[00:00:00] James Breese: Strength Matters Media. Video. Print. Podcasts. 

[00:00:05] Josh Kennedy: Today's topic is what is hybrid personal training? Obviously, everyone knows the traditional model of in person training. And I think, after uh, The blip, the Thanos blip, as we like to call it, the COVID 19 pandemic that changed the, changed the world, changed the face of training, uh, forever.

[00:00:25] Josh Kennedy: Um, suddenly people have to find a way to survive in their training business. Everyone came online, obviously, because they had no other choice. And there were zoom calls and classes galore. And it, uh, you know, it burns a lot of people out, but there is, there is a better method. And I think probably if you are, if you are still doing in person.

[00:00:45] Josh Kennedy: training, there's always a place for that, by the way, that's never going to be replaced. But if that is all you're doing, I highly recommend listening to this episode and considering switching to the hybrid model because it offers so many more advantages for you [00:01:00] and for your clients. Would you agree, James?

[00:01:02] James Breese: A hundred percent. I would never go back to doing anything different anymore. It is such a big part of how we approach our model of training, but it's also a big part of how we grow in the business. And also getting some time, some flexibility, and some freedom in our lives again. Because the hardest thing about personal training is, and for all the trainers out there doing this on the shop floor, I think I spoke to Simon Bradbrook the other day, who'd done 14 hours straight on a Monday.

[00:01:29] James Breese: You know, one after the other, each client. That's hard work and hard going. So, what we're trying to do is find a balance between the two. We're trying to give the best experience for your clients. But also you can manage time, expectations around yourself as well. So you can live the life that you want basically.

[00:01:44] James Breese: That's, that's a really important thing. Yeah, exactly. 

[00:01:47] Josh Kennedy: It offers, you know, the, the advantages of, of both, both in person and the online training approach. Obviously here at Strength Matters, we do a bit of both. Um, and it works very well for us. James, do you want to go into a [00:02:00] little bit more detail about how the hybrid model works?

[00:02:02] James Breese: Yeah, it's fair in a nutshell. It's very quickly where you're doing a mixture of in person training with your clients. And then online training, training the rest of the time. So, for us, the default kind of model is this. In an ideal world, we'll only work with our clients once, maybe twice if they're lucky, a week in person.

[00:02:21] James Breese: But they're then following a program which is going for seven days of the week. Right? So they're training on their own. Maybe they're coming to some classes. Maybe they're doing some nutrition plan. But the idea is we're approaching this 365 day, 24 7 type rule when it comes to training. And we're moving away from just training 1, 2, 3 hours a week.

[00:02:39] James Breese: It's a very different model. It's a more holistic approach is what we're trying to say. But to do this you need systems, you need software in process to make it happen. I know that, but what you're doing is you're freeing up your time. So say for example... You have 20 clients and they're each doing two hours a week with you in [00:03:00] person.

[00:03:00] James Breese: That's 40 hours on the floor. It's quite hard going. Right? Yeah. And you're 

[00:03:04] Josh Kennedy: maxed out there basically, aren't you? 

[00:03:05] James Breese: You don't have any more time. Exactly. Can't grow. But what if you had 40 clients with one hour in person each week, doing the same thing but you're charging the same money, giving them better experience all around.

[00:03:16] James Breese: It's a different approach. You can scale up a little bit better. And what you can, it's almost like a semi private version of one on one training almost, I think is a way to put it. But it's definitely a more sustainable model for yourself. But the value you're giving to your clients is so much more, which means better results, more retention, higher retention rates, and more word of mouth referrals saying how fantastic and wonderful you are at doing your job, 

[00:03:40] Josh Kennedy: basically.

[00:03:41] Josh Kennedy: Yeah. Exactly. And it also allows you to potentially take control of the program a bit more. Cause if you're like, if you're just doing one to one in person session, you've got that generally an hour slot, uh, and that's all you can do, but perhaps, you know, if you have a beginner client, they might only need 45 minutes.

[00:03:57] Josh Kennedy: And if you've got a more [00:04:00] advanced client, they might need a 90 minute session. So, you know, you can tailor it more. You can deliver this online and then, you know, it isn't just limited to that one hour slots as well. And you're, you know. From, from a client perspective, it's more, um, it's more cost effective and, you know, lots, lots of other advantages.

[00:04:18] Josh Kennedy: Do you want to go into that a little bit? Yeah, 

[00:04:19] James Breese: sure. I think as well as that, you know, it also gives you the freedom. To do consultations with them outside the training zone. So, and what I mean by that is like say once a month as a check in. You can do it via Zoom call. Sit down in your like, in your comfy office.

[00:04:32] James Breese: Be professional about it. They're at home. They don't have to travel in potentially. And you can sit them and talk about, How's it going? What's going on? What's going well? What's not going well? What do we need to change? So it gives you more scope to change around this and add some more value into it too.

[00:04:45] James Breese: So, that's the main thing. Sorry, I forgot my question. What was the question? 

[00:04:48] Josh Kennedy: No, there wasn't, there wasn't really a question. I kind of got a minute, a little, a little tongue tied. I wasn't sure where I was going with that brief section. My, my brain had a little bit of a brain fart, um, flexibility, [00:05:00] flexibility.

[00:05:01] Josh Kennedy: That was, I think was where I was going for it. More flexible for the client. Again, if you're doing in person one to one sessions and a client can't make it for whatever reason, then they've essentially lost that session. Whereas if you are, you know, online, they, they still have their program. And if they're traveling, they can go and do that program.

