It’s that time of year when you put up your prices. Happy days!
However speaking to many personal trainers via our, webinars, blog and podcast’s and colleagues who are also personal trainers, they are afraid to put their prices up.
Afraid because they think they will lose customers.
I asked one trainer the other day when was the last time they put up their prices and they said never, no surprise he was struggling for money only charging £20-£25 per hour! It hurts to say he also did discounts…..nuff said ;-(
I asked them “does that mean you have never improved or none of your costs have increased?”.
The look on his face said “of course they have and so have I, I’m a good trainer”, he went on to say he had been on loads of courses, gets good results and works hard for his clients.
If you are having some second thoughts about putting your prices up here are three reasons why you 100% SHOULD:
- It’s April. It’s a good time to do it. That’s when the price of things goes up for everyone! People are already expecting it so it’s not a huge surprise when you say it. Also if you do this every year or two your clients get used to it.
- You are worth it! You have hopefully improved yourself and invested in your business for the last 12 months. You have been on courses and learnt lots of helpful stuff to improve your client’s progress towards their goals. You have read books to improve your self and as a result have written articles and recipe planners to give to your clients. This means you now offer more, charge for it. ”You dont get paid for the hour, you get paid for the value you bring to the hour” .(forget who said that one but its so true).
- Your costs are going up all the time. The price of fuel, food, rent and rates, insurances and everything else is going up FAST! Your margins are being squeezed constantly and you should not be the one who pays for all these price rises. Did you ever hear a big company or business moaning and saying “we will have to pass these costs onto our customers”, well that’s what you have got to do.
I’m afraid my customers will leave me…
If someone says that they don’t want to stay with you if you are putting your prices up, say sorry that they feel like that and thank them for their custom.
If you put your price up by £5-10 per hr or the equivalent and people decide to leave, either you’re a crap trainer (or just not compatible with each other 
) or they were probably going to leave anyway – for what ever reason.
You don’t want people staying with you because you are the cheapest or your rates are excellent anyway in my opinion.
You want them to stay because your helping them changing their life and giving them the tools and support to do it for themselves in the long term.
There is no correct way BUT here’s how I did it
Creep your price up, don’t just double it.
I went from £300 for a 6 week package back in the day to £450 per package and then from there I went to £600 for the same package. This all happened over 2 years.
Then I decided not to do 6 week packages any longer (as I believe they are a waste of time for lots of reasons) and now I’m getting £1800+ per 12 week package.
Give your customers some period of notice, tell them on their next bill they will pay the old price but the one after that its up to the new rates.
New customers will not know any different.
Still afraid? Maybe you really are not ready quite yet. Maybe you should do a bit more personal development so you can justify it. Check out my podcast called personal trainer secrets , also on itunes, and it gives lots of help to get better results with your clients and will really help your development to become an elite personal trainer earning the big money.
I hope this will encourage you to increase your rates with confidence because your worth it. Bloody hell that sounds camp as Christmas, its from one of them expensive women’s products, “L’oreal – because your worth it” LOL .
Please leave your comments below and let me know your experiences on putting your prices up.
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Great post as always guys, I put my 1-1 prices up a few weeks ago by over 15% for new clients and have actually got busier as a result. 4 new clients in 7 days on minimum 6 week packages. No price resistance at all. Why do you think 6 week packages don’t work?
Thanks Liam, thats great news thats you have increased your prices and had no resistance.
With regards the 6 week packages, i dont do them as i feel that its all over too quickly, it leaves more gaps in your diary over a year(more time wasted between clients etc) and it’s alot of changes for someone to make all at once. i find lots the people i used to sign up for 6 weeks (or less sometimes) were not as committed as people who were signing up for the longer packages, so it made sense to go with what was naturally happening and was best for myself and the business. Plus the admin seems constant, i was like i was always asking them if they were going to re-new! I still did 6 week packages for a while but they were more expensive to reflect the length of the package/committment. I hope that helps mate.
Absolutely helps Rich. Makes perfect sense. cheers