Ep. 295 Why Personal Trainers Don't Make 100k The 3 Truths No One Wants to Admit

Most trainers don’t miss six figures because the market is saturated; they miss it because they rely on a textbook, skip the team, and avoid hands-on learning. We pull back the curtain on what actually drives a durable, high-earning training career: real competence, strategic partnerships, and pricing that reflects value.

We start by dismantling survivorship bias in certification advice and explain why multiple-choice exams don’t prepare you for a people-first, problem-solving job. Then we map a practical path from C-level certs to true capability: build a team with a physical therapist for pain cases and a registered dietitian for nutrition scope. You’ll hear how to approach clinicians with respect, speak their language without overstepping, and structure paid consults that lead to mutual referrals and better client results.

From there, we break down a simple revenue model that stacks without burnout: premium in-person training, a clear month-two nutrition add-on under RD oversight, and streamlined online programming. We share concrete screens for shoulder function you can use within scope, when to refer out, and why quarterly hands-on seminars beat another PDF. Real-world case studies highlight trainers who leveraged seminars and networking to land roles at top gyms, grow into management, or expand into corporate wellness—showing exactly how layered income can reach and surpass $100K.

If you’re ready to trade generic certs for real skills, build a professional ecosystem, and create a career that pays and lasts, this conversation lays out the steps. Subscribe, share this with a trainer who needs it, and leave a review telling us which action you’ll take first.

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Website: https://www.showupfitness.com/
Become a Successful Personal Trainer Book Vol. 2 (Amazon): https://a.co/d/1aoRnqA
NASM / ACE / ISSA study guide: https://www.showupfitness.com

Chapters

• 0:00 Welcome And Mission
• 0:32 Why Trainers Don’t Hit $100K
• 2:33 Certifications vs Real-World Competence
• 4:10 Build A Professional Team
• 7:10 Nutrition Partnerships And Pricing
• 10:18 Hands-On Education And Assessment
• 14:20 Avoid Guru Traps, Master Anatomy