[00:05:17] Josh Kennedy: Uh, in, in, in the hotel gym or, or wherever they happen to be at the time. So again, offers much more, many more advantages for the client themselves. Yeah, a 

[00:05:26] James Breese: hundred percent. And it's, you can scale up as you want to. They can do once a week, they can do once a month if they want to, because sometimes you need a bit of check in or there's, there's ways of doing it where, for example, some of the cricketers we work with on our assistant company, Cricket Matters, what we're doing is we're working online with them, but every couple of months they're coming to work with me in person for maybe two to three hours and they're paying for sessions.

[00:05:47] James Breese: In a block setting. Now, we're not always a big fan of doing block sessions up front, but sometimes it needs to work if people are traveling big distances and they don't live near you, so you need to be flexible with your pricing as well, but this is such a good model. It's a better [00:06:00] relationship all around.

[00:06:00] James Breese: And I see as a big win for, for all involved, basically. 

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[00:06:42] Josh Kennedy: Yeah. Talk about,

[00:06:50] James Breese: yeah. And I always go to practical examples. Now there's lots of people saying you should charge 3, 000 for your 12 week program. You should charge this online, [00:07:00] do this. And we've tried it all. We've been doing this since 2016 and we've split test all. And see how it works. Trust me. We've tried it. We've tried 79 a month 97 a month.

[00:07:10] James Breese: We've tried 1, 000 plus a month right for these services. We've even done a 12 week plan in various different ways What we found is the optimal on a rough scale is about 299 us dollars a month. That's about 250 pounds a month For the online component of training, that's not the in person component. So for anyone who comes to 

[00:07:33] Josh Kennedy: work with us now...

[00:07:33] Josh Kennedy: So you have a monthly fee just for that, for the online specific? 

[00:07:37] James Breese: Yes, exactly that. So for, for anyone who's coming to work with us, our standard method is this. They must work with us online first. That's the first thing here. If they want to, they want to do this in person, then that's a bolt on. Like a, like a, do you want fries or that style thing if you go to McDonald's, you know, you buy a burger.

[00:07:55] James Breese: Hey, you want fries of that or upgrade to a Happy meal or whatever you want to do. Like it's one of [00:08:00] those things. It's like you got to upgrade afterwards. So the default is them online and then we upgrade to the, to the in person sessions afterwards. Now, I'll give an example with us. Anyone who comes into work with Strength Matters, there's, they 12 week program.

[00:08:14] James Breese: Because 12 weeks is enough for us to get a good idea of who they are, what they do with us, and how we want to work with them. Because sometimes they're not the right fit. And sometimes we don't want them to be the right fit. So what happens is they start with 12 weeks minimum commitment. And then after 12 weeks they transition to the 299 a month program.

[00:08:31] James Breese: So we charge a bit more up front for our services. I think it's 12 weeks within our Pro Plus plan. And our pro plan, it's 997, I think, so it's a slight difference between the two. Uh, from what I'm, I need to check this out, I didn't think about pricing at the start of the day. I need to check that out, but.

[00:08:48] James Breese: Those are the two options basically they come in with us at the high level pricing for online coaching for 12 weeks And then they do the bolt ons for the in session. 

[00:08:56] Josh Kennedy: Yeah, but that's that's our price And that depends on what you charge for [00:09:00] your what your hourly rate would be. That's based off our hourly rate, right?

[00:09:03] Josh Kennedy: So depending on your geographical location Demographic your hourly rate might be less. So basically you have a an online Monthly fee for your online component, and then you can obviously figure out what you then charge for the in person sessions as a bolt on, as 

[00:09:19] James Breese: you say. Exactly, that's important. So like, we find 2.

[00:09:22] James Breese: 99 is a good standard across the board. It's not too, it's like the Goldilocks effect. We see clients stay with us long term, like we were looking at yesterday when we were doing the system changeovers. You know, looking at the lifetime value of some of our clients, our lifetime value of our clients now at the top end is 15, 000 plus.

[00:09:38] James Breese: for online coaching. That's how long they've been with us at that price range. It's a huge, huge retention thing. So it's long term, not just short term plays here as well. So we go for the long term, not just this 12 week fix and get people through time and time again. So, but yeah, you're absolutely right Josh.

[00:09:55] James Breese: You get the hourly rate down for your time and you adopt it according to Cardiff is [00:10:00] way cheaper than New York City or than London, as an example. So you're going to adapt your pricing range accordingly there for your hourly rate. Exactly. 

[00:10:09] Josh Kennedy: Um, any final thoughts? Any final summaries you'd like to give before we wrap this up?

[00:10:14] James Breese: Yeah, for those who are looking to go into this, don't think it's going to be easy. It's not. To make this work and work well, you have to have systems, you have to do, and you need to do what we say, professionalize your fitness business. If you haven't got systems and structure to manage clients, the software to manage the training programs, you're going to struggle.

[00:10:32] James Breese: So that is the first point of call, you start off here and get it. And we're more than happy to help you out, help you guys out. We've got a whole certification about this and how you do it. But, you know, come to school. com forward slash strength matters. And we'll get you into the community and see how other people are doing it and they'll ask us questions in there.

[00:10:48] James Breese: So that's a really good way to start off and, uh, get any questions answered. Absolutely. 

[00:10:53] Josh Kennedy: Hope you found that episode helpful. That is it for today. Please don't forget to rate, review, and subscribe. And if you want to [00:11:00] find out more about our system of training, go to strengthmatters. com forward slash system.