I read ‘The Four-Hour Work Week’ by Tim Ferriss in 2007, basically all about how to cut back on the hours you work, automate stuff in your life and go on vacation and still make money, lol.

And at the time, I remember thinking, “Gee Tim, must be nice for you! But this would never work for me. You don’t understand, I’m a personal trainer AND I NEED MORE CLIENTS!”

I was living in constant anxiety and scarcity.

I thought my clients were going to leave me every second. I was worried if I asked for more money, they’d be out the door. I dealt with problem clients by just saying, “It’s fine, no, no, I’m cool when you cancel at the last second, no problem!”

Lolol.

Meanwhile I was drowning.

I was working 70+ hours a week, training at multiple gyms, taking any money anyone would pay me, begging for business and becoming more resentful and exhausted.

Enter Tim.

And though I immediately discounted much of what he preached (because I grew up a hard worker who felt like if every second of my day wasn’t packed, well, certainly I could work more, yea?), I slowly, sloooooowly started testing the waters.

And from 2007 to 2012, I was able to slowly not only cut back on my hours training, but somehow make more money in less time spent on the gym floor, and eventually quit my full-time job and all my PT clients to move fully online.

Look, THAT’S 5 YEARS!

Which can feel like a long time, but not in the grand scheme of things considering this was my life and I simply could not keep doing the Fitness Hustle like I was.

So today I want to share 3 main switches you can start to make to open up your time, stop living in scarcity and start making a bigger impact through leveraging your expertise and experience, ready?

1) Compartmentalize your schedule.

Two things that worked for me with clients:

ONE: Asking them to move 15-30 minutes one direction of the other, so that I eliminated all down-time between sessions.

I hated having 15-60 min free time between clients because it was basically enough time to eat or check social media, but not enough time to actually create anything substantial. My clients were waaaay more accommodating than I thought they would be, because surprise, surprise, they were just as attached to me as I to them.

TWO: I moved from 60-min sessions to 30-min sessions.

I had them warm-up and cool-down/stretch on their own, so when we started, we could jump right into the session. As a result, people paid less (say, $40 instead of $70) but I was able to now take 2 people per hour ($80 total) versus one for $70, and make more money in less time.

The result of both of those switches was that I was able to be at the gym for less time, and created “block time” in my schedule—big 2-4 hour time “chunks” that I could be doing creative work, like blogging and social media posts to build JillFit.

2) Say goodbye to problem clients (or Energy Vampires or Negative Nancies or naysayers).

Gah! Firing my first client was such a toughie for me!

It was hard because in my mind, the person with the green stuff is in charge, and me—as a lowly trainer—I am at the mercy of the client. BUT, the client also agreed that their money was worth the same amount as my time, so don’t I have a say, too?

Clients (or people in your life) who always show up late, who text you nonstop with no regard to boundaries, who cancel at the last second—these are the ones who need to go.

Hard, because we want to give people the benefit of the doubt, but here’s the thing:

Us continuing to mess with people who don’t respect us or our boundaries puts us in the same category as them: not respecting ourselves.

And when we release the need to accommodate and overextend, we open up our energy (and actual time in our schedule) for the people who not only respect us, but can’t wait to be there!

After I started letting go of people who didn’t get me or weren’t able to compromise, I was FLOORED by the clients who came into my life who were easy, grateful and valued my time and services.

And, they were also happy to pay more. Which brings me to #3…

3) Increase your prices (but more importantly, increase the value you bring).

Here’s what gets missed: people don’t necessarily want the cheapest thing. They want the best value, which includes achieving their desired outcomes. So, your only job is to be the best at what you do.

Ten years ago, I started doing things to enhance the value of my services as a trainer.

I bumped my prices FAR AND ABOVE industry standard for my area (lost 10% of my clients as a result, but ended up making more money over all) and assumed the role as best trainer in town.

I just declared it. And then, I went about making it true.

I added online support, nutrition coaching, books and resources for my clients, meeting for coffee dates and added meet-ups, etc.

My support did not end at the end of the session, I made sure they had every resource they needed to be successful the other 23 hours of the day.

And most importantly, I started walking my walk and invested in myself.

I hired my first business coach, worked to achieve top certifications, I read book after book on nutrition and habit change, spent my weekends at business conferences and continued to rigorously add tools to my coaching tool belt.

I wanted to be indispensable to my clients.

I did everything I possibly could to bring the highest value to them (and asked for the commensurate compensation as a result).

The key here was not asking for more money from them, but the willingness to continue striving as a professional.

Investing—time, effort and actual money—changed everything for me.

I became the professional who wasn’t scared of losing clients because I was so confident in my ability to bring so much value, and I also trusted that if I lost one, there’d be 2-3 right around the corner to take their place.

This is a mindset shift!

But one backed up by actual competency, as a result of taking massive action in my business.

And now I want to give you the opportunity to up-level your skillset too.

Best of You Business Boot Camp, the 12-Month Online Business Coaching Program for health/fitness professionals is open for enrollment this week only.

This is the most robust education for those who want to increase their online coaching services, reach more people and free up their time from the gym.

If today’s email resonates with you, and you’re like, yep, yep, I need that, I need to do this stuff, then this is your opportunity to SHOW YOURSELF how much you’re worth.

Our investment in ourselves is the closest thing we have to guaranteed success.

Are you ready to FINALLY take the leap?

The time will never be “just right,” but I know one thing for sure: I wish I started earlier. I wish I did more with my online business earlier. I wish I started reaching people all over the world with my messages earlier.

A year from now, you’ll wish you’d started.

I can’t wait to see what you create in the next 12 months!

You can check out all the details for BOY Business Boot Camp RIGHT HERE.

The deadline is Tuesday May 22^nd, 2018. Not sure when it’s going to be opening up again, so be sure to grab your spot ASAP.

Let me know if you have any questions and legoooo!

Xo,

Jill