’re working toward and we’re always paying attention to what they want instead of simply asking them to just do what we do mindlessly.

 

My Positioning

I’d focus on attracting people with a household income over $100,000 who lived within 5 miles of my location who wanted to live a high performance lifestyle. Not only do they want to look and feel more like what they perceive an athlete looks and feels like…but they are successful in other aspects of their life and want to optimize their performance.

 

 

My business wouldn’t be for the first time exerciser….

 

It would be for the person who wants better coaching, wants to be part of a high performing culture and is attracted to the training like an athlete style brand.

Aside from that I’d use my experience as a College Strength Coach and work with college and professional athletes as a differentiator and my time teaching at a University to appeal to the more discerning prospects…all to add to the ‘higher end’ positioning.

 

Marketing Overview

 

I’d start by applying the Interval approach that I developed where you essentially alternate sprints (high effort) with a more evergreen approach (lower effort).

 

I’d use the high effort periods to run my Transformation Challenge type of promotions and really work to drive people into those – essentially pulling out all stops since they combine a deadline to register, and a pretty specific in a defined time frame…that’s about as good of an offer that you can have.

For those, I’d start about 4 weeks out and really do everything I could…at minimum:

• FB Ads
• Internal Signage
• Mentions in sessions and an incentive to refer
• A strong email promotion to my newsletter list
• Press Release
• Promotions on my Private FB Group

 

Then I’d mix in my evergreen stuff, which would essentially be a combination of list building and relationship marketing.

 

For the list building efforts I’d develop two Lead Magnets, one encompassing a broad interest (like a healthy recipe guide) and one that would be more specific to my business (like a video series about the 5 Secrets to Achieving Your Own Transformation).

Then I’d drive traffic to those with FB Ads, find a few Strategic Alliance Partners to send out the recipe guide to their list and also get my current clients and newsletter subscribers to share them with their friends.

 

I’d set up a follow up campaign (emails and calls) to get opt ins to come in for a Success Session.

 

For relationship marketing I’d have:

• A point of sale referral promotion in place, something simple like give me the names and emails of 3 friends and we’ll invite them into a program as the new client’s guest and give them the recipe guide as a gift.

• I’d alternate a Bring-A-Friend Month with a Charity Workout – each promoted to get clients to bring guests. I’d invite my newsletter list to the Charity Workout.

• Once a year I’d run a referral contest.

• Twice a year I’d run a reactivation campaign.

• I’d set up a Private FB Group and use it the way that we might have used a Fan page a couple of years ago before FB stopped showing posts to most of the people on the page.

• I’d spend time each week networking and working on relationships with local business owners.

• I’d send a weekly email newsletter.

It seems like a lot, but let me lay it out in a calendar (or as much of one as I can put in an email):

 

January

Transformation Challenge – pull out all the stops.

Reactivation Campaign (Promote Contest).

Bring-a-Friend the week before the Contest launches.

 

February

Charity Workout

 

March

Transformation Contest – pull out all the stops.

Bring-a-Friend the week before the Contest launches.

 

April

Charity Workout

 

May

Bring-A-Friend

 

June

Charity Workout

 

July

Bring-A-Friend

 

August

Charity Workout

 

September

Referral Contest (lead to TC)

Reactivation Campaign (lead to TC)

Transformation Challenge

 

October

Bring-A-Friend

November

Short Challenge leading up to Holidays

Charity Workout

 

December

Charity Workout

 

During each month I’d be doing the following:

Sending a weekly newsletter

Posting 1-3X per day in my private FB group

Running ads to my lead magnets and/or directly to free Success Sessions

Networking

POS Referral Request for all new clients

This should take 5-6 hours per week if you’re doing it well.

 

I’d set a goal of getting at least 150 new opt ins per month to start but scale it up from there as my skill and budget grew – and I’d make sure my follow up was dialed in enough that I’d get an average of 25 prospective clients to walk in the door each month.

 

My Role & Team

I’d be comfortable training up to 10 hours a week, handling the sales and marketing and leading a small team of 2-4 additional coaches and an administrative assistant. I’d be paying myself as a Coach and Manager as well as an owner to meet my financial goals and focus on leading my other coaches to be extraordinary at maintaining and enhancing the culture internally and executing some of the internal market…but no external marketing and only selling if I’m on vacation.

 

This size staff and my role would allow me the freedom to still get out and spend time with my family, take vacations, etc.

 

My Ancillary Revenue

I’d package up some of what works and either offer it online to other consumers that match my local audience or to other fitness pros who could benefit from it.

 

I’d do this instead of adding a 2^nd location to create more leverage for me and to maintain my freedom while adding to my income.

 

I wouldn’t expect this to be my primary business…but I would expect to be able to add at least 50% or more to my personal income once through this channel once I had my gym to a solid, stable level.

 

My Gym Goals

I’d expect to be able to get to 200 clients…so if the average revenue per person is $225 then we’re talking $450,000 per year.

 

Could it be bigger…sure, but not at the expense of happiness or freedom. 

 

At this level, I would expect to run at 30% margins (after paying myself a comparable salary for my day-to-day role)…yielding a nice pre-tax profit.

This wouldn’t be instantaneous by any means…but that’s my ideal. I would set that out as my target and work toward it daily. When everything got up to the target I’d be able to make 150K between the gym salary, owner profit and online offerings…which would offer a nice balance of income and security.

 

Wrapping Up

That’s the Ideal Business…at least if I was running a local adult fitness business.

 

That vision would give me something to work toward making a reality and the reality would allow me to have the impact, income and lifestyle I want.

 

So that’s mine…and in truth it’s just an example to get your wheels turning to create yours.

Hopefully it did just that.

Start giving your Ideal Business some thought…

 

By Pat Rigsby