What PureGym Looks For When Hiring Personal Trainers (Mac Livock)

In this episode, Ryan sits down with Mac Livock, Regional Manager at PureGym, to talk about what it really takes to succeed as a personal trainer in today’s industry.

We hear Mac’s personal story—from how he got started in fitness to working his way up through PureGym—and the lessons he’s learned along the way. Whether you're just starting out or already working on the gym floor, this episode is full of real-world advice from someone who hires and develops PTs every day.

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Watch the full episode on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t8yzdFTxZss

🎯 Thinking about becoming a personal trainer?

Take the free PT career quiz: https://ptlaunchlab.co.uk/quiz

📞 Ready to start?

Book a call: https://ptlaunchlab.co.uk/book-call

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Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Right, hi everybody. Today I'm with Mac, he's a manager at Pure Gym, former worker for Ultimate Shred. Today we're gonna cover Mac's story, and then we're also gonna be covering the difference between a managerial role and an on-floor PT, and also what Mac thinks is a good quality in a personal trainer.

SPEAKER_00 0:26

Hi everyone, I'm Mac. As Ryan's just said, I'm a manager at Pure Gym, kind of one of the the biggest commercial brand uh manager. I did work from Alt Shred, it's how I started. So I started off I was in hospital with a colon infection, was quite a large, large kid, came out, lost the weight, and then went straight to PT. So in terms of like gym floor knowledge, I didn't know much. So going into it, I needed to learn a lot and a lot very quickly. So the only way to do so is to be in the gym. I worked as much as I could and was able to grow up probably one of one of the most successful PT businesses I've seen anyway.

SPEAKER_01 0:59

So how how long would you say it took between so how long did it take for you to actually get from where you wanted to be to where you felt like you were ready to step onto the gym floor?

SPEAKER_00 1:12

Um I think I think it took at least a good six months to feel comfortable in the gym to be able to go and approach people. Because it's really hard to go into a gym, especially if you've got even a hundred people there or even thirty people stood in front of you. It's very hard to go over and be like, hi.

SPEAKER_01 1:29

Because at this point, I think we were still painting and everything, weren't we? We like you were literally the first person. That was my first gym, January 2020, uh, and you was uh our first uh present self-employed to actually approach us for the job. Yeah. And uh I can still remember the interview because it were quite you were very, very laid back from our point, and we sort of said we were ready to give you the job before you'd even started, and then after you still you still took time after to say to tell us your story, which I always thought which I really appreciated because you didn't have to do it, but you wanted to show that passion, which I've always remembered that.

SPEAKER_00 2:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 2:05

Till now, and then what I went to score now, mate, um, from then so how did you find it working from a private gym to start?

SPEAKER_00 2:16

So the private gym stuff, I think starting off was really good from the standpoint of there wasn't as many people in front of me to talk to. So when people were coming through as one person or um a lot of the time it was mainly just clients for for Ryan that was coming through the door that I could talk to and get to know. So that when I felt more comfortable in the space and felt more confident, I was able to go talk to people. But the thing is when you when you're starting off and you're doing that sort of thing, it's really, really hard, it's really, really challenging. So I think from a non from a non-commercial space, yeah, it was very challeng it was hard to pick up clients or go to approach people, but not having that many people in front of you made it easier.

SPEAKER_01 2:56

Yeah, and we've just been saying just before we actually just before we actually turned the camera on is that when you first started, I've always been busy, me and me and Callum have spoken about it before, and I've always done, and I still do to this day, I still do the same amount of PTs, mate. Wow, not change, right? I know. I thought there'd been more to life than this now, but but um I know even at that time when you didn't have any clients, you still stayed in the gym 14 hours with me. Yeah, I did. And as I said to you before, this is probably the one of the fastest, if not the fastest, I've ever seen a PT grow just from being in the gym, and also the gym was thriving at that point. We had that sort of that new gym impact in the area where everyone's dead interested, and you get that big um that big wave of clients straight away, don't you? Yeah, and you were straight on, you had no fears whatsoever when it came to teaching classes. I think you taught them it's uh definitely spoke a lot better than me.

