Volo Innovations

We all know one; some even live with them, control freaks. Now being this kind of freak can have benefits but for the fitness entrepreneur it could lead to major disaster and even failure in their business plans.

First thing you need to know is are you a control freak?

Second thing is do you have control freaks in your business, either as partners or staff?

If any of the following symptoms apply to you then chances are you are a little freaky in the control department. You may need a non-biased evaluator to read the list for you, if you can let them.

1. You brag, boast or often tell people how you never take vacations or you work during vacations and you need to tell people about it
2. You are always swamped with a backlog of to do items on your list that could go on for months even years
3. You are often angry when other let you down or make a mistake
4. People ask you a ton of questions, mostly because you are angry when they make mistakes
5. Your employees are actually annoyed when they see you coming because you constantly check up on them, your excuse for this is if you didn’t nothing would get done

And the number one way you can tell you are a control freak....

You honestly believe that nobody else can do it better than you.

So now you know you are a control freak. The good news is that most first time entrepreneurs are. The bad news; it is also one of the top reasons a lot of fitness businesses fail. What can you do about it? Simple, let go! You need to allow others around you to take things on or you need to hire to get things done. For some of you that are too far gone in the control deep end you may need to start with a good counselling session. But most I assume just need to learn how to do the following 5 things to have success in your fitness business.

Success will come faster and more often if you can implement these 5 steps:

1. Hire people; it is good to hire the right people but even if they turn out to be wrong the first time around it is better than not even trying. Hiring forces you to departmentalise your business and starts the process of finding the things that you can let go of. 2. Delegate; assume that you’ve hired you now need to give them something to do, if you don’t they will either quit, never a good feeling, or just do nothing even a worse feeling as it reinforces your faulty belief that only you can do it.
3. Learn to trust others; ok this is probably the hardest of all the things a freak needs to do because trust is typically earned but since control freaks tend to be too involved in projects they need to completely trust people without checking up on them and they will not know if the person can even do the task required.
4. Learn that mistakes are a fact of life; some would even argue that if we did not have mistakes we could not have any success. Accept, embrace and learn how to turn a mistake into a positive by growing from them and trying to never repeat the same mistake twice.
5 Learn how to build a great sandwich; not the kind you eat but more a way that you communicate with others. Compliment, suggest and then reassure the person they can do it as well as you or even better, this turns you into the mentor instead of the ogre that some staff may see you as.

By enlisting some of the above techniques and possible some therapy even the most controlling person can learn to let go, trust and accept that other people are there to help and not hinder the growth of their business.

This is how any entrepreneur will succeed because the greater your success the more your business venture will attract qualified people to assist in achieving greatness beyond your dreams.

There are many different ways to grow your fitness business like networking, business management and marketing or creating referral systems. Generally any personal trainer can implement these concepts into their fitness business almost instantly.

One thing that people have trouble implementing, but it is a great way to take your business to the next level, is public speaking.

Now you may speak in front of people all day long but you may not realize that doing a public speaking event and teaching private or group exercise class are totally different.

1) In group exercise you are in your zone, you are the leader everyone is following you and they do as you say, sure some may not and some may do it poorly but this is not even going to register with you when you are in the zone. In public speaking the people are there for information not instruction this is a key difference because they will feel more justified in challenging your information and asking you questions on how you know this.

Best advice; make sure you are an expert before you do a talk on a subject, do research know where the information comes from and be prepared to defend what you are saying- without getting defensive.

2) In group exercise people have signed up and even paid to be there or it is part of a membership but even a person who does not like a class or training session will very rarely leave because they feel an obligation to stay because they want to get fit, even if they do not like it. In public speaking this could not be any more the opposite, people feel compelled to leave they actually want to go and do something else have lunch, make a phone call or even take a nap some will even do this during your talk.

Best advice; you need to really WOW them into staying and listening to you your topic and delivery needs to be clean, clear and compelling in other words tell a story that elicits emotion.

3) In group exercise you can cover up a screw up easily, if you ask people do something and you are demonstrating a different exercise you can say that you are testing them or that you did not say 'Simon Says'. However in public speaking once it is out there it is out there and you cannot take it back.

Best advice; own it and correct yourself, always correct it if you realize the mistake.

4) Fitness has ambiance there is music, action happening around you and even video or TV playing all of these provide a distraction for the client and they will even focus more on you as a result. Public speaking does not have this advantage if you are lucky the projector will work and you can have a slide deck going but do not count on this any good presentation needs to be able to go without a side show just in case.

Best advice: set the mood prior to the talk by being early and set up before the people, then play some music on a portable player and always have handouts just in case the projector does not work.

