How to Know What to Charge at Your Gym

Hey, it's Ben from Business For Unicorns.

This is a question I get so often when talking with gym owners, and the answer is always, “it depends.”

So I thought I’d share my expanded thoughts on how you should price your gym and common mistakes I see.

How to Know What to Charge at Your Gym

What is value? Or stated differently, how do we know how much something is “worth?”

Related, how do you decide what to charge at your gym? There’s a lot to consider. But here are a few things to appreciate.

1. No matter what you charge, it will always be too expensive for some.

So don’t try to be affordable enough for everyone. That will never happen.

Marketing legend Seth Godin says your pricing should offend 1 out of 5 people. This is a good rule of thumb.

2. Selling from your wallet is normal, but a mistake.

Too often we price based on what WE would pay.
There are two problems with this.

For one, you may not be very successful (yet). And if you’re broke, you’re not a qualified prospect.

Second, you undervalue your services because you already know how to eat and train. So it feels less valuable to you.

Your clients are not you. They have different financial situations and different needs.

3. The cost to make or deliver is different from the value to the end user.

Too many gym owners set their pricing by figuring out how much they need to pay the coach, then charging a bit more. This is unwise.

First of all, most gym owners underestimate the other overhead costs of running a gym. They tend to have too skinny of a gross margin for their business to work. Even at unrealistically high volumes of clients.

But leaving this aside, pricing is about the value to the person making the purchase, NOT the cost to the business to provide it.

In other words, what’s the cost to your clients of NOT hiring you? What’s the cost in healthcare expenses? What’s the cost in lack of energy and physical vitality? What’s the impact of poor health on their relationships? Or professional pursuits? So what’s it worth to solve those problems?

4. Price is sometimes a circumstance, and not just a sales objection.

Even IF everyone truly valued what you do, not everyone will be able to afford it. That’s the way the world works.

After all, you can’t be the best and be the cheapest. You’ll have to accept that not every single person can afford what you have to offer if you’re offering something that has real value.

And if you hate that some people truly can’t afford it? I feel ya. This bugs me, too.

So consider this… They may not be able to afford your highest level of service… But you can share content and information for no marginal cost. It gives you leverage.

So if you’re committed to making the biggest possible impact on the world? If you want to serve those who can’t afford to work with you?

Commit to world-class content. Provide actionable solutions to the challenges your avatar faces. Remember, your marketing may change more lives than your paid offerings ever will.

And as a bonus? Some percentage of those who consume your content will eventually hire you for more support, which means it’s a virtuous cycle.

PS: Interested in a personalized 3-step plan to grow your gym?

We’d love to offer you a complementary 10-minute brainstorm.

If you’re a gym owner with 30 or more clients, you might be just a few strategies away from growing your monthly revenue by $5k-$10k or more. We can help.

Book your call HERE.

Want to shift to learning more about business (and make more money)? Check out the FREE Raise Your Rates Playbook for a step-by-step guide for how to increase your rates (and how much).

Click HERE to grab it.