LEGENDS! Please take a moment to read this letter.
The end of the year is an interesting time for me. I shed old skin and assassinate parts of my character that don’t serve me. I’ll not lie, entering new terrain is uncomfortable – then again, I can’t think of anything worse than being stranded on the same island for the rest of my life.
And, I’m sure the same holds true for you.
1-Year from now we will be bigger, better and wiser than we are today.
In 2023 we have two options…
DRIFT – Do the same thing we did last year and expect to win.
CONQUER – Conquer bigger mountains and advance together as humans.
We are in immediate danger if we choose to drift. Nothing good will come of it.
Tackling challenges as a team is fulfilling.
If we don’t seek challenges we won’t be fulfilled, abdicate our responsibility to grow as humans and fail to save the endless amount of people that need our help.
2022 was a tough year but, we finished strong:
We went above and beyond for our community and helped a lot of people WIN big in life and business.
We crushed every live event and gave our clients experiences they will talk about for the rest of their days.
We built our Hyper Support system that gives clients an unparalleled level of support and access. Dare I say it, “it’s impossible to get stuck growing a fitness business with us..”
We built a new library of Marketing Playbooks that clients can use to generate leads and cash very quickly.
We created an aspirational identity every Fitness Professional truly desires to become – The Fitness Entrepreneur. That is an individual that owns an asset (business) that allows them to live life on their own terms.
+ way more (but I’ll stop there)
2023 is going to be an interesting year…
Back when I was a die hard personal trainer in 2008 the world experienced an economic crisis that saw millions of people drop from wealthy to broke overnight.
At the time, I didn’t absorb the noise, chaos and devastation that was happening outside my bedroom office.
I never worried about the market not being able to afford me or clients wanting to leave lol.
I truly believed with every ounce of my existence that working with me was a life changing opportunity.
When you became a client – it was game time!
I integrated myself into your life and led you to your dreams.
My inner most dominant thought about who I was became my reality.
The secret? Instead of focusing on what I didn’t want (everyone does this 24/7 365 days a year) I focused on what I could control and what I wanted, which was:
Mastering my craft and being the best in the goddamn business.
Moving into 2023 that’s exactly the attitude we will take.
Let’s focus on being the best team, unit and force of nature we possibly can be.
We will achieve this by focusing on:
Attitude – How we show up on both the good and hard days.
Skill Sets – Mastering the skills that solve the biggest challenges in the business.
No-nonsense straight talk – Ambiguity doesn’t exist and critical feedback is welcome with open arms.
Taking this attitude will keep us safe and create an everlasting sea of opportunity that we can fish and feed from.
We refuse to focus on…
Reds – Clients that don’t want to be helped.
Global Affairs – War, Inflation etc.
Other mentors that are surface level and quite frankly warming future leads for us (little do they know)
Unfortunately, the current climate has created a lazy trainer who lacks vision and relies more on the latest marketing tactic than being truly aspirational and a master of their craft.
We do not want to work with this kind of client, and if one happens to slip through the net. They either learn to swim (change) or drown (leave).
The community is only as good as the clients we bring into it and the commitment we make to serving, growing and evolving as a team.
Just in case you forgot. Here’s a reminder…
We are the best in the world at what we do. This is clearly evident with the numbers we attract, the caliber of clients we’ve built and the opportunities we get offered.
We have a remarkable team that would put most businesses to shame. We are grounded on Skill, loyalty and critical feedback.
All eyes on us. We are a role model for the fitness industry. Pretty much every “fitness business mentor” has learnt or modeled us in some way.
We are starting the year FULL THROTTLE with our live event on the 9th and 10th Jan in Dublin. This will be an experience for our clients to journal about.
Like we always say “…our events keep getting better and better.”
These words will be spoken at the dinner table after our live event in January.
We are building our outbound sales team. This will allow us to interact with and help 1000s of coaches on our database.
We are launching The Fitness Entrepreneur YouTube Channel which I want to position as the world’s leading news and education channel for fitness business owners. The channel will publish regular content educating and inspiring coaches over the globe. In particular, I’m looking forward to a quarterly show called “The State of The Fitness Industry” – this will serve as a global update on the economy and how to run a successful fitness business. You will all be involved and feature on this channel.
I’m writing The Fitness Entrepreneur Book. This will be an Amazon business best seller and get our message out to every ambitious PT, Fitness expert and online coach on the planet.
Generation Iron have filmed a full documentary on our mission and work. This will be launched on Netflix and Amazon Prime later this year. Again, this will show the world what we are doing. Out of everyone in the world who could have done this – I got the shot and I took it!
We are launching 6 and 12 month check in calls for clients that have been loyal to us. Even though clients can book in for 1:1s anytime they want, they don’t because they don’t know how to extract value. We’ll make life easier for them by checking in on them and stretching their vision.
We’re hosting and running events in Croatia and Portugal next year for Power Room. We’re also doing Strabiliante sessions for clients who are doing 6-Figures P/Year. These will be exceptional, no other words needed.
PS. If your business is currently doing 250k P/Year and want to SCALE. Power Room is the place to be. Please speak to Vince, my head of client relations. You can book directly into his diary here.
We’re running more training sessions for our Client’s Success teams. We build their success teams, they build their business.
Take a peep at the calendar for next year…
We are expanding the client success team and will be looking to take on 2-full time roles when we hit 25% and 50% of our target numbers (see end of doc for targets). This will add serious firepower to our current Success Team.
