Are you whey into social media but not sure how to use it to make gains in your personal training business?
You’re in the right place.
Social media is an incredibly valuable business tool. Not only is it cost-effective, but when done right, you can use your posts to generate leads and attract your dream clients.
Want to open your DMs and see it overflowing with messages from people asking how to work with you?
Follow these 7 best social media tips for personal trainers, and you’ll grow your audience, boost your engagement, and land more clients.
The 7 Best Social Media Tips for Personal Trainers
1. Get Clear on Your Audience
Who is your ideal client?
Are you passionate about getting brides-to-be into the best shape for their weddings?
Or do you have a particular exercise style you teach, like yoga or Crossfit?
Each of these options would attract wildly different clientele, which is why it pays to niche down.
When your dream client lands on your social media profile, you’ll stand out because you’re offering exactly what they want.
BONUS: You’ll make a name for yourself as the go-to expert in your niche. This will steamroll referrals and make it easier to differentiate yourself from the other personal trainers.
2. Show a Success Story
Social proof aka testimonials, are one of the most powerful pieces of content you can create.
Why?
Because it does the following two things:
1. It shows people that your methods work
2. It makes people feel safer and trust investing their time and money with you
How do you create social proof?
Ask your current clients if you can share their results with a classic before and after.
One personal trainer who does a fantastic job at this is Krissy Cela. She’s always sharing her client’s insane transformations, which she uses to promote her fitness app.
3. Share Workout Ideas
Sharing workout ideas gives potential clients a glimpse into what it would be like working with you.
Plus, it’s free! Who doesn’t love a good freebie?
Some of the best ways to share workout ideas are with Reels on Instagram, Tiktok, or YouTube videos.
You could create an entire mini-series targeting a particular part of the body, like abs or legs.
Chloe Ting followed this recipe to success.
The free workouts she posted on YouTube during quarantine went viral, and her sub count is currently sitting at 21 million!
Or, take a page out of Hanna Oberg‘s book if you don’t want to commit to weekly YouTube videos. She posts quick workouts on Reels, and the engagement is fire!
4. Share Healthy Recipes
Exercise and healthy eating habits go hand-in-hand.
Give your followers an inside look into your daily meals.
Share your favourite high protein breakfast, your #1 delicious post-workout smoothie, or what you eat for dinner to stay lean.
Need some inspiration?
Check out, Stephanie Buttermore.
Steph creates scrumptious ‘what I eat in a day’ Reels and shows what she eats on treat days.
You can take this further and give your followers food ideas to achieve specific goals like weight loss or adding muscle mass.
5. Host a Giveaway
Want to grow on social media fast?
But with the right followers, not just people who like looking at photos of abs (and not actually working for them themselves?)
Generate buzz for your personal training sessions by hosting a giveaway.
Team up with other fitness and wellness brands and make the prize something that would appeal to your target audience.
Maybe it’s a month of training sessions with you, luxe gym wear, or vouchers for protein powder.
But before you hit ‘publish’ on your giveaway post, make sure the entry rules include asking people to like, share, comment, follow, and tag two friends.
This is how you’ll gain exposure beyond your current audience, boost your engagement, and grow your social media presence.
6. Run a Challenge
Fitness challenges on social media are a sure-fire way to engage your community and get people excited about working out.
Cassy Ho from Blogilates has used challenges to grow her brand to millions of active followers.
Over the years, she has hosted stretching, splits, HITT, and ab challenges.
Brainstorm the different challenges you could create, how many days it would be, and start creating the content around it!
You could even make an infographic printable like this one:
Or you could show up daily on Instagram Live to host your challenge online.
7. Use the Top Hashtags for Personal Trainers
Instagram is a powerful social media platform for personal trainers.
It’s super visual and has tons of ways for potential clients to find you.
While Reels, Instagram Stories, and feed posts are fun to create, you need a solid fitness tag strategy.
Without one, you’ll reach the wrong people (or none at all) and see little ROI with your content.
How do you find the top hashtags for personal trainers?
Some of the most famous fitness hashtags on Instagram are:
• #gym
• #workout
• #fitness
• #fitnessmotivation
But these fitness hashtags are oversaturated which don’t make them ideal for personal trainers with small accounts.
You want to look for fitness hashtags that don’t have a lot of competition.
Let’s look at an example.
Say you teach pilates. The hashtag #pilates has over 20 million posts. That is super competitive, and if you use it, your post will quickly get buried.
#pilatesflow #pilatesfun and #pilatesfit are much smaller exercise hashtags for Instagram. If you use one of these, it will be much easier to get your content in the ‘top posts’ section and get your content trending on fitness hashtags.
Start Plann’ing Your Personal Trainer Content Strategy
Ready to put these social media tips for personal trainers to work?
Sign up for a free Plann account today, and never accidentally cheat on your posting schedule again. We even have content prompts specifically for people in the fitness industry, so you’ll never get stuck on what to post again!