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Stellar Client Service in 10 Simple Steps For Your Pilates Business

If you’re like me, you’ve had plenty of experience with BAD client service. Just think about the last time you had a bad experience with a product or a service. Perhaps the product or service did not live up to the sales pitch. Maybe the company was unresponsive to your calls or emails. Maybe they did not do what they said they were going to do. 

A lack of client service usually stems from a lack of client focus. Over the last number of months, I’ve been watching real closely (don’t tell them!) my personal Pilates business owner clients who are crushing it right now and identified a number of trends in their client service approach.

In addition to the 10 points below I’ve noticed one common theme – all of them fundamentally GET the expression “Our job is to serve you”

The good news is, it’s not hard to give great client service in your Pilates business. You simply have to be aware and make it a priority. The following 10 tips will help you offer stellar client service:

1. Be Accessible

Your Pilates clients should be able to get a hold of you if they have a question. Provide multiple ways for your clients to get in contact with you.

2. Respond in a Timely Manner

Make it your policy to return all phone calls or emails within 24 hours or less. And, if you cannot commit to that, then determine what timeframe you can manage and let your clients know upfront they can expect to hear back from you within that amount of time. 

3. Listen to Your Clients

Often when a client calls or expresses a complaint they just want to be heard. In fact, sometimes, just listening is all you need to do. Take the time to listen to what your clients have to say before you start responding or defending your service. They may just have a point. This simple rule has won so much business for these clients – I can’t count how often these business owners have told me they have turned what appeared at first to be a complaint into a sale by listening.  

4. Treat Your Clients with Respect

It goes without saying, right?, however as your Pilates business grows and you get more personalities coming into your business it does get tougher at times. Even if the client on the other end of the phone is acting irrationally, or being rude, don’t lower yourself to their level by reciprocating. Treat everyone with respect and you will be respected in return. Plus, you never know when someone’s just having a bad day, and they happen to be taking it out on you (we’ve all done it).  

5. Don’t Argue With Your Clients

You can never win an argument with a client. Because if you do win, you’ve more than likely alienated the client and you’ve lost their business. We all know the client isn’t really always right, but instead of focusing on what went wrong and defending yourself, focus on how you can solve the problem or fix the situation. 

6. Honour Your Commitments

If you say you will answer emails, then answer them. If you offer a guarantee, then honour it. Nothing spoils a client relationship faster than being promised something and not getting it.

7. Do What You Say

If you say you’re going to call someone on Tuesday, call them on Tuesday. It’s as simple as that. If you want your clients to trust and believe you, you have to follow through and do what you say. Goes to another point that these Pilates clients of mine are all highly organised. Little things matter to your clients and once you get that it makes all the difference.  

8. Focus on Making Client Relationships, Not Sales

The long-term success of your Pilates business rests on your ability to make long-term client relationships. If you sacrifice relationships to make short-term sales, your business will be short-lived.

9. Be honest

Don’t exaggerate the results your Pilates will provide just be honest and direct about what you can deliver and the role they have in making their experience a success.

10. Admit When You Make a Mistake

No one’s perfect. We all make mistakes; it’s part of learning. So, when you do make a mistake, don’t try to cover it up or deny it. Just admit it and if necessary, do something to make the situation right. Your clients will appreciate it and they’ll be more likely to stay clients.

So how does your client service measure up in your Pilates business?  Are you practicing these 10 steps and offering stellar client service? If not, I challenge you to take your service up a notch. Approach it like Ken Blanchard and instead of just being satisfied with happy clients, create “Raving Fans” (a great little book if you haven’t read it).

Commit to putting these 10 tips into practice. Get to know your clients more. Continue to make them the focus and feel extra special. It’s one of the keys to business success and best of all, it doesn’t cost very much!

To Your Success

Brendan

3 Ways Brendan can help your Pilates Business to grow right now;

1. Join the Free FB group dedicated to Pilates Business Owners only to get free resources, information, support, training and much more.

2. Run your business through his Profit Acceleration Simulator and see all of the potential growth areas – many you won’t even have thought of!. Download your personalised 12 month roadmap – all absolutely FREE.

