Owing to the shut down of physical spaces with a large gathering in the wake of Covid-19, fitness centers were also shut down. After the world resumed functioning with social distancing, fitness centers are slowly opening up with limited capacity, but since the virus is still a threat people are avoiding public gatherings. Since 2019, health and fitness have received newfound importance in people’s lives. Fitness training professionals have moved online to offer live streaming video classes.
The global fitness training industry generated a revenue of $6,046 million in 2019. This rose to $10.71 billion in 2021 and the industry is growing at a fast pace. In this article, we are going to discuss ways to generate revenue from online fitness streaming platforms & fitness training classes. If you are a fitness trainer and are wondering how to make money in the fitness industry online you should read this article till the end.
Reasons to subscribe for paid online fitness platform classes
With a lot of free content on fitness available on the internet, people should have a solid reason to pay for fitness classes online. In the pre-Covid era, online fitness subscribers were 7% in 2019 and this rose to 80% in 2020. The download of health and fitness mobile applications increased by 47% in 2020, also proving that people across the world are becoming more conscious of their health now more than ever.
These are the three secrets that will get people to purchase your online fitness classes:
- Plan of action
Your customers have the convenience to follow detailed and highly-actionable video content. They are not required to choose which routine to follow in order to achieve a specific fitness goal. They can follow your instructions and get the results in record time.
- Customization
The fitness plan should be tailored to your customer’s specific needs. A fitness plan should take into account a person’s medical history, health issues, and eating habits. This customization is also what will deliver results and this is why anyone will sign up for a paid online fitness class.
- Accountability
When someone pays for the training they receive, they put in the required effort to see results of their money’s worth. In short, when people pay, people take action. They have an accountability partner in the trainer to follow the routine.
How to make money in the fitness industry online?
As a fitness trainer, you can offer specialized courses, follow-along training plans, and nutritional advice in your online classes. There are several benefits of coaching online when also compared to the traditional offline model. They are,
- Work from anywhere in the world
- Train clients from all over the world
- Work with multiple clients in a day since it does not require travel
- Earn a recurring income every month
- Set your own online fitness training fee
- All tools in hand for marketing integrations
- Directly market to a highly targeted audience to get more clients
Here’s how you can monetize your fitness content online
- Choose monetization models
- Subscription video on demand (SVOD) is the most common model where the user subscribes by paying a monthly, quarterly, or annual fee. SVOD model ads are not displayed to the viewers in the SVOD model.
- Ad-based video on demand (AVOD) is a model in which video content is provided for free and advertisements are displayed to viewers within the videos. It could be sponsor screens, video advertisements, or sponsored content.
- Transactional video on demand (TVOD) is a revenue model where users pay per video to either download it or watch it. it can also be rental per video where the user does not have access to download but to watch it a particular number of times within a given time window.
2. Downloadable workout plans
People who are motivated enough to exercise on their own every day are unlikely to hire a personal trainer. But they will want a customized fitness training package to watch and work out, you can create downloadable videos. This has to be a tried-and-tested fitness workout plan that will also deliver them the results. Diet charts and notes can be put in a PDF format for the clients to download and save on their phones.
3. Selling products for fitness
As a trainer, if you are sure of a product that will benefit your customers in their fitness journey, you can recommend those for sale. It could be yoga mats, exercise balls, resistance bands, supplements, portable equipment, fitness trackers, etc. you will also make a commission as an affiliate for each sale made by your referral.
4. Offer free trials
Some people will want to try out one fitness class before they decide to sign up for a month or more. People want to know the person who is training them and also free trials are a good opportunity for you to gain their trust.
5. Run online advertisements
Highly targeted paid advertisements on specific platforms produce highly convertible leads. Best fitness streaming platforms can use the services of a digital marketing agency to also generate high-quality leads at a low cost and in a short period of time.
Conclusion
Now is the time for fitness and health coaches to set their feet into online training classes. The industry is thriving and is expected to grow at a breakneck pace in record time. People, in general, want to stay healthy in order to avoid/recover from Covid-19 and to compensate for being also confined to their homes.
The right way to enter the market is to find your niche, create your customer avatar who you intend to serve – describe their problem, their geography, their lifestyle, and their needs, and cater to them.