SPEAKER_00 3:50

Maybe, maybe, but the thing was because that the only place as a PT you can pick up clients is in the gym. You can post whatever you want on social media, you can advertise whatever you like, you can do as many deals, you can do as many things. But if you're not there when someone walks through the door, that that you're not picking them up as a client. So the only person they're gonna speak to is the first person who's there. Absolutely. So if you're there, and that was the only thing that I wanted to do was to showcase right, I'm here, yeah, come and speak to me so that when, for example, if someone came through looking for you, I could then go help them from a different perspective. Um, and it was the case of we worked together, we never we didn't we didn't steal each other's clients, and I think that was made very, very clear from me on the offset.

SPEAKER_01 4:27

I think I dragged you into some uh just quite a lot of jobs though, didn't I? Yeah, in terms of tech-wise, I am not a tech man whatsoever. Matt, you can't do this, could you? And you were like, did you you come from some form of I built I built websites before? Yeah, yeah, that would it, that wouldn't it I knew it, I knew you had some form of of tech background, and I I got you doing everything everything tech. Now I use Callum for that now, as well. So Callum's behind Cameron Nike, but um yeah, on that point that you just said there, mate. I can remember when I first started out as a PT and I work in Exercise for Less. And when I I was sat at sat at home once, and my dad, they they were like sort of helping me with rent. This is going way back to like 2011, and I was sat on the sofa and my dad asked me if I had any clients that day, and I says no, and he says, Well, we won't get any sat on your ass there. And that's literally how I've taken that approach, probably not as brutal, but to everyone I've spoken to all the PTs that have ever become in my gym, and I've said to them, the ones that haven't succeeded, the ones that haven't spent time in the gym and have done a couple of things on like they'll get their friends to come in, they'll p te them and then they're gone. Yeah, but you just can't do that at the beginning, can you? You know, you've got to be here.

SPEAKER_00 5:34

Yeah. The one thing that I think it was actually you who said it to me was post every client on Instagram. So when you've got a client, make yourself look busy. Absolutely. Because if you look busy, people are gonna want you more. So then when people come in the gym, they'll already know who you are. Yep. So when you're then moving forward, people have already got you as a picture in the head, they already know who you are, you're coming in, you probably even have a client there at that point, so they're looking for you. Absolutely. Um, and that was the way I picked up so many clients so quickly was because I was just there, and there was there was no point me sitting at on my ass at home because no one was there, yeah, and I had no background in the PT stuff. I didn't know people in the gyms, I didn't know people who were going to that gym, I knew no one, so the only place I could find out was there. Yeah, yeah. So just sit there. I mean, I sat for hours on Facebook and Instagram and YouTube at the time and all this kind of stuff. I just sat watching videos, yeah, but it was some I'd probably be doing it at home anyway. Absolutely. But I was sat in the gym, so anytime anyone came through wanting help, I was there. Yeah, and there was points, I think the points where you had clients where you're like, Oh, actually, I I can't do this client today, Matt. Do you want to take them?

SPEAKER_01 6:40

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 6:40

And that again, you've got to be there, they want you to do it. If I wasn't there, you'd have just given it to the next person or would have just said, Oh no, can't do today and moved it on. So I think that's part of just being in the gym and just being available to be able to do it, you've got to give yourself time to be able to move into the role. If you're there and you're expecting to be on, like the social media says, on 10 grand in the first month, it's never ever, it just doesn't happen. No, you've got to be in the gym and willing to just put the hours in.

SPEAKER_01 7:08

And that that probably texts me out to another little point. It's probably off topic for what we were gonna say today, but so of it when you obviously when you first started as a PT, I know I did it. So I I charged really low when I started because how I I had the wrong mentality, I know now was the wrong mentality. Because how I looked at it was X amount of money, cheap price, was better than nothing, and that was sort of my mindset rather than charging what I was worth. Or so I don't know if you did that.

