As a personal trainer, when you first meet with a new client, you are both bound to have a lot of questions. It is your job to determine important information about your client’s lifestyle and goals. You need to be prepared to ask the right questions so that you can give your client the best information and training in the future. At Plunkett Fitness, we urge personal trainers to ask the following questions during a consultation session.
1. What do you hope to accomplish by hiring a personal trainer?
It is vital that you know what your clients’ goals are prior to starting training sessions. Some clients might want to lose weight, while others are trying to build muscle. These are two very different goals, and each will require very different training routines. You can ask your client for both short- and long-term goals that you can work toward together to achieve.
For some clients, a goal might be to stick with a program. As a trainer, you hold clients accountable, so some people might need you to act as a motivator. If you start to notice a client like this skipping training sessions, you can focus on getting them back into the routine.
2. Do you have any medical conditions?
While this might seem incredibly personal, there are medical conditions that could restrict activity or change the way that you work with a client. As a trainer, you need to know up-front if there are any medical conditions you need to work with. In some cases, you may not be equipped to handle the challenges associated with said conditions. In these instances, you might need to find a different trainer to work with the client that does have the expertise to work with clients with certain medical conditions.
3. What do your meals generally look like?
Nutrition is a huge factor in health and weight loss. Some clients are going to need more than just fitness help. You need to be prepared to help with meal plans and dietary advice depending on what your client’s goals are. However, since not all personal trainers have training in nutrition, don’t offer services that you aren’t trained to offer.
When you have to craft meal plans for clients, it is also important to listen to the things that they will eat and the types of meals that they prefer. If you offer up a meal plan full of foods that your client won’t eat, you aren’t really helping them.
At Plunkett Fitness, our trainers have all completed proper training to provide nutritional advice to all of our clients. We believe that proper diet is one of the most important factors when it comes to losing weight, so we have all of the tools that we need to be able to help our clients with both a diet and fitness plan to reach their goals.
4. What type of exercise have you enjoyed in the past?
It is important to remember that just because you like a certain type of exercise that doesn’t mean everyone does. If you have clients that don’t enjoy certain workouts, then you can come up with other ways to work the same muscles and get similar results. You don’t want to force your clients into doing activities that they don’t enjoy, because they will be less likely to stick with it. Try to make things as fun as possible. Plus, it is easy to intimidate people who aren’t familiar with intense workouts by pushing them to do things that they aren’t comfortable with. You can always switch things up as your client becomes more and more comfortable being in the gym.
5. Do you have a support system of friends and family?
While it is your job to keep your clients motivated in the gym, it is important that everyone has someone in their lives that can give them additional support. Your clients will need someone who can support them in their endeavors when they aren’t in the gym. If they have someone that can provide them support to stick to their diet and get them in the gym for every session, they are much more likely to succeed. If they don’t have someone outside of you to support them in their fitness journey, that means you need to try to push them to succeed even when they aren’t in the gym. This could mean that you need to send emails or text messages a few times a week to keep them motivated.
As a personal trainer, you know that it is hard to get and keep clients. The more that you understand your clients, the better you can help them. When clients are happy with their progress and the things they are doing in the gym, they are more likely to stick around, which is good for every party involved.
If you are a client looking to find a personal trainer in Overland Park, Kansas, contact Plunkett Fitness today at 913-390-3360.
