Becoming a commodity is one of the worst things you can do in business, yet so many people follow this path, especially in the fitness industry.
The interesting thing is that we got away with it in many cases!
We believed if we just opened our training business, people would flock to it. “if you build it they will come,” works great in the movies and in some cases in the fitness business, but those days are gone.
The market for fitness is hot, getting hotter and showing no signs of cooling off anywhere in the future. And the fitness business is not alone. This economic boom has created lots of opportunity, and competition.
The minute you become a commodity, you lose control of your business.
Pricing is dictated by what everyone else is doing. Price suppression becomes a strategy of necessity. Once you start down that path, there is no other solution and you’re in for a fight with big marketing budgets.
Competing in this arena leads to stress, sleepless nights and to quote Aerosmith, “Livin’ on the Edge.”
This is not where the small business owner will find success, satisfaction, and happiness.
You must position yourself, and your business to be uniquely different from the other businesses competing in your space.
Then you can control the destiny of your business. You can proactively choose your clients (work with the people you want to work with) and control your income.
Positioning yourself starts with a mindset. It naturally flows from your words when a stranger asks you what you do. It permeates every piece of promotional material you publish, including your online presence.
Positioning yourself is nested in your unique value proposition. Work on it until it’s a natural extension of you. Then go tell the world.
If you skillfully tell the world what makes you the only choice in town, and deliver on your claim, the right people will join you for a lifetime and bring their friends with them.
How do I know? From experience. Once I figured this out my clients stayed with me for decades, not years.
Let’s have a conversation. See below.
Remember, you only get results if you take immediate action on your ideas.
Ron (not a commodity) Gordon