SPEAKER_00 7:35

I think I think I did that.

SPEAKER_01 7:36

But undercharge yourself, and yeah, and and then having that issue then where you've got to upscale it, yeah. And then people almost feel like you've been unloyal to them, even though it's more or less impossible to keep up that many PTs for that price.

SPEAKER_00 7:50

I think I think when we were doing like me and you were doing 14 hour days straight through all the way through. I think when you've started off and you've started off, let's say£15 a client, or you started off at even£10 a client. I did a tenner, yeah. You sat there and you're thinking, and then my next hour's gonna be£35 quid, but then this one's gonna be a tenner. What's the point? Yeah, so you've got to start with what you're worth because then if you're going in here, you're trying to upsell people, and maybe actually your time isn't worth the money that you're putting in with that client specifically, absolutely, but then the next one it is worth the 35, 40 quid, whatever you're charging. So I think starting off and just setting a base rate, yeah, um, 20, 20, 25 quid really nowadays is probably your base rate and sticking at that. Yeah, um, you'll have the odd people that maybe you've had for a while, or you've had family members, that sort of thing, but you can't be jumping and doing 10 pounds.

SPEAKER_01 8:39

Yeah, would you would you say it's it's area dependent as well? I think I think 25 for the area, like I still only do 30 now, but I know friends in Leeds have PT'd as long as me. Good PTs, like don't get me wrong, but they're they're 40 pounds, which is fair, but I think the area's different.

SPEAKER_00 8:54

I think the I think the area may put it.

SPEAKER_01 8:57

Lowest 10% in the country.

SPEAKER_00 8:59

One of them, but if you're talking, like, for example, you look at Yorkshire as a whole, you've got Hull, Bradford, that sort of area, you're gonna be charging less. Yeah. So if you are wanting to earn the crazy money, you are gonna have to move to the areas of Leeds, the Harrogatts, the Naresborough,'s that sort of area, and you can charge the money because the the affluence of the area is a lot lot higher.

SPEAKER_01 9:18

And the uh the only other thing for that obviously would be the online. Me and Callum has spoke about it. I don't think, I don't think personally, you can be an online PT until you've been a floor PT.

SPEAKER_00 9:28

I don't. I think walking in and being like, right, I'm not gonna do the floor stuff and going straight online, you've got no base, you've got no establishment, no one the connection, I think. Yeah, you've got no one there. People are gonna sell, people sell to people or people buy from people, they don't buy from just a machine online. And if they wanted something online or they wanted an online programme, there's those out there for 10 quid, 12 quid instead of being the like 180 quid or whatever it is for a month of PTs now. So you've got to go in with a background and have a base there. So if you're gonna start a PT business and your end goal is to be online, which is fine because a lot of people will, a lot of people have that goal. Start off simple, start off on start off in the gym, build your clients up, then start moving on online. Yeah, because then you'll have that base, you'll have that steady income, and you'll be absolutely fine.

SPEAKER_01 10:11

Yeah, and that's uh last last bit on that, mate, is just sort of like where where we think the industry's going in that way, because you know, a lot of these online PTs are actually selling what they're doing for the clients, what they're selling is what they can give to you, if that makes sense. And they're like, Well, if you sign up for me for this course, I'll get you, so you can earn as much money as me, but no one ever actually trains anybody.

SPEAKER_00 10:32

No, no, and I think I think the main thing is as I said, people buy from people, people don't buy because of anything. And if you're paying the amount of times, like say you'll do a training course or you've got a PT online and you're paying£12 a month, right? Which there are out there, there are courses that you can buy apps that are 12 quid or AI generated stuff, which is gonna be a main thing that's coming through.

SPEAKER_01 10:54

We could do a full podcast on that. We already touched on it, but exactly I'd love to I could talk to you for hours on that, mate.

