Building Your Fitness Brand – 3 Steps to a Successful Personal Brand
The internet has given a lot of fitness lovers the opportunity to start their own fitness brand.
I feel that phrases like ‘personal branding’ and ‘marketing’ are thrown around so much nowadays, nobody can really understand what they mean. They’re always backed-up by “researched” mumbo-jumbo that speaks to you about broad concepts instead of what will help YOU improve YOUR business.
Today, let’s take the process of developing such a business and break it down to the actionable steps you should take if you want to develop your personal brand in the fitness industry!
1. What is a Personal Brand and How To Create One
For starters, we need to know the difference between branding and marketing.
Marketing is getting the word out for what you do. If you’re a fitness coach, that includes being on social media, running ads, funnels, getting people to visit your website, all of that.
Branding is all about the experience people get when they work with you. It’s a lot more emotional than rational and has to do with everything from the way you work with (and who you work with) to the way you present yourself online – your name, your logos and colors, your voice, your copywriting, even the comments you leave under other people’s comments.
Think about that – is the presentation and copywriting in your website too serious? Or too sweet-sounding?
There’s hardcore, pushing people to the edge coaches, there’s the laid-back, fitness lifestyle type coach, then the wellness coach, the diet coach…
You need to find a niche of people you can help with your knowledge and expertise. One of the biggest mistakes that I see a lot of personal brands making is trying to appeal to everyone.
We all work with different people who have different interests, so “developing your brand voice” means finding out who you want to be online and focusing on that target market.
You do that by:
- Making sure your website copy, your social media content, your talks, interviews and marketing materials all have the same style, vibe and energy. This builds trust within people and increases the exposure you get by making you more easily recognized online.
- Making sure you always have a clear next goal in mind and making them bigger over time.
Now that we know what branding is, let’s take a look at how to actually get the word out for your business, make sales, impact the lives of people, and become a voice recognized in such a crowded market!
2. How To Get Exposure for Yourself and Your Brand
Now that we know what our brand voice is and who we’re trying to help, it’s time we reach out to these people and give them value!
Always remember – you have to be congruent in all of these channels. Branding and marketing must go hand in hand like a lock and key. If one of them is missing, you risk coming across as either unprofessional or uninteresting.
Before you start getting more exposure you need to figure out one thing – where your audience is spending their time. For the fitness niche, there’s already a few great places you can go and build a solid foundation!
Here are a few ideas for channels where you can reach people online and engage potential clients for your fitness brand!
- Engaging people on social media – commenting, liking, following and messaging on Instagram and Facebook.
- Running Facebook and Google ads – to a landing page for a product (free or paid).
- Doing webinars, live trainings, even Instagram Live – just giving out free content or promoting courses on a webinar.
- Ranking higher on Google with SEO – absolutely crucial!
- Local events and networking – you can meet people to collaborate with.
- E-mail Marketing and collecting leads – the best way to communicate to your audience via text.
- Creating a blog or podcast – giving out free content to your audience.
- LinkedIn – setting up auto-responders and engaging people there.
These are only things that you can do yourself!
Keep in mind, one of the best ways to promote yourself online is to collaborate with other people in the fitness industry. If the branding is right and the energy matches between you, amazing things happen.
Doing guest posts on their social media and blogs, being a guest on their podcast, being in their YouTube videos, even on their Instagram stories. Even reaching out to an influencer is not a bad idea.
Another thing crucial to your success is to gather testimonials from the people you’ve helped. They will really help you identify your strengths and weaknesses, know what the people are thinking, and show people that you’re truly all about giving value!
What matters is getting the word out to as many as possible, right? So think about which of these channels you’re not using and start implementing them into your marketing strategy.
So, when you’re doing things the right way and people are seeing you, engaging with you, and approving of what you’re doing – how do you turn these views into profit for your business?
How do positively impact the lives of the most people while making the most sales and building your brand?
Let’s learn how!
3. Growing Your Brand and Making Profit
For someone who has been in the fitness industry for quite a long time, I can honestly say…
Every fitness industry personality is endorsing something nowadays.
And that’s a good thing!
Whether you decide to create your own product – be it a supplement, an E-book, a course, a clothing brand – or you decide to endorse others for a piece of the pie, selling products is the most obvious way to generate profit, so it goes first on our list.
Brands will have no problem paying you for representing their vision online. Mutual promotion between brands and ambassadors is a win-win way to hook your audience up with products you love using at great discounts – and get paid for it.
Chances are you’re already promoting products to your friends and community – you’re just not getting paid to do it!
But if you decide to create your own product, and you truly create it from start to finish and put a piece of yourself in it – people will love it and you will have success.
And always make sure to have a product you’re giving out for free! By doing that, the people whose ideologies your brand voice matches will become loyal followers you can keep giving to again, and again, and again.
If training and living healthy is a lifestyle for you, chances are you know a few things that can be beneficial to others.
And if you love working with people one on one and want to make a positive impact on their life – you can consider coaching as your go-to way to profit online.
Honestly, coaching others has changed my life as well.
I see so many positive, motivated and goal-driven people that it inspires me to work hard and be at my best self all the time. Watching someone’s life change in front of me and seeing them deal with their insecurities and giving them the confidence to take on the world has made me a completely different person.
And even though fitness coaching has become a huge industry, there’s still a spot for everyone who wants to do something unique and give value!
Bottom line is, the more people you help and the more people you reach, the more opportunities you’ll be open to.
If fitness is your lifestyle and you want to share that with the world – don’t hesitate and start a fitness brand!
It’s a great way to get paid for doing what you love, helping people achieve their goals and doing it while building a sustainable business. Nowadays, that can seem like a feat, but the opportunity is here, for you, now!
Now that you know the proper way to do develop a brand voice, get exposure and grow your brand, there’s just one thing you need to know…
Whether you’re going to promote brands, sell courses, or do online coaching, there’s a ton of people who love fitness, need help, and want to hear what you have to say.
Marketing is important so you can get the word out for yourself and speak to the world. But make sure your personal branding is on point – it is exactly what people will be hearing when you speak.