5) In fitness if a person is breathing heavy, sweating and wanting to lie down in complete exhaustion you have done your job. In public speaking they are probably having a heart attack and that is never good but luckily if you are up to date on your CPR you may save them and still get good reviews on the talk. Seriously the key here is in fitness class a person is participating and therefore unable to judge and in some extreme classes even talk back to you but public speaking has an opposite effect these participants are sitting and fidgeting and looking for a reason to move.

Best advice; is to let them, get them up for a stretch move them around the other option is to make them laugh because laughter allows people to feel comfortable and at ease with what you are saying. Also keep your CPR up to date just in case.

Practice, practice. practice get your friends and family together and run through the entire talk without restarting. Public speaking is probably one of the top ways for any fitness professional to become known as an expert in their field it can lead to clients, referrals and future jobs like writing fitness column in a company news letter. In business you have to earn trust and credibility and the only way to do this is to put yourself out there and start to build a reputation as the go to person for fitness information in your area.

I hope I have waited an appropriate amount of time to discuss this hot topic. I am not here to debate the pros and cons of this historic piece of legislation but instead to look at what opportunities it may offer.

As a fitness professional and entrepreneur I like to look at all legislation from those two perspectives, first as a fitness professional does this new law effect me or my clients and then as an entrepreneur, how does this new law change my business and what are the opportunities it creates. The last point is often over looked when a change is introduced and this is a shame because the glass should always be half full. It is easy and often too much so to just look for the negative and jump on the ‘I hate this band wagon'. I say we leave that for Fox News and CNN. Most obstacles and changes in life present new and often better opportunities for a serial entrepreneur.

Whenever any government passes a bill or there is a vote on legislation you want to look at it as a potential business opportunity. In the new health care reform there is a provision that could allow the savvy fitness entrepreneur an opening.
One part of this current legislation allows for a discount on insurance premiums, up to 50%, for persons that are taking part in a wellness program. Talk about opportunity, every fitness company and corporate wellness company should be running to human resource departments and say "I am going to save you huge amounts of money." do you want to know how?

A second opportunity is the 15 billion dollar allotment towards prevention and wellness services. Medicare will provide one free annual visit that includes a health risk assessment and a personalized 5-10 year prevention plan. Fitness and wellness companies must be excited at the potential opportunities to expand their services from the employer to the individual market.

So no matter if you are a pro or con person it is time to take off the glasses that scrutinize and put on a clearer pair of opportunity glasses and go out and build a new wellness service package that will assist to propel your business to excellence. The best part is that our Volo software will be there to assist you. You can create new schedules and appointments that will track these offerings and will ensure accurate billing for all new services.

So no matter what you decide to do with the new legislation this is a great opportunity for your fitness business and a great opportunity for all the people in the US.

I hear from fitness professionals all the time wondering what type of ads or promotions they should run or how do you get people to buy, in other words how do they make a sale. There are three different areas here the first is advertising followed by promotions and then finally the sales process. There is much confusion as to what these three areas are in any business the reason being that it is different depending on your business and your target demographic.

The first two items; advertising and promotion can cause the greatest amount of confusion for people because most businesses advertise their promotions. This is where you will see a store special in a news paper or a TV ad offering a limited time two for one deal. Advertising is meant to attract people to your brand and to build recognition so that people will choose you over a competitor. Promotions are offerings of your product or services these offerings can be at special rates or not; the goal is to let people know that they can buy and receive a special from you. Both are marketing tools and both should lead to an increase in sales.

Here is an example of and advertisement and a promotion by Snap fitness.The advert is simple it states a message about the brand -it is fast, convenient and open 24 hrs, period end of story. It could be for any of their franchises.

The promotion on the other hand has restriction of time and an offer for a specific thing for a specific group of people in this case the city of Kenosha employees.

Now the nasty ‘S' word ‘Sales', this word tends to have a negative image associated with it, most people think of a used car sales person or aggressive sales tactics that are so annoying. For most fitness professionals becoming a sales person is not an image or role they feel comfortable with. Good news -you don't have to be. But you still have sell it is the how sell that is 100% up to you. If you do your promotions correct and actually offer a great product or service then the sales part should be easy, in some cases it can be as easy as "Go to my Volo site and you can sign up and purchase online". Others will need to hear the benefits and value statements from you in person.Either way you still need to make a sale. By definition a sale is a completion of a transaction for goods or services, how you get there is up to you.

I receive two or three emails a day from Fitness Professionals asking about these accounts ranging from what are they to how do I get one.

In simple terms a merchant account is needed for your fitness company to process credit cards of any type. EFT allows you to transfer money directly from people's bank accounts, some areas call this ACH.