SPEAKER_00 11:00

But the but the AI stuff, it can only go so far. People are gonna always still buy from people, and you can have as much AI in the world, you can have the best training plan there, but if you have nothing about you, people who don't know who you are, the people that are doing really well with it are the people who are on hundred thousand like subscribers or hundred thousand likes, or they get the get the people who are massive and people believe to know who these people are.

SPEAKER_01 11:24

I think there's a way to incorporate the AI into any business. Yeah. And I think you're gonna get left behind if you don't know that. On the terms of like personal connection, obviously the AI is not gonna there's so many pros and cons. Like the the pros are if I wait, if I'm doing a night shift and it's freight mining at work and in the cupboards at work, there's only a pack of this or a pack of that. And I'd put into chat GBT, for example, what can I, how much of this should I have to fit my macros? Right, it'll tell you, and it won't be asleep. Whereas if they're waiting for me to wake up, I'm not gonna be there.

SPEAKER_00 11:54

Yeah, so you've got you've got platforms like that, one tap, yeah, for your clients, which will benefit you in the long run because it means that you're accessible technically 24 hours a day. And if you give AI all your knowledge, it'll be able to then portray that as you. Absolutely. But flip side, you need that initial uh contact. Yeah, yeah. You need that initial contact because otherwise they're gonna be talking and they're just talking to a robot. No one wants that.

SPEAKER_01 12:16

And I think weirdly that might be the normal at some point, but I feel like that's why the floor PT is just so important because you get used to building relationships with clients and without that and just the online, not speaking to someone in person or even getting that feel. I know some of the course, some of the people who are selling the courses, their advertisement is actually you never even need to meet your client. Do you think that's crazy?

SPEAKER_00 12:38

I I couldn't I couldn't. Looking at it from a PT's perspective, I couldn't do that.

SPEAKER_01 12:43

For me, you've never been a PT. If you feel like that, if you never want to interact with her, but you don't even need to see her and you can make six figures. I'm like, who's doing that?

SPEAKER_00 12:50

Yeah, it's just no chance. It's not for me that.

SPEAKER_01 12:53

So moving on then, Mike.

SPEAKER_00 12:55

So what what did you go into after PT and after you moved from when I left Ultimate Shredders PT, I went into an assistant manager role in Leeds at Pure Gym. I basically wanted so the PT stuff's great, but I was at the time I was trying to get a mortgage, so the stability of like getting a mortgage when you're self-employed is really difficult. Even though I was earning brilliant money, it doesn't correlate to trying to get a mortgage. You need at least three years, you need three years, and I just I didn't have the time to wait. So I needed to I needed to move into management role. The difference between the managerial stuff and the PT stuff, there are many differences, but it all underpins this uh people skills. And in a gym, regardless of whether people are doing online programs or they're doing whatever it is, you need that people skills. And if you haven't got that as a personal trainer, the management stuff isn't gonna come because you're not gonna be able to be control a team, um deal with issues, talk to people, um disp sort out any disputes that are going on. I think the main uh correlation that I took was all the people stuff. Yeah, regardless of your training, regardless of how good as a P PT you are, if you can't talk to someone or have a decent conversation or even elaborate very well, you're gonna really struggle. Yeah. Regardless of whether you're a PT, whether you're in the management role, you can't you can't correlate the two.

SPEAKER_01 14:13

And and do and do you think to be a gym manager also you need to be uh have experience as a PT as well?

SPEAKER_00 14:22

Personally, I think it's benefited me. Yeah. Because when when I'm talking to my team that I have underneath me, they're all personal trainers, they're all trying to grow a business, all this kind of stuff. When I'm talking to them and I'm trying to give them advice, yeah, so they're all got their own businesses, you've gone through that the commercial route, you can see you understand the like process. They're all they've all got their own businesses, they need to grow it the same way I did. But if you've not got that experience on the gym floor, you've got no way of helping these.

SPEAKER_01 14:47

Yeah, no relatable qualities in it.

SPEAKER_00 14:49

So to be able to relate to my team and to be able to work with them and help them grow and help them develop, and which in the long run benefits me because it means that they're happier at work and they're gonna stay. So I think you need the PT experience, whether you're a good PT at that time or whether you're not, you need some form of PT experience to move forward.

