When looking to build a personal training business (or any business for that matter), referrals are the best and least expensive form of marketing you can ask for. If you provide a great service and give your clients what they are paying for, then new client referrals should be almost automatic.  It’s as simple as someone doing something they enjoy or finding a new business they like; they tend to tell family, friends, and colleagues about it.  So just like telling your friends about a new restaurant you tried and loved, your clients will tell everyone they know about this AMAZING trainer they have hired.  The key to grow your business faster is to not just sit around and wait for these referrals, it’s OK to give your current client’s a little push to get those referrals coming in faster.

Here are 3 quick tips you can use to speed up the referral process:

1. Reward client referrals 

Run a discount or incentive for current clients who refer a friend that signs up for training.  This could be anything that you feel is a fair reimbursement for spreading good word about your business, such as 25% off their next month or a free t-shirt, for example.  Also, make sure all of your client’s know all about your “refer a friend” program when they hire you and what kind of prizes they can get should a friend sign up.

2. Get active on social media

Tag client’s in posts on social media for friends and family to see their progress.  These could be a short Instagram video of their workout that you share on your business social media outlets or perhaps a screen-shot of one of your Skype progress checks with a comment like “Just did our monthly progress check with “Jimmy” and he has dropped another 8lbs and 10 inches! Way to go “Jimmy” keep up the great work!!”.  This creates what I like to call the “jealousy effect” that I have talked about in previous blog posts, which means people see others doing well and they want it too.  This get’s people “Facebook stalking” your client and then internet stalking you and your business to see if you could perhaps help them lose weight like their friend “Jimmy”.  Make sure you keep posts really casual and personal as personality can be the determining factor of whether a post get’s attention or not.

3. Create coupons

Provide your clients with referral cards complete with your contact information and a free trial offer.   For one on one (in-person) clients I use coupons that are business card size, but perhaps a better option for online training clients would be a coupon code such as “FRIEND” that they can use when they log-in or an email link that they can then forward on to their friends.

It’s important to not pressure your clients to continue to refer you to their friends and family, but making it easy and worth their while is always a great way to spread word about your business.  There are many other ways to increase client referrals with your online training business, so if you can think of anymore feel free to share them with me in the comments below.