An Omnichannel Approach: The Future of Personal Training

How an omnichannel approach can make your club’s personal training services your No. 1 profit center.

Omnichannel hybrid services. Try saying that five times fast. It may be quite the mouthful, but it’s also the future of personal training and a key strategy for making your club’s personal training services its No. 1 profit center.

You may already be familiar with the concept of hybrid training — a methodology that brings together elements of both in-person and online coaching to offer club members a complete fitness and wellness journey that extends far beyond the gym doors.

This training modality has been growing in popularity for a few years now, but in 2021, hybrid training established itself as a “must-have service” for modern fitness clubs. Its adoption was accelerated by evolving health and safety requirements and the changing preferences of consumers who drastically cut back on their visits to the gym, but rapidly adopted new technologies to supplement their disrupted fitness routines.

Now, even as restrictions are lifting and options for in-person services are back on the table, club members aren’t giving up their new favorite apps, subscriptions, wearables or at-home equipment.

Because of this, hybrid training isn’t going anywhere. It is, however, evolving by embracing the many options available to modern club members and making them all part of the hybrid experience. This is where the omnichannel piece comes in.

Instead of clubs viewing those apps, subscriptions, wearables, and pieces of at-home equipment as threats to their personal training services, cutting-edge clubs today are using them as elements to be leveraged in a member’s training program. Each channel as they’re called represents an opportunity for the club and its trainers to build deeper bonds with their members and deliver the kind of training that fits seamlessly into their members’ lives — the very same kind that also boosts retention and member lifetime value.

If a member is using a Peloton or Mirror between sessions, those workouts get added to their program. If they use a meditation or sleep app, play in a rec sports league or subscribe to a nutrition service, that’s added too. Even if they’re just going for weekend hikes or long walks in their neighborhoods each night, it’s all added. Whatever they’re doing between their in-person sessions is incorporated into their programming — with the club at the heart of it all — offering accountability, guidance and motivation.

Thanks to the already flexible and affordable nature of hybrid training — now coupled with this holistic and extended coaching experience — omnichannel hybrid training is poised to become the most sought-after type of personal training by club members around the world, and the next big revenue stream for clubs.

For fitness clubs that have already dipped their toes into the world of online fitness and digitized their existing offerings, omnichannel hybrid training can and should be the cornerstone of their revenue strategy for 2022 and beyond. While for those who’ve held true to their traditional model, there has never been a better time to take the leap and upgrade their tech stack.

With omnichannel hybrid training, it’s time for fitness clubs to extend their reach, level up the way they deliver on member wants and needs and become part of the future of fitness.