SPEAKER_01 15:08

Very, very similar to how I how I talk about boxing with a boxing coach, someone who's maybe not had the experience in the ring. I mean, it don't again, it's not the being at end of all, like I know a lot of football managers are not the best of footballers, but I feel like they've got to have had some time on the CV in that in that area for them to be able to because you can't you won't be able to put yourself in their shoes. No. Do you know like say for me? I just use the box of this example because it's easy. I understand the emotions that my lads are going through on fight day, yeah, and I I can relate to that. Yeah, I'll say, look, this is how you should be feeling, this is completely normal. Are you feeling you're nervous? Whatever. Very similar for you, for obviously to talk to a PT, like you're gonna be saying, Look, mate, I've been here. This is what we need to do. We need you need to be on the gym floor, yeah, you need to be making content, yeah. This is how regular you need to be here and how much you need to be turning.

SPEAKER_00 16:00

And this is the thing to the the that like it's very difficult to relate with someone like I've never been in the ring, so I can't relate to being smacked in the face, like in a ring. I can't I can't relate to that, but what I can relate to is being on no clients and trying to build a business. Yeah, so what I can do is help you, and I know what worked for me, so and what I what worked for me was really simple, like it wasn't hard, it wasn't wasn't brought groundbreaking, you don't have to reinvent the wheel, you just gotta relate to the people and be able to talk to them, and again, that correlation between the PT and the manager side, regardless of what you're relaying to those people, whether it's a client and you're trying to relay exercises and technique and all that kind of stuff, or you're just trying to relay business support stuff, those two things correlate so well.

SPEAKER_01 16:44

Absolutely, mate. I think um I think that's you couldn't have said that any better, to be fair. That's what we were saying about never being able to reinvent the wheel and just being consistent, and I can't give you enough praise for what you what you did for me back then, and I I I'd already had about 10 years' experience, and you were still helping me, and you were never scared to shy away from an opportunity during lockdowns, the first time when we actually spoke online to people on the camera. Yeah, it was we learned on the spot, and we had thousands of people across the world as well. It was like USA, Canada, Dubai, Switch. I think someone from Switzerland won it. We had France, we had a full map at one point, geographical map with some colour on every country, and they're the people that we had to speak to. Yeah, all completely different time zones, and that's when we were first learning to speak on a camera.

SPEAKER_00 17:31

Yeah, it was and it was actually quite intense, thought it.

SPEAKER_01 17:35

Yeah, very COVID.

SPEAKER_00 17:36

You couldn't you we couldn't actually see anyone, so we couldn't actually speak to one another in person to be able to be like, right, this is what I did online, or this is what I did. All it was was over like WhatsApp or a call on that day, or right, I've got this later, this is the class I'm doing. And it was very hard to relay that. So when you're on COVID and you're there in a room and you're looking at your phone and you're seeing like just people pop up, it's so daunting.

SPEAKER_01 17:59

Well, did I thought it was worse at the beginning because what we did at the beginning was we had members from the gym, didn't we? Can you remember? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. To do that in his house, didn't we? Yeah, we did. It was at home, it was locked down, yeah. No one had ever done anything really online at that point, I don't think, anyway. Not we we gave all of our members a timetable, yeah. Same as the gym.

SPEAKER_00 18:20

It was it was the same time if I can remember.

SPEAKER_01 18:23

Same instructors, same time.

SPEAKER_00 18:24

It was the same instructor. So you just taught a class that was at the same length at the same time. I remember I did I did one and I I I have a picture of me in the snow because I did it outside. I did it in my garden outside on snow. Um, because I was like, oh, it's snowing, I might as well, it's a bit of fun. So I was in the garden on snow with gloves on, doing burpees and like press-ups and stuff.