3. Book a no obligation Pilates Profit Acceleration Jumpstart call with Brendan and see for yourself the proven steps he’s taking with other Pilates business owners to transform their businesses and lives. In this session Brendan guarantees to uncover anywhere between €25k – €75k of hidden profits within your business.
Book an inquiry session today and change the direction of your business and your life forever.

What it Takes to Succeed in a Pilates Business!

Business is tough in today’s world! Most small businesses go bankrupt or are closed abruptly in the first five years. Over the course of the next five years many of the remainders also “pack up” shop and lock their doors. Why do so many businesses fail?

The reasons lie in three main spheres. Those spheres of influence can be labeled personal, customer, and operations.

The Personal Sphere deals with the owner’s personal motivation to start a business. For example, if an owner wants to start their own Pilates business, but isn’t willing to make the sacrifices necessary to make it thrive, then they are at a disadvantage when compared to other motivated businesspeople. When a business starts for the first time often it doesn’t have a lot of money. Owners are required to sacrifice time, money, and happiness to succeed. If you can’t do that, it is unlikely that your Pilates business will flourish. Many times owners thought they could handle the hardship but once the novelty of “being your own boss” wears off they close the door. You see there’s a big difference between teaching Pilates and running a Pilates business.

The Customer Sphere is one of the most important components of your Pilates business. Without customers you do not have sales, without sales you do not have money and without money you do not have a business. Many factors go into generating a good customer base. In the beginning you must have a cost-effective marketing strategy that targets your intended buyers. This can be done by developing a psychological profile of your customer and then advertising in those places that they frequent. Because it is more expensive to get a new customer than it is to keep one you must make sure they are satisfied with your business and offering. Keep in touch with them by sending them a follow-up letter with a survey, check in with them from time to time, find out what’s keeping them loyal and do more of it.

The Operations Sphere is only second to the Customer Sphere. In operations you must have an appropriate method for running your business, for reducing costs, keeping track of paperwork, and maintaining improvement week after weeks and year after year.  Operations can also take into effect the accounting, timetabling, scheduling of instructors, answering queries and pushing the business forward. Do you have a clear roadmap for where you want to get to in your Pilates business, has the vision been set and are you actually working towards it.

If all of these three components are well thought out and are appropriately designed you will increase your chances of survival. Failure to understand the integral details of your Pilates business and what it takes to succeed may mean failure in the long run. If you are having difficulty putting all the pieces together then consider us having a chat – the simple reality is that I can show you upfront how any investment is offset against what your business will gain and I actually 100% guarantee that statement in writing.

To Your Success

Brendan

3 Ways Brendan can help your Pilates Business to grow right now;

1. Join the Free FB group dedicated to Pilates Business Owners only to get free resources, information, support, training and much more.

2. Run your business through his Profit Acceleration Simulator and see all of the potential growth areas – many you won’t even have thought of!. Download your personalised 12 month roadmap – all absolutely FREE.

3. Book a no obligation Pilates Profit Acceleration Jumpstart call with Brendan and see for yourself the proven steps he’s taking with other Pilates business owners to transform their businesses and lives. In this session Brendan guarantees to uncover anywhere between €25k – €75k of hidden profits within your business.
Book an inquiry session today and change the direction of your business and your life forever.

How Well Do You Know Your Pilates Prospects?

Take this 10-Point Quiz to Find Out

It’s crucial to know your prospects if you want to market effectively to them and win new business.

Take this quick quiz to see how well you know and understand your prospects. If you can’t answer these questions, how can you be sure you are connecting with your audience in a relevant and meaningful way? How can you be sure you are reaching them with a compelling message about your services? How can you be sure you are tapping into the conversation they are already having inside their own head with respect to Pilates? 

1. Who are they?
2. Where do they live … work … play?
3. What problem do they have that you can solve?
4. How does Pilates fit into their life?
5. Where do they get information regarding Pilates?
6. What is most important to them?
7. What are they most afraid of?
8. What is their emotional connection to their health?
9. How will they rationalize purchasing Pilates?
10. What’s stopping them from signing up?

How’d you do?  If you can’t answer these questions, odds are your messaging isn’t connecting with your prospects. And if your message is not connecting with them, you won’t be as successful in getting them to join up.

Take the time to get to know your clients and prospects. Learn all you can about them. Use this quiz as a guide. When you do you’ll be able to speak directly to their needs and concerns, they will respond. And your business will thrive.

