10 Ways to Get Business Leads for Personal Trainers

When you're a personal trainer, you're not just building bodies. You're also busy building your business and more importantly, a list of leads. Lead generation for personal trainers is all about finding potential clients and nurturing a steady stream of income.

It is an essential step. Yet, it can be difficult to find leads that are ready and willing to dedicate the time and resources it takes to commit. The good news is the business leads are out there – you've just got to know where to look, and how to attract them.

10 Techniques to Master Lead Generation for Personal Trainers

Today, we'll share 10 ways to approach lead generation for personal trainers. We explain how you can bring more clients to your personal training business. From online marketing tactics to in-person interactions, we're covering it all.

Ready to get started? Lace up your sneakers and let's jump in!

1. Establish Your Business Growth Vision

In business, it's always important to have a vision and a plan for your future. Thinking about and setting goals before implementing set strategies ensures that any decisions you make have direction. 

Take a moment to think about what your lead generation goals look like by time periods. How much would you like to grow in six months to a year? How big would you hope your business becomes in three to five years?

Whatever your aims, break each goal down into smaller milestones and aims. Set markers or key performance indicators (KPIs) to help you measure your progress toward each goal. For each lead generation technique you use from this list, you can also add a corresponding KPI for progress monitoring.

​2. Become a Social Media Rockstar

More and more, people are turning to their smart devices for health benefits. You can follow a workout, track your diet, and reach out to others to talk about your progress. Social media platforms are an important part of this journey as they are where ideal clients go to discover fitness information, learn more about services, etc.

This makes optimizing your social media channels a great starting point to connect with prospective clients. You can use social media to spotlight your personal training services, reach your target audience, increase your business's visibility, and much more. You can also gain valuable insights from social media platform analytics as well as engagements such as likes, comments, shares, etc.

The key to using social media for lead generation is to treat your audience as you would your existing clients. Develop a relationship, learn more about your target audience, and engage. Just as you would encourage a client to stay consistent to reach their fitness goals, you have to stay active on your socials!

3. Take a Look Around the Gym

Often, one of the best sources of business leads is right under your nose. The gym can be a great place to find prospective clients as it is already full of people seeking an exercise regime.

To start, try joining group fitness classes. Nurture relationships with other participants and tell them what you do. If you prefer, you can even ask to speak to the group beforehand, to see if anyone would like any one-on-one assistance. There might be people who've been seeking a more direct, personalized training routine but weren't sure where to go. 

When you reach out to people in your environment, you have the opportunity to attract loyal clients who trust you.

If your gym permits, you can also share pamphlets or posters around the gym. This is a space filled with potential clients already on their fitness journey.

4. Support Local Community Efforts

Collaborating with local businesses and community organizations can be an exceptional way to find personal training clients. Think about event sponsorship, participating in local events, advertising with local businesses, and more.

This can be as simple as asking to put up posters at stores and shops or setting up a stall at your local market. Or it can extend to social media collaborations and advertising on businesses' digital platforms.
Also, consider event sponsorship. Even in the smallest community, it's not difficult to find some sort of outdoor event looking for sponsorship.

Look for five kilometre races or health expo shows. They can be great spaces to connect with prospective clients. It's a great opportunity to give them a firsthand look at your exceptional customer service.
Give away a few free trial sessions or a personal consultation. If you're sponsoring a race, try handing out water afterward or helping runners stretch before they line up.

The approach you take depends on your capacity, budget, goals, and more. However, becoming an active member of your community and working with local businesses can legitimize your fitness business. It also creates brand recognition, familiarity, and trust.

​5. Publish Some Impressive Testimonials

Customers want personal trainers they can trust. "75.5% of consumers put their trust in online reviews when making a purchase decision." They need someone who doesn't just claim to get results, but who can substantiate and back up those promises with real-life endorsements.

Even if you've just been at it for a little while, chances are you've got a success story in mind. If so, ask previous customers if they'd be willing to share their stories to help you grow your business. Getting those testimonials out there is key to reaching a wider audience and showing potential leads that you have happy clients.

Some of the channels you can use to share client reviews and testimonials include:

• Social media accounts
• Blog posts
• A Google My Business profile
• A fitness Facebook Group
  

6. Incentivize Referrals

Another lead generation technique you can use if you have existing clients is to offer incentives for referrals. An incentive that encourages social sharing and works as a recommendation and social proof to new customers.

For instance, offer a free session or two for both the existing client and a friend. Doing so allows the prospect to experience your service and rewards your current customer for brand loyalty. This can be a powerful tool for your generation efforts as well as for client retention.

​7. Establish Yourself as an Industry Expert

Many customers are hopping online to discuss their health journey. And fitness businesses are using content marketing to establish themselves as experts in fitness and health issues. This means people constantly have instant access to experiential and expert advice from around the world.

You want to rank high as someone they can turn to for expert advice in fitness and personal training. You also want to increase your visibility and nurture trust in your advice and contributions to the fitness industry.

Make sure your voice is included in the virtual conversation by including content marketing in your marketing strategy. Do this by creating high-quality content through, amongst other channels:

• Informative blog posts
• Social media marketing
• Guest posts and other collaborations
• Video ads
  
  

Also, consider the variety of topics you can get into. Sure, you're a personal trainer, however, you can touch on all areas of fitness, establishing yourself as knowledgeable overall. Create content on nutrition and meal planning, health supplements, wellness and mindfulness, etc.