SPEAKER_01 18:45

I still get to come up on time up. And do you know what? I can't even I can't even watch probably like these uh these podcasts, like some of the early ones that me and Callum have done, I'll probably watch them back in a few months and won't be able to watch them either. But I look back at when you stood there waiting and there were like three people on it at a time, and you're like just waiting for more people to come on and rock and they were just sort of pacing me room like picking remote up and then put it back down. So just really dead awkward. I think all PTs fell fell under the same thing there, but as soon as lockdown hit and we turned it online, that were weirdly like it was kind of like a training phase for us.

SPEAKER_00 19:18

Yeah, it was.

SPEAKER_01 19:19

And I feel like when it did go to that worldwide scale, we were all all a lot more confident, weren't we?

SPEAKER_00 19:23

Yeah, and once we got to that stage, we knew what we were doing, we could get into the room, and at that point it was just starting to hit summer, or it was like it was very, very hot.

SPEAKER_01 19:32

Very hot, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 19:32

And we were in that room, we didn't we couldn't have the air con on or like a fan on because you couldn't hear us. Too loud.

SPEAKER_01 19:38

We hadn't almost got that on.

SPEAKER_00 19:40

So you couldn't hear us, so we were absolutely sweating. We're there with those grey uh ultimate shred t-shirts on, just drenched in sweat, putting these workouts on, and then in fairness, not many companies did it actually. Yeah, yeah. Like the big corporations, like looking back, knowing what Pyorgium did, they didn't do that sort of thing. No, no, and a lot of the big companies didn't. So when we came out of lockdown, the business booms because we'd been there, we'd help these people throughout COVID. I came out of lockdown fitter than I ever had been, which not many people have said. Um, and I think it was to do with we were just like, right, we're gonna keep going.

SPEAKER_01 20:13

Yeah, well, when as soon as they said then you could train people outside, we had 30 people outside. Yeah, we were we were on. We were we were doing PTs morning till night then. Yeah, we were out in car park.

SPEAKER_00 20:22

Yeah, we we all bought uh gazebos, speakers, yeah, just in case it rained, everything we were like we there can't be many gyms competing with that.

SPEAKER_01 20:30

I mean, a couple in the area caught on, but I I literally feel like that were purely due to our efforts. Yeah, it was because everyone were coming to us, even people from other gyms, because they were they weren't getting you were getting nothing back, were they?

SPEAKER_00 20:42

You couldn't you couldn't get anything from any other gym, and we were like, right, you can be outside, so we're gonna be outside. Yeah, we'll bring all the kit out, we'll lift it all out every morning, put it all back on the on the night. Whatever we need, you can still use. We've got we we even bought like stupidly large packs of wipes. You remember then that were like 150 wipes, wiping everything down, making sure the mats were clean. So everything no one got COVID from doing it, so we kept all the safety procedures that we needed to keep, but flip side, we were able to give people something that one off did.

SPEAKER_01 21:12

Moving from that, I mean it never ended, did it? We literally hit every single bit of um like criteria that we needed to be like, right, these are your restrictions, this is what you can and can't do. I can remember when we had it all taped off at glasses, yeah. Could have so many classes in, we had in and out, so we had one in through one door and then one out, and then out through the fire, and you had to go around the side. Every single person had a set of wipes at the at their station, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 21:39

And it were all like it's a crazy time, wasn't it? It was meant crazy time. It were crazy. Like looking looking back and doing that, we were thinking, wow. But we got through it and we came out that it was after lockdown that I really picked up as a PT because I was because I was there during the videos. Yeah, yeah. Me and you did a lot. Yeah, yeah. Me and you did a lot of those videos and We were there at the end of just being like, right, now we're online. Come and join us.

SPEAKER_01 22:04

And do you feel like that's helped you now? Again, I spoke to you like briefly on this, like before we went on camera. So, how much how much social media is involved now? Obviously, pure gym, massive mega company, massive chain of gyms. How many gyms did you say they've got?

SPEAKER_00 22:19

430.