To Your Success

Brendan

3 Ways Brendan can help your Pilates Business to grow right now;

1. Join the Free FB group dedicated to Pilates Business Owners only to get free resources, information, support, training and much more.
2. Run your business through his Profit Acceleration Simulator and see all of the potential growth areas – many you won’t even have thought of!. Download your personalised 12 month roadmap – all absolutely FREE.
3. Book a no obligation Pilates Profit Acceleration Jumpstart call with Brendan and see for yourself the proven steps he’s taking with other Pilates business owners to transform their businesses and lives. In this session Brendan guarantees to uncover anywhere between €25k – €75k of hidden profits within your business.
   Book an inquiry session today and change the direction of your business and your life forever.

Highly Effective Strategies for Overcoming Procrastination In Your Pilates Business & Life

In this day and age we are so inundated with choice and opportunity that you might even say we are spoiled for choice. There is just so much that we could do that we often end up not doing anything at all. Procrastination is one of the biggest dream killers. In a world where there is so much demand for your attention it is becoming ever more difficult to stay focused and act on the things that would truly give you an extraordinary quality of life. Time is, was and will always be your most valuable asset and the way you use it will determine what you create or fail to create with and for your life. Having an effective strategy for overcoming procrastination is critical if you truly want to push past short-term obstacles to create a life of fulfilment.

The abundance that modern life offers us tends to overwhelm us which leads to an emotional overload that will distract you and scatter your effort and concentration. There simply isn’t enough time to do everything, but there is always enough time for the most important things in your life. Success at anything in life, whether it be your finances, your relationships or your Pilates business, requires an investment of time and effort from you. You need to focus and concentrate your physical and emotional resources on creating a desired result.

The first step in overcoming procrastination is to get clear on exactly what you want from your Pilates Business and your life. This clarity will give you the power to look past distractions that may throw you off course. It gives you a direction and a target and will help to build a mental picture for your life. One of the most destructive effects of procrastination is that it makes you feel out of control; like the events of your life are controlling you. If you don’t know what you want it is all too easy to jump from one task to the next. Apart from knowing what you want you should also develop some strong reasons why you want it. This will give you a sense of purpose and motivation that is critical for staying focused long term.

The truth is that most people know what they need to do to create their life the way they want it. The challenge is not with knowing what to do, but in doing what you know. The only way you will create any result in your Pilates business and life is by taking action and procrastination is what prevents you from acting on the very things you know would give you a greater business and quality of life. The reason why people procrastinate is primarily because of fear, especially fear of failure. By not taking action and postponing important actions you avoid the potential for failing. The only reason why you procrastinate about anything is because at some level you link more pain to taking action than to not taking action. The ridiculous truth is that these “links” are mostly conjured up (by you) in your mind and they are not even real. When you make a task too big in your mind it will overwhelm you and it would seem too difficult and too big and you will end up procrastinating.

One of the most powerful strategies for overcoming procrastination is to learn how to break your tasks up into bite size pieces. Any task, no matter how big, can be broken down into small manageable tasks that are easy to do. If you focus on bringing in 50 new clients it will probably put you off immediately, but if you focus on creating a workshop, telling people about what you do, giving a talk, having an open day, providing people with useful information etc. small achievable tasks that you know you can do, the overall goal becomes more believable and achievable. The power of chunking down your “big” tasks empowers you to take back control of any overwhelming situation – you cut it down to size. Your size.  

One of the quickest ways to overcome procrastination is to learn and utilize the power of immediacy. What can you do immediately? What action can you take right now that will move you closer to your goal? Doing something, no matter how small, will immediately break your mental pattern of procrastination and put you back in control. Taking the first step, even if it is small will create momentum and you will almost automatically be driven to take another step. Don’t wait for everything to be perfect before you take the first step. Just do it. Just get it going and improve as you go along. Often you will only know what to do next after taking that first step.

There are many strategies and skills you can use for overcoming procrastination. You don’t have to be stuck or spinning your wheels. Like any skill you need to learn and practise it until you get good at it. Eventually it will become an automatic response and you will develop the habit of taking action despite your fears and apparent limitations. If you focused on that first workshop, learned from it and honed your delivery could you repeat it? Of course the answer is YES and now could you repeat it monthly? And if you did that for the next 12 months how many of those 50 new clients would you have secured over that year!