8. Optimize Your Online Content

Search Engine Optimization works hand-in-hand with making quality content that boosts visibility and brand legitimacy. Implementing SEO practices ensures your website and content show up when people search for fitness and personal training services.

Optimizing search terms and keywords is one of the basic principles of SEO. You want to learn what people search for and how you can satisfy their wants or what they need.

Check out this client who started an SEO campaign with and ranked on page one three times!

Discover search terms and keywords relating to personal trainers using platforms like Semrush and Ahrefs. Include these phrases on your social media profiles, Google Business profile, website, blogs, and other digital channels.

In addition to keyword optimization, everything from website design layouts to article structuring can contribute to your SEO ranking. Practice and research are key to mastering this marketing approach and making yourself visible to potential clients.

When done successfully, sites like Google will rank your content well, and rank you higher in user search results.

9. Optimize Your Google My Business Profile

Many fitness businesses make the excuse of overlooking the potential of a Google My Business profile. Having a Google My Business profile doesn't just mean Google recognizes you as an operational business. It can also be an exceptional tool for lead generation.

To reach personal training clients, you want to show up when potential customers search for personal training and fitness services in your area. An optimized Google My Business profile can push you up search result rankings.

According to Google, businesses with finished Google My Business account setups were 2.7x more likely to stand out in search results. They also have a 70% higher chance of visitors looking into their business.

Prominence is another determining factor for search engine rank. Customer images and content, testimonials, reviews, and more can evolve how Google sees you. It can build your prominence to search engines and legitimacy to clients. 

Google also decides on local search result ranking by observing your relevance to searches. A Google My Business profile is a chance to prove why you are a relevant result for fitness and personal training searches. Do this by including relevant and target keywords in your profile bio, name, etc.

Create a Google My Business profile and optimize it for your personal training business today to reach more prospective clients. It will open you up to potential leads as Google will use its content to rank you higher for searches.

10. Use Online Ad Programs

There are many online ad programs to choose from. Some, called lead generation ads, are dedicated solely to bringing in more leads to your business. You can use online ad lead-generation strategies to direct traffic to your website, product pages, or lead-generation landing pages.

First, you can choose search ads that publish your advertising on relevant user search engines. This type of ad will immediately suggest your business at the top of rank results when users look for personal trainers. It will also usually have a 'Sponsored' tag.

Clicking on this link can lead users to your site or a landing page for them to enter their information. Google Ads also allows you to add call-to-action (CTA) buttons like 'Apply now' that initiate information forms for leads to fill out.

Facebook's Lead Ads have a similar feature where prospective clients can click and add their information. Facebook and social ads are another great option for lead generation.

Bonus Tip 1.​ Utilize the Power of Email Marketing

Email has been proven to be a powerful tool for businesses. For every dollar invested in an email marketing campaign, the return was approximately 36 dollars. It is a key generation marketing strategy and a wonderful form of advertising to explore.

Personalization is the key to mastering email marketing. Use email software that enables you to customize features and tailor each message according to the client's (or prospect's) specific needs. With this direct, personal approach, you'll stay in people's minds (and inboxes).

Who should you email? Reach out widely and leverage your existing connections with people.
Email past clients. Send cold emails. Share information with existing clients (ie: how they can participate in your referral or testimonial programs).

Bonus Tip 2. Make Yourself More Valuable

Generation strategies and marketing efforts can only do so much. When it comes down to it, potential clients want to be certain that you know your stuff. One way to attract new business leads is to immerse yourself in your industry and seek out new certifications that up your knowledge and skills.

This cements your expertise and ensures potential clients that you're dedicated to and invested in your field. It also builds trust in your understanding of the personal training industry

Bonus Tip 3. Create Packages That Retain and Recruit

So, you've got the skills and knowledge to attract clients? But are your packages and services also worth it? Another important factor that influences whether your generation efforts can even take off is your pricing packages and services. You have to ensure that what you have to offer is worth customers' time.

Try creating some exciting pricing package deals with discounts for clients and services that will tempt them. Scrap the standard 'Bronze, Silver and Gold' idea and swap it up for something more goal orientated like Muscle & Size programs, Fat Loss for Women, and Fit For Life.

You can also consider group packages like 'Couple Goals' sessions for two or corporate wellness programs.

Get creative by thinking about what potential clients might need and showing how your packages meet their goals.

​Bonus Tip 4. Track the Data

Finally, as you work on generating leads, it is important to evaluate the data. Analytics on platforms like Google Ads, your website, social media accounts, etc., will give you great insight into the effectiveness of your strategy. Reflect on which decisions or techniques have a higher return of leads and which don't work so well. Adapt your approaches where relevant.

This is an important step in developing lead generation practices that work but also evolving them where necessary.

​Work it Out: Grow Your Business Leads Today

If you're a personal trainer looking to reach potential clients and retain your existing customers, we'd love to help. Build your client base and nurture personal training leads through intentional marketing materials and a marketing strategy focused on high-quality leads.

Collaborate with us to create the perfect personal trainer website, master SEO, and plan your marketing to the tee!