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:00

Welcome to the Show Up Fitness Podcast, where great personal trainers are made. We are changing the fitness industry one qualified trainer at a time with our in-person and online personal training certification. If you want to become an elite personal trainer, head on over to showofffitness.com. Also make sure to check out my book, How to Become a Successful Personal Trainer. Don't forget to subscribe, rate, and review. Have a great day and keep showing up. Howdy all, welcome back to the Show Up Fitness Podcast, 30 days of podcasting. Today we're gonna help you level up your business and challenge why so many trainers are not making$100,000. Reason number one, you have a C-level certification. You read a textbook and you have false expectations that clients are gonna be lined up out the door from eight to five. We take the unwritten oath as personal trainers. We train early in the morning and late at night because we work when our clients are not working. The average trainer does not make it past one year. 12 months and they quit. Wonder why? They read a book and they expect to be good with people. What about the business skills, the technical skills, the people skills? Those are the three most important trainers need. You're not gonna get that in a textbook. NASAM, ACE, ISSA, NSCA, ACSM. You go to Reddit, you go to Facebook. I want to become a trainer. What do I do? Survivorship bias. That trainer is gonna tell you to do whatever they did. I got NASA, and therefore you should get NASA. Instead, your question should be: did that certification set you up for success? Are you happy with where you're at because of that certification? What if you had an opportunity to go through an internship where you get three certifications? You're working with physical therapists, gaining hands-on experience, and then getting placed at the top gyms like Lifetime and Equinox. What are your thoughts then? Those aren't the questions we're asking. We're not doing a thorough research approach. We type in the Google Machine, how to become a trainer. We'll click on the first paid ad, and all of a sudden you buy a bundle for$2,000 and you start reading a book. Six months in, you give up. Or the information you're reading, like what the hell? So you start finding the answers online. What does this mean? What is the answer? Because the test is multiple choice. But yet, as a trainer, it's not a multiple choice career. You have to be able to interact, think on the fly, program for clients on the spot, get them out of pain. You need to level up that C-level certification. That's point number one. Number two, you do not have a team. With our partnership with Lifetime and Equinox, we've been to numerous gyms. There's 182 at Lifetime, over 112 at Equinox. We've been teaching their trainers, and one of the things that I asked them: who in here has a physical therapist on your team? Who has an RD? Less than 2%. Doctors have teams, or does the doctor draw your blood and also do the anesthesia? No, we surround ourselves with capable, competent individuals that level you up. Trainers try to be a jack of all trades. I can work with you with correctives, I can work with you nutrition. Versus you reach out to a physical therapist, you pay him or her their hourly rate for that consultation, you bring them into your location, train them for free, and then you send them a client based on their rate. That ROI long term is gonna pay dividends. I work with one of the most expensive physical therapists in the greater LA area. He's$750 per hour. I consulted with him. I've sent him business and he sent me business. One client that I have right now for three years pays on average$3,500 per month. That's a$40,000 ROI for that initial investment. If you're frugal, which most trainers are, they don't like investing in themselves. It's so hard to get clients. Gimme, gimme, gimme. Take a growth mindset. Find a cash-based therapist, pay their hourly rate, let them know you're qualified. You don't go in there and start naming off the sits muscles. But if you have a shoulder issue, you say, Yeah, sometimes when I put my hand up here, I don't know if it's my superspinatus or my infraspinatus, it's probably one of the rotator cuff muscles. Love to see how you handle this. The fact that you can speak their language, they're going, huh, this isn't a normal personal trainer. They're thinking trainers are a bunch of idiots doing battle ropes, bosu ball, backflips, hurting people because that's what they see online. And guess what? Trainers don't reach out to therapists. I've interviewed so many therapists on our podcast, and they don't have trainers reaching out to them. It's because of the imposture syndrome that trainers have and not confident to reach out because they're not competent. That goes back to those C-level certifications. You need to level up your anatomy, your programming, how to assess. You need to build better teams. Do you have an RD? Reach out to one, get a qualified certification. Don't get one that's just a textbook. You need to interact with registered dietitians. So when I have my client come in and we assess them, I offer training as one option and then nutrition as the second option, but we do not talk about nutrition until month two. You got to earn that right. What most trainers do, they talk about it within the session. And then they get frustrated because the clients aren't getting results. It's like going to the dentist, have them check out your teeth, and then you ask them about your big toe. You would never do that. They're different specialties. So you get a certification like the one we have with Show Up Fitness, S U F N C, you become a qualified nutrition coach, but you get to network and link up with a registered dietitian. So during that assessment, you tell your client it costs$1,500 a month for training. Next month it's$500 per month for nutrition coaching. What that includes is A, B, C, D, these templates. It's not just macro breakdowns and carnivore for life. It's specific to that individual, but they work with an RD once a month. You send them to your RD, you pay your RD$250, you're profiting$250. If you had 10 clients doing this,$2,500 extra per month, that's$30,000 extra per year. That's how you can work towards faster making$100 plus thousand dollars. If you build your team, you are gonna stick out from the saturated market. They got all these acronyms after their names because they read a bunch of textbooks, but they're not making this into a career. They're struggling, but that's not you because you're a qualified trainer. The difference, the average trainer understands their body. Qualified trainers understand the human body. And you're gonna be significantly more confident when you build your team. And last but not least, continuing education with hands-on learning under the proper supervision. I'm not talking about going to a gym and having another C-level trainer tell you how to do animal flow. That's not what I'm talking about. Getting to a course from a physical therapist or the ones that we have at Lifetime, twice a month. In January, we're gonna be in Atlanta, we're gonna be in Phoenix. In February, we're gonna be in New Jersey, Dumbo. And in March, we're gonna be in Houston and back in California. Two a month at the best gyms in the world, which are lifetime. And we teach these trainers to level up their assessment skills. How to screen clients who have shoulder pain. Can you get your hands above your head? Can you touch your opposite scapula and bring your arm above midline? Can you lift your hand off your back? And then the brake test with the empty beer can. We don't drink beer, but you're testing scaption to see if the shoulder is within our scope to implement soft