If you’re still not sure email me and I will give you one task right now that you can take to improve your Pilates business and it won’t cost you but a few minutes of your time. But you may just overthink that offer and do nothing at all!!!    

To Your Continued Success

Brendan

3 Ways Brendan can help your Pilates Business to grow right now;

1. Join the Free FB group dedicated to Pilates Business Owners only to get free resources, information, support, training and much more.
   
2. Run your business through his Profit Acceleration Simulator and see all of the potential growth areas – many you won’t even have thought of!. Download your personalised 12 month roadmap – all absolutely FREE.
   
3. Book a no obligation Pilates Profit Acceleration Jumpstart call with Brendan and see for yourself the proven steps he’s taking with other Pilates business owners to transform their businesses and lives. In this session Brendan guarantees to uncover anywhere between €25k – €75k of hidden profits within your business.
   Book an inquiry session today and change the direction of your business and your life forever.

Feeling Overwhelmed In Your Pilates Business And Life

I was leading a conversation recently with some business owners. The hot subject up for discussion was how “overwhelmed,” beat, tired, and burned-out many of the people were feeling due to the “too much to do / can’t stop now” syndrome.

Are you one of those people who can’t seem to stop “doing?”

I have yet to meet anyone who hasn’t felt overwhelmed from time to time. Since it tends to feel uncomfortable, if not downright unpleasant, we tend to view it as negative and as a weakness. We don’t dare to admit we are overwhelmed or dare to talk about it, which can leave us feeling isolated and alone, further exacerbating the feeling. We often deny we are overwhelmed because we do not know how to stop the frenetic behavior that leads to this feeling. So we do nothing. Why do we do this to ourselves? Primarily, this syndrome occurs in our work life but it can carry over to our personal and family life, and it frequently does.

Focusing on projects often begins with good intentions but we can quickly and easily be overwhelmed if we do not have a plan to minimize and balance our work. Getting the project finalized for your team, meeting more clients, trying to generate leads, writing the copy for your website, designing the new sales brochure or completing the 90-day marketing plan are extremely important – but having a balanced, healthy life is equally important.

This stressful pattern is telling you to change your life! Once you get this message, it is easier to identify the steps you need to take to shift out of the behavior quickly.

Following are helpful strategies gleaned from my personal experience and from my work with coaching clients who are burned out, growing cranky, frustrated and even depressed. These strategies immediately diminish feelings of being overwhelmed so you can refocus and make some work/life balance decisions.

• Stop what you are doing for a few minutes and take a break. Go for a short walk, sit outside under a tree, meditate, breathe deeply, go to a movie, call a friend to have coffee and share what is going on.

• Get a piece of paper and make two columns. In one column, list urgent things you need to do this week. In the other column, list those projects that you can delegate, hire or barter to be done.

• Eliminate, eliminate, eliminate. Unsubscribe to unnecessary e-mail, organize your desk and office to decrease clutter, stop attending meetings, get off committees and decrease volunteering at fundraisers unless you have a total passion for the organization and the cause.

• Do not spend time with people whom you do not like. Assess your friends and business colleagues. Do they support and honor who you are? If they are negative and don’t share your vision for your dreams, don’t spend another minute with them.

• Decide what is most important in your life. If you want a balanced life, you will have to make changes in your life to allow this to happen. That takes some time and planning but it will be well worth the improvement in your life!

• Take an action step today to make a change in your life! Call a friend who will support you, take a class to get organized, or work with a coach who will support and motivate you to have a more balanced life.

To Your Success

Brendan

3 Ways Brendan can help your Pilates Business to grow right now;

1. Join the Free FB group dedicated to Pilates Business Owners only to get free resources, information, support, training and much more.
   
2. Run your business through his Profit Acceleration Simulator and see all of the potential growth areas – many you won’t even have thought of!. Download your personalised 12 month roadmap – all absolutely FREE.
   
3. Book a no obligation Pilates Profit Acceleration Jumpstart call with Brendan and see for yourself the proven steps he’s taking with other Pilates business owners to transform their businesses and lives. In this session Brendan guarantees to uncover anywhere between €25k – €75k of hidden profits within your business.
   Book an inquiry session today and change the direction of your business and your life forever.