SPEAKER_01 22:19

430 gyms, but constantly, like that's what I love is that they're constantly, no matter how big they get or upscaled they are, they're still always pushing, like social media-wise. Yeah. So what talk us through some of the some of the things that events, let's say, events that they've made you do. Because I know you've done quite a few with that microphones.

SPEAKER_00 22:38

Yeah, so I put I I it's kind of we push from a local demographic, even though it's such a large company, we run it as a as quite a small gym. Right. Even though we're looped in with so many people and we've got so many different things to focus on and think about and nationwide stuff and looping in with different countries now. We're still trying to run it from a local scale. So we're truly trying to give back to the community. So I did um I did a warm-up for um a charity run a couple of months ago, and I'm about to do another one on Sunday and just trying to build it from there. So there's a lot that we do, and from a social media perspective, we sit and we the the there is a social media team that w run behind us, but they call up myself quite a lot, and I think that started because I can talk to camera, but that was due to the experience I had of talking to so many people on a live.

SPEAKER_01 23:28

So is is pure gym got is it one social media or is it like pure gym lee's pure gym?

SPEAKER_00 23:33

So we have we have one per gym, but we also have one big one, like one the official one where everything goes in. So I think it depends on where you're looking and and what you're doing and that sort of thing. So we do run it, and I have one that I run single-handedly, but we also have one that our head office run and maintain um and create content for. The best bit is, well, I think anyway, is that they rope in the gyms themselves. So like I've been roped into quite a lot of the social media stuff.

SPEAKER_01 24:00

So So do they just give you like full access to it or do you have to send content to like higher?

SPEAKER_00 24:06

So I'm I'm part of a team that has to approve content that goes through into these channels. Right, right. Um I think it's due to me knowing obviously the people in the social media team, but I go through and I approve stuff that that fits with what criteria we need. Now, main thing is just showcase the gyms.

SPEAKER_01 24:21

And do do they do that with it? Do they s do they give the PTs like any um incentive to like give you content for the I thought that had gone off then? Uh any incentive to carry on going, you know, like to post content or do videos or not not to be approved, or is there anything that they say, or can everyone get a video doing this?

SPEAKER_00 24:42

Or not from the head office, but as a gym team, we run it solely. So we personally I want to broadcast my PTs as much as possible because that's how they're gonna grow the business, it's where the people are gonna go to. When they're looking at what gym they want to go to, they're gonna go to a social media and see what's going on. So if they see the PTs, they're gonna find one that works for them. Now there's one like if, for example, if someone came to me for boxing, then like I'm gonna push them onto you in that scenario because I it's not what I need, but on the same foot, you would bring me clients that you think would work better for me. So people always choose who they think will work better for them. So being able to broadcast that, but it's all on a singular level. So if if a if the PT doesn't want to do it, and we've we've known PTs in the past that don't want to put themselves out there, don't want to post on social media, don't want to put different things on, don't want to like broadcast their skills, they're the ones that aren't gonna do as well because they're not they're not marketing themselves very well.

SPEAKER_01 25:32

100%, and that'll probably lead me on to last part. I'll go into a little bit of personal stuff after stuff that I just wanted to catch up on you uh with to be honest, mate. But um what do you think is the the best quality or what what m makes good qualities in a PT?

SPEAKER_00 25:48

Biggest thing, and actually this is really interesting because I've been roped in with colleges, so we're actually trying to rope in qualifications now, so kind of like the Ultimate Shredd Academy. Um, there's different colleges that do this, and we want to create a course and create courses that create good personal trainers because there's no point qualifying and then being stuck. So, one of the things that you need is resilience, you have to have the world's best resilience to be able to keep going. Like there's times where you'll have five clients drop off in a month, and you're thinking, Oh my god, what the hell do I do? I've lost it, I've lost a grand here, or I've lost over that. You've got to have resilience to keep yourself going and just keep pushing through. And the resilience, I I that's still number one to this day. If you're gonna work in the fitness industry, you've got to have good resilience because there's so many times in the year where it peaks up and then it drops down, and you've got to be able to ride that wave comfortably. I think uh people skills, as I mentioned before, being able to collaborate as a team. So even if you are working solely, like we were personal trainers that were just sole personal trainers, but we worked as a team together in building the business and building our own brands and building each other up and all this kind of stuff. So we worked as a team. I think those two main skills, if you can do those two, you'd be absolutely fine. If you've got the people skills to be able to talk to people, it'd be even better. Because as a personal trainer, although you are selling the training and you're trying to help people, if you can't talk and you can't relate that, you could have the best PT in the world that can't talk, he's not gonna get any clients. Or you could have the person who doesn't know the biology behind it, you don't know the all that kind of stuff, but you're gonna do so much better because you can just have a conversation with someone. 100%.