There are different types of merchant accounts and they all charge different fees. This is where the confusion comes in. What type of account do you need? Where do you get one? How much will it cost? What about Pay Pal?

Applying for a merchant account is similar to applying for a loan, if your fitness business is new, has no credit history or is not incorporated you will need to provide a personal guarantee. Why is it a loan? Most merchant accounts will deposit the money into your bank account before they have received the money from your mutual client.

The type of account you need depends on your business and the management software you choose. With Volo being online software you would need an ecommerce account in order to have your merchant account integrated and your Volo store active. Your other option is a terminal based account this is where you would have a separate terminal to swipe your cards and then enter your sales into your management software.

Fees will vary based on the account and the credit card that your customer uses when they purchase; in the US there are 300 different transaction rates so it can get very complicated, some companies will give you a flat rate or 3 flat rates, qualified, mid qualified and non qualified, but these usually end up costing you more in the long run.There is also:

• a monthly fee
• a per transaction fee
• a % of each transaction
  
• terminal based accounts will also have a rental fee

EFT accounts usually have:

• a monthly fee
  
• a transaction fee
  
• rarely do they have a % fee

For an excel sheet that you can use to calculate what is best for you and a PDF of the aspects of a transaction enter your name and email here:

Since applying for merchant accounts is like applying for a loan the obvious place to go is your bank, however this should not prevent you from shopping around because rates will vary from bank to bank; also there are brokers that can look at multiple suppliers. If you are signing up for Volo we can help you with all your paperwork so please feel free to contact us first.

Online accounts require the use of a gateway, the gateway acts as a go between the online software and the merchant bank. These fees are sometimes rolled into the fees of the account but can be additional so be sure to read your contracts and make sure you ask questions.

Things to look for:

1. Set up fee
2. Annual fee
3. Monthly fee
4. Type of % fee flat or variable
5. % rate(s) this is called discount rate - get lowest, highest and average make sure this is for e-commerce
6. Number of days to deposit in your account from the transaction date
7. is the full amount deposited or a % of it, is there a hold back
8. Is the discount rate taken off of each transaction before it is deposited to your bank account or a total every month (Monthly is way better)
9. Per transaction rate
10. When is the per transaction fee taken off of each transaction before it is deposited to your bank account or a total every month (Monthly is way better)

You do not want hold backs at all and you should try to get an account that has your money deposited sooner.

Having them bill you monthly means that they add up all the fees and take them at one time this will save you hours of accounting or accountant fees, so if it is less than 1% point i personally would always choose the company that only bills me once per month. When they take their fee on each transaction you will need to log a journal entry daily in your accounting program versus monthly.

It is important to remember that a lot of Merchant and EFT suppliers require contracts that are around three years in length and have will have penalties' for canceling early, so be sure to read your contracts before you sign.

Don't forget to get your copy of the merchant rate comparison worksheet and the 10 steps to an EFT transaction. Fill in your name and we will get it emailed out to you right away:

The ripple effect is a term used to describe consequences of event that are beyond your control. These ripples are often far reaching and may have a blanket affect. The current economy has had this very affect on numerous businesses and several fitness centers have closed their doors and filed for bankruptcy from small mom and pop operations to larger fitness chains this ripple has hit businesses hard and consumer confidence even harder.

Some fitness members are being left with little to no recourse when a club closes hence the increase in popularity of surety bonds. Wise gym members or those whom have been stung once are now starting to ask before they sign if the club caries a surety bond and the amount.

What is a surety bond?
A surety bond is a contract among at least three people.

• The principal or primary party who will be performing the contractual obligation - the health club
• The oblige or the party that is the recipient of the obligation - the member of the health club
• The surety who ensures the principal's obligations will be performed - usually the states attorney general for health clubs

These bonds offer security to the gym member that should a facility close or not live up their obligation under the membership contract that the member will be able to seek restitution from the amount of the bond.

Who must be bonded? How much?
Health club bonds are not limited to just health clubs but instead reach multiple businesses that offer prepaid memberships with the amount to be determined by length and types of memberships. The fees and types of companies that must buy bonds depend on the state. Businesses must check with their attorney general to see if they are required to post a bond and how much this bound will cost for. Typical bonds requirements can range from $50,000 for 12 month memberships to a higher $150,000 for 2 and 3 year memberships.

Fitness industry business types that may require surety bonds:

• General health and fitness clubs
• Racquet and tennis clubs
• Gyms
• Weight loss centers
• Self-defense schools
• Personal or athletic trainers - currently only if they have a facility
• Body building clubs

Who could be next?

• Yoga studios
• Pilates studios
• Boot Camp operations - no facility needed
• Personal or athletic trainers - no facility

Should your business get bonded?