tissue. When you do these mobilizations, we're not adjusting joints. We're getting into sensitive areas and then teaching how to get stronger. If it's out of our scope, you refer out. That levels up your confidence because of the environment that you're in. You're seeing professionals who've been doing this for 20 years and you're around the 1%. Here's my challenge for you. At your gym, other trainers that are struggling, ask them the last hands-on seminar that they went to. I guarantee you it's none. I have it. I'm scheduled to get this free CEU course. That's another 25-page pamphlet or PDF. You don't get to interact with the professionals. So when you bring in case examples, I have a client right now that's 15 months post-ACL reconstruction. Could you talk me through that? I'm not a physical therapist, but we have the best physical therapist on our team. We'll zoom a therapist in and you can talk to them. But we teach you how to get therapists and RDs on your team, which goes back to number two. You got to build your team. And when you're surrounded by the 1%, people who are thinking bigger, that levels you up. So you go from your ceiling being here with that C-level cert. Now you're up here. And you're thinking, wow, not only can I make 100K, I can make 150, I can make 200, but most importantly, by not burning the candle at both ends. I'm making more by doing less because now I have streams of revenue. I'm making a 100K training one-on-one because that's what I love. I have online programming. I make another 20K online. And then I'm making 30K from nutritional consultations and being a nutrition coach because of my team. You can absolutely turn your passion for fitness into a career. But when you ask trainers who are struggling, that whole survivorship bias is very toxic. It's so hard to become a trainer. It's the most saturated industry. Hmm, you read a book and you're struggling to get clients and you're frustrated because you can't get hired at Equinox or Lifetime where you absolutely can make 100K. So you went to a gym that you got hired on the spot and they didn't have you do any type of practical. They looked at you and said, You're hired. You start tomorrow. You got 15 clients. And then you go to a Facebook group and type in first assessment tomorrow. Can I get some advice? Could you imagine a doctor doing that? I'm an MD now. Who would like to give me some pointers on my first heart surgery tomorrow? Love some help because I don't know what the fuck I'm doing. Are you gonna let that doc work on you? Are you gonna let your mom work with that trainer? That's why we're not respected. We take the path that everyone else is going down. We don't have optimal credentials. We don't have internships, mentorships, we don't have a team, and you're not continuing your education by investing in yourself. We have numerous podcasts where trainers ask their clients to sponsor them to go to these seminars. You don't have to be forking out$5,000 for some crazy mentorship with some dipshit who has a private jet behind him who's super dry and dead inside because he's not really actually making that much money. He's selling you a fake dream, but he has a lot of followers, so you think, oh, he must know what he's doing. I'm gonna buy this$5,000 program. And it doesn't work. You're not gonna be making$50K a month like these mentors are saying. Get into a program that levels you up by being able to ask questions, build your confidence, by improving your competence, starting with anatomy, 17 muscles around the shoulder, 20 of the lower body, 14 around the knee. Can you confidently say those muscles where they're at and what they do? That's gonna allow for you to have those conversations with the other medical professionals. When it comes to nutrition, you don't reach out to an RD and say, I'm a nutritionist, I know just as much as you. Can you send me your clients? No. You reach out to them and say, thank you for everything that you do. There's a lot of idiot trainers out there that are prescribing food plans and thousand calories that are inappropriate and outside of their scope. I want to link up with qualified professionals such as yourself because my clients need help, and that's who I want to send them to. You're gonna gain respect in their eyes. We've helped numerous trainers make over 100,000. I literally lost count. I have numerous podcasts, some that really stick out to me. Chelsea Rose, she's a trainer here in LA. She trains out of her house, she has a kid in amazing shape. Help Nick, as I talk about in my book. She has all of those tenants. She makes 70% of her income in person, 20% online with an app, 10% mentorship, and she has an RD who she works with. Mr. Poujan, rated number one trainer in Lancaster County, cleared significantly over 100,000. Go listen to that podcast. Mr. Joe got hired at lifetime because he went to three seminars. He would not have been able to get that opportunity if he didn't go to the seminars and network with other people. Hired him on the spot, moved up to manager. Now he's running his own gym within Lifetime. The whole entire facility is his. He runs that shop. And guess who he's hiring? SUF CPTs, because they're the best that's out there. With our relationship at Knifetime and Equinox, management will say three to five years of experience or an SUF CPT because trainers come in and they're confident and they're killers, but not in a salesy way like a car salesman. They're confident in their product because they know they're the best and you can help your clients safely. Miss Melinda, she got her NASAM CPT, wasn't able to get hired at Equinox, went through our two-month internship here in Santa Monica, leveled herself up, got hired. Top 15 trainer in the entire company at Equinox, clearing significantly over 100,000, working for a big box gym. Mr. Cody, one of the cooler stories. He's set to make over 200,000 in 2026 because he's now working within the corporate wellness structure. His client, who he met because he was in the trenches, training anyone and everyone to build up his competence and confidence. So now that person hired him. Now Cody is hiring trainers and physical therapists to take care of his book of business, which he'll be profiting from, but also working over here in the corporate wellness structure. We have Mr. Dillon, the number one trainer at Lifetime, number one out of 4,000. We have the most trainers at Lifetime in Equinox who are in the top 100 because they're qualified. They have more than that C-level certification. They have a team and they're also continuing their education on a quarterly basis. Invest in yourself. Every client that signs up, take 5%, put it into account, take another 5%, and invest back into your clients. Take them to lunches, take them to dinners, celebrate their successes in your community. Have them bring in coworkers, network with them, get them in for assessments, and you can absolutely turn your passion for fitness into a career. 20 years as a trainer, 15 years as a teacher of trainers, and the fastest growing certification in the world. The number one certification with the most trainers who are making 100K, SUF CPT. I talk about it in my book. I know you don't like me because my personality is almost as big as my biceps, but you got to realize YouTube, social media, it's all just for fun. When we meet in person, you're gonna level yourself up and you're gonna realize that this dipshit with the belt buckle over here wants you to succeed. Not like these marketing companies. Reach out to them, see if you can get on a call. Reach out to us, see how quickly we respond to you. No AI at show up, only actual fitness professionals. I want you to succeed. Let us know where we can help. And remember big biceps are better than small ones and keep showing up.