I got the most amazing email from my clients this morning that anyone trying to run a business (if you can call it that) absolutely dreads. In short, it was
“We don’t need you anymore.”
This scares the bejesus out of anyone trying to make money because they have now just lost a client. For the “slower” readers, that means I just lost income, revenue, money, dollars, Benji’s, etc. Get it?
For me, I’m tickled pink. It means I have given two people the power to make their own educated choices. It means my interactions with them have been so positive that they actually trusted the advice I gave them, applied it, saw results, and are now competant enough to do it on thier own. Rather than just showing up and barking orders at them, I actually educated them on what, how, and why we do certain things.
How powerful is that?? If you could teach all of your clients to not depend on what other people say, you would be giving them a much bigger gift of health for the rest of their lives, not just a short-term solution from which they will most likely regress.Think of that relationship you just built and how strong it is.
A lot of trainers are nervous to do something such as this. If you give your clients the ability to make the right choices, they won’t need you. And if they don’t need you, they won’t pay you. Such poor, poor short-term thinking that is.
Just think about how many people they are going to tell about how wonderful their experience was and how, after 6 months, they’ve been able to think for themselves and keep the weight off. That, to me, sounds like a much stronger testimonial than, “yeah, I lost weight at an 8-week bootcamp, but I was miserable the whole time, then gained it all back when I stopped going.” And if that’s what your goal is as a trainer, you’re one of the pieces of garbage that fill this industry. I prefer to educate, rather than dictate.
Anyways, I could not be happier to be losing these two clients. I will still be in close contact with them, more as a “consultant”, for the final month of their program, and I cannot wait to post their results.
You bring up a very good point that a vast majority of trainers tend to be completely ignorant of. Too many trainers just tell their clients what to do and how to do it, and leave it at that. They seem to believe that they should try to keep their clients for as long as they possibly can. While there will always be clients who just want to be told what to do and are willing to stay with their trainer for years, the goal should always be to guide them and teach them until they are ready to continue on their own. We should be aiding them in changing detrimental behaviors and teaching them how to program their own training so they can continue on a healthier path for the rest of their lives.
Josh, thanks for the comment! As you might guess, I totally agree. I think the more I can teach, the more students I’ll end up getting.
Exactly. Word of mouth is a trainer’s most reliable form of advertising!