I believe that it is only a matter of time before this becomes a necessity in order for businesses to ensure the peace of mind of their members. Add to this the pressure on the government to rebuild consumer confidence and before you know it the current legislation will have a ripple effect that will soon include your business.

I would recommend that if you can afford it that you take initiative to be ahead of the curve and take out bond to provide your members and clients the security to buy from you. You may want to advertise the fact or just keep it on your contracts.

The second option is to switch your business model to post billing versus pre-paid memberships. Some businesses may charge an initiation fee to cover initial cost; this fee may be refunded at the end of term similar to the leasing of property. Remember don't spend these fees instead use place them in a separate account as you may be required to refund with interest depending on your state.

There several different options and successful business opportunities that may suit your business needs so do some research and make sure that you are properly covered for all circumstances that may face your business. This will also protect you from personal liability and possible criminal proceedings.

Ok so we all know the old adage the two things for certain in life are death and taxes right, for some fitness businesses the tax can cause their death.

Such is the case in BC and Ontario Canada as both provinces are introducing a Harmonized Sales Tax (HST) come July 2010. The HST is a combination of the Goods and Service Tax (GST) and the Provincial Sales Tax (PST). Currently fitness memberships and service are exempt for PST in both Provinces, so what does HST mean for the fitness industry in these two regions, simply put it equals a 7% increase for BC and an 8% increase in Ontario on all fees and services the business offers. It is a forced fee increase that turns a business based on health and wellness into a tax collector for government and has no benefit to the business.

It may seem small to add another $5-20.00 per month to these fees but add to this the possibility of new and higher tariffs from the Society of Composers, Authors and Music Publishers of Canada (SOCAN) and the proposed 5% tariff on gross sales from the Neighboring Rights Collective of Canada (NRCC) and you suddenly have an industry that is here to help people stay healthy, fit and active feeling a little sick to their stomachs.

Below is a breakdown of what a fitness company will pay in taxes and tariffs based off their potential sales and income.

In Canada get involved and help support the legal challenges to the NRCC proposed tariff go to the Fitness Industry Council of Canada and learn more about how to help.  No single thing that can bring down your dreams quicker than being side swiped by organizations and government.

Go get involved no matter how small your business is this will affect you and your clients or members in a negative way so post signs in your gym get member to sign petitions and let's put a stop to the tax and tariffs that are kill our industry and livelihood. 
For list of who wants your money go to the following links: In Canada in the US and globally

I do not normally like to comment on a news article but sometimes it just seems necessary. Sunday’s San Francisco Chronicle has an article about the cost of obesity and the huge obstacle that Americans face in trying to reform health care. The big concern is funding the rising costs that an obese nation is creating, $147 billion last year and 100,000 deaths that can be linked directly to obesity.

The article adds some other amazing numbers like 33 percent of children born in 2000 and 30 percent of adults in America are obese. This is just sad. It may not be a shock to most of you but I think it is really sad that so many people allow their friends, family and neighbors to get this fat.

So what is the solution?

The article talks about junk food taxes and legislation to change food outlets but are these solutions? One point glossed over in this article is that around the same time that junk foods were added to schools for their lunch programs the school boards started to eliminate PE (physical education) as well. Instead of getting people active the solutions provided are to tax and limit access to foods and warn people about the effects of excess weight, like death (a pretty big negative effect). I personally don't think is going to be effective because as the saying goes "Nothing is certain but death and taxes". These 2 "facts of life" don't deter people most of them just shrug and say they are inevitable why bother fighting it.

I feel the solution will be need to be divided into two areas;

1. The future children
   
2. The current generations

For the first group the answer is in educating the youth (and their parents) and reinstating physical activity in schools along with changing the schools food offerings.

This solution is only for the upcoming generations and does not address the current obese generations. For them I do not have a quick solution because by this time most have developed some really bad habits and they need to want to change in order for any change to happen.

This posting should reach a few hundred fitness professionals so my challenge to all of you is to put forward your solution to this problem write a comment and send the challenge on to others I think we have a great opportunity to have a really useful discussion. It is up to everyone to find a way to instill health back into America because other nations look up to this great nation and if America cannot solve the problem then this epidemic will reach global proportions. Who know it might help you find a niche to work with as well!

Here is the challenge comment on this post about:

1. How you feel the future child obesity dilemma should be addressed
2. How to deal with the current obese population.
   

Remember to be constructive and sincere because whatever it is that needs to be done will need to be done by all of us.

If one in three Americans are obese then every single person has a family member or friend that is obese. So what are you going to do to help that person? As President Obama says; “Together we can!”