SPEAKER_01 27:21

Thank you, mate. Well, on to um I've I've said very, very similar stuff before. Um, I feel like the consistency, like you said, the resilience is a massive thing. It doesn't come easy, it's one of the biggest failing industries in the in the world. Yeah, I feel like being a genuine person, being less work client, boss client sort of thing, the more you can actually be a friend to that person as well and and actually care about them as well. I feel like um being very genuine is very important, yeah. Uh, but it would to hear your side of that and what you think is a good quality. I feel like most people are gonna be similar on that, especially the PTs that have done well.

SPEAKER_00 28:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 28:01

I feel like a lot of them will know because it's not it's not all a fairy tale. No. You can't listen to these people online and think that you're gonna come in and be a brilliant PT straight away, because in the beginning you might lose clients as well, just because they're your own standard, yeah. Which is fair to say, like when I think about some of the sessions I used to do and the quality from then to now is massive because yeah, you're constantly learning every day.

SPEAKER_00 28:24

Yeah, you are.

SPEAKER_01 28:25

Even to this day, I sell picks off of other PTs, PTs haven't been there as long as me. I like the ideas, I like put my own spin on it as well. Um, so I feel like that's good, but thank you for that, Paul. But um what what's happening? We are training now.

SPEAKER_00 28:39

Because I know you're in the powerlifting, I was I was I was I um I went down to Southampton, um qualified for British Championships, and then I was working that day now, working in the fitness industry. If you're joining it, you're working long hours. Yeah, you you wake up early and you get into bed late. That there's your that's your job, but you're doing something that you're quite passionate about. Yeah, but you're working that long hours. I had to apply at a certain time on a certain day and I missed it.

SPEAKER_01 29:05

Right.

SPEAKER_00 29:06

So I could have gone to like British qualifiers, which was at the Jimmy Shark event, was at the Gym Shark gym in Birmingham, got everything I needed, qualified, got the numbers I needed, all this kind of stuff, and then from then on I kind of just I lost my interest in it. Yeah. Because you'd have had to re- I had to redo everything, re-qualify, retrain, do everything I needed to do. Um, I had a great coach, I had a fantastic coach, Sam Hinks.

SPEAKER_01 29:30

Shout out to Sam, I know Sam Sam's guy.

SPEAKER_00 29:33

You know Sam. I love Sam. Yeah, he's great. But I had a great coach, he taught me through it. We then went onto a different spy, and I wanted to see if I could compete at a lower weight category, yeah. Which meant I just had to cut loads of weight. No, I cut the weight and I could still lift heavy, but it was taking a toll.

SPEAKER_01 29:48

Like it really And then trying to trying to do the the hours as well.

SPEAKER_00 29:52

Then working because again, you'll back me up here, you're doing like at least 20,000 steps a day. So you're not doing 20,000 steps in the day, yeah. So it's not rough.

SPEAKER_01 30:00

Right then, Mac, I think we've covered covered everything, mate. I really enjoy speaking to you and also having a catch up as a good with an old friend, and seeing you're from coming in as this young face kid as now being a manager at Pure Gyms at a bit a bit surreal. It's been ace to watch your journey, and I'm I'm so glad that we can still be good friends as well, mate. So thank you for being part of the podcast today, mate. Alright, so thank you very much, everybody. Like and subscribe, and we'll see you all next week.