About 10 months ago I moved from Ohio, where I had been living for a couple months to focus on finishing my doctoral dissertation to North Carolina to start on a new business venture. Before I could open my sport training facility there was much to be done with equipment, finding a location, waiting for lease agreements to process, etc. While doing all this I thought it would be wise to start building a client base by offering to train athletes at parks or high schools. The idea was that I would offer free training to a select couple people in an attempt to serve as an ‘on ramp’ for future clients. I was brand new to the area, didn’t have any network to speak of and I thought this might be good in helping to spread the word so I could ‘hit the ground running’ when I opened up my facility. While I did gain a couple people like this the free training idea wasn’t worth it. Of the handful of people I worked with only a couple are with me today. All of these individuals I trained for at least 2 months before opening my facility. Did they stop training with me because they didn’t like what I offered or weren’t getting results? Hell no! Everyone got much better and loved the training. What happened is that some moved on when their sport season came up and some moved on when it came time to bill them. It was as if they were shocked that the service wouldn’t be free forever. And it wasn’t as if the payment was something that got sprung on them all of a sudden and these were not people who couldn’t afford to pay. I do after all need to make a living. The problem however was mine in the making. I undervalued my services and set a precedent that became too comfortable. In retrospect, I should have provided the same services at a discounted rate and rewarded these first local clients for their early trust and continued loyalty by offering the same discounted rate as long as they kept training with me. As they say, hindsight is 20 / 20 but the circumstances were a nice lesson and provided real world support for a recent quote that made an appearance on the Athletic Lab wipeboard about a month ago:
The minute you settle for less than you deserve, you get less than you settled for.
-Dowd.
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ELNORABanks
January 6, 2010
[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Mike Young, PhD and Patrick Ward, Kurt Clark. Kurt Clark said: So true Mike! RT @mikeyoung: Medirected Blog: Free doesn’t Pay http://bit.ly/7VU4Ew [...]
January 6, 2010
Mike, I guess we have all learned some of our business the hard way. But if we don’t make mistakes, it means that we are not doing anything.
I don’t know if you have considered boarding your target market from just elite training to targeting the boomers that have just hit late 40′;s and early 50’s? Perhaps you are already doing that but all I have seen is you tweeting about elite athletes. After seeing a U-tube video from one of your links, I set a goal in Aug to train until I could do 20 pull ups all at once, by the end of 09. It took five months and 3K pull ups later I did 21 on 12-31-09. I printed out the instructions from one of the sites that I found from your link. I also printed the next work out routine that I plan to do from a site that I found from your link.
Boomers have the money and they want to stay young and in shape for as long as they can. When I was selling gym memberships a few years back, my sales improved when I changed my direction from selling health to selling the cosmetic effect that training will bring. Your service will save them time and they will get the most for their efforts. The money seemed to be secondary to getting results quickly and with less chance of injury. I would never had made the 20 pull ups had I not found the site giving me a blue print on how to do it.
I will keep RTing your tweets that I think have the kind of info that is usable for us normal people.
Tks Paul sends. If I am incorrect about not offering training for others other than the elite athlete, My bad. pa
January 6, 2010
The best lessons are often learned the hard way Mike. I learned a long time ago that you ALWAYS charge for your services (i.e. training, seminars, etc.) no matter how nominal a fee. That way, you “pre-qualify” your audience as people willing to pay for good service/information. I think it was Ian King that taught me that. Anyway, best of luck with your endeavors. I always enjoy reading your posts. Keep it up.
January 6, 2010
Awesome post dude. I have the same problem myself and I’m always kicking myself for undercharging.