Next year we also plan to launch:
Fitness Business Growth Agency – I want to build the best paid media agency for the online fitness industry. This will be a boutique style service with strict pre-qualification (clients must be doing over 25k P/month) and have a strong organic base. We will specialize in Facebook, PPC, YouTube and all the essentials. The goal of the agency is to provide a high touch paid media service that increases brand authority, leads, call bookings and sales. We will control numbers very tightly in order to maximize results and customer service. There are far too many agencies out there underdelivering and holding successful fitness entrepreneurs back from scaling.
Fitness Business Sales Bootcamp – One of the biggest bottlenecks for the modern day Fitness Entrepreneur is sales calls. This service will train and deploy highly skilled sales specialists for Online Fitness Businesses. It will include education, support, workshops and recruitment. Clients can send people to us for training, or request one of our trained sales specialists.
Fitness Business Growth Assistants – We will source, train and deploy high quality VAs for the Fitness Industry. They will be trained in everything from personal assistant based roles right through to handling outbound conversations with prospects.
These additional services will make the difference between a 6 and 7-figure online fitness business. They will take time to build, but when it comes to scaling online fitness businesses these services are essential. Having control over these services will radically improve their performance and results for the industry.
We’ve much more planned but I’ll save it for later in the Quarter.
We are moving into 2023 strong.
This is not the Phil Graham show anymore. I am not interested in looking successful or being the center of attention. I could disappear tomorrow and never worry about posting another ‘subtitled inspirational reel’ on social media again.
As tempting as it is, my life would cease to have purpose if I wasn’t behind Fitness Entrepreneur.
Family, health etc are great but they only make up a proportion of my life’s purpose.
Fighting a meaningful war with life, doing my bit to make the world a better place and growing as a leader lights a fire in my belly, heart and mind that most won’t understand.
The Fitness Entrepreneur mission ticks ALL of those boxes.
This is a shared mission to transform the fitness industry, grow leaders and build real businesses that impact millions of lives.
My main metric for success in business/life has always been the words: “You’ve changed my life.”
The funny thing – my soul desensitizes to these words every year, which means one thing…
We need to change more lives this year.
This is our ethos moving into 2023.
If we lead with an attitude of changing as many lives as possible – we WILL WIN. Period.
We will do this by working smarter NOT harder.
Leverage, A-Player Team, Systems, Automations, Relevant trainings, Tight knit cadence and a safe constructive environment to speak your mind.
I always want you to be thinking…
How can we get better results by doing less work?
Believe it or not, this is actually harder than throwing more work at problems.
Thinking like this will keep us sharp and on top of our game!
Our Purpose
We redefine business success for the busy fit pro by teaching our clients how to build a business that serves humanity AND allows them to live life on their own terms.
To provide the planning, training, support, accountability and community to help our clients generate consistent profit, huge impact and real freedom from their business.
To help our clients reinvent themselves and build a strong, healthy identity they love. At its essence, we want our clients to fall in love with their life again.
We challenge our clients to play a bigger game and pursue business growth for the right reasons (personal growth & maturity) NOT just accumulating a bigger bank balance. I can tell you from experience this is a futile existence.
Who Matters Most
Our Team – We operate like a tight military unit, hire A-Players and aren’t afraid to engage in conflict to win.
Our Clients – The business and mission would not exist without our clients. In order for us to grow, we must solve problems for the people that are paying us. As a general rule of thumb, clients should easily be making a 10X return on their investment every year they spend with us. Clients consider us a safe long term business investment.
The Marketplace – Our messaging, ads, team and community serve as a beacon of hope for the fitness industry.
What work actually moves the needle?
Understanding “What’s true for you…” is not true for someone else if they don’t understand it. Avoid abstractions, give context and if needed break things down into bite sized chunks/steps to aid understanding and believability. Do this when communicating to both clients and team members.
Get the real truth behind why someone is stuck and failing to make progress. For most clients, they are scared, lack vision and are stuck in a comfort zone. The easiest exit plan is to blame someone for their shortcomings. Be mindful of the victim. Make clients believe what is possible is actually attainable for them. Chunk down beliefs and strategies down and up into bite size steps that are easy to believe/achieve. Reframe their meaning of the problem.
Make clients feel seen and heard.
Celebrate the behaviors you want to see more of.
Tell us what’s not working. Critical feedback will help us grow and work better together.
2023 CULTURE
We Are The Best In The World and Reject Average. We are committed to helping our clients WIN and building the best businesses in the fitness industry.
Think Twice, Act Once – Don’t react. Respond. Remove emotions. See both sides of the equation and be objective.
We Operate With Lightning speed – Speed kills. It kills the competition.
Stay Organized – Use your diary, write project details down, stick to deadlines and be on time with everything.
Do The Right Thing Even When No One Is Watching – Shortcuts and falsehoods are always found out.
Initiate Conflict & Challenge Each Other When Needed to Resolve A Problem – Balance your argument, speak your mind and prepare to challenge each other.
Take Ownership – If you drop the ball. Own up and fix it immediately. You are human, you will make mistakes and that’s ok as long as you take ownership and learn.
Time and Place – We are all about open, honest communication and critical feedback. However, there is a time and place when valuable insights are best delivered. Avoid dumping your thoughts at the wrong time of day (Monday morning) or right before a team member goes on holiday. Whilst I’m all for communicating quickly and early. If something needs to wait 24 hours or a few days. So be it, if it’s going to be better received and resolved. Think: Is this the right time? or, can it wait?
Don’t Add Noise – Think: Is this information essential? Listen more than you talk. Add value. Avoid repeating what we already know just to hear your own voice. When you talk too much you lose the power of your voice.
We Don’t Get Hung Up On Mistakes. We Learn and Move On Quickly
We Operate As A Tight Unit. One For All. And, All For One
