What’s up guys? Kaiser here, getting at you with a long overdue blog post. Despite my best intentions, I can’t get my blog posts over to Sam as fast as I’d like. I’ve never been good with homework, and writing for Super-Trainer has kind of turned into my high school History class, where when I didn’t get the homework in, I just wouldn’t go to class.The only difference is avoiding Super-Trainer isn’t an option. With the killer info here, the only person that ends up hurting is me. This site has all of the info you need to create, grow, and market a fitness business. It’s among the highest level marketing info available in the world period, and I recommend everyone get more involved and take part as much as possible. Part of being successful is knowing the real thing when you see it, and once you’ve found it, taking full advantage of it. That’s what you’ve got with this site and with Sam as a resource.Speaking of Sam, what I wanted to talk about today is a weekend that pretty much changed everything about how I do business over at my boot camps. It was the weekend I spent over in California visiting my man, Seven Figure Sam. It’s been a little more than a month since I got back, so I’ve had time to digest and use the information, and measure the results it’s had in my business. And all across the board, the impact the meeting with Sam has had on my effectiveness, sales, piece of mind, time off, and long-term vision has been astronomical.Even though I’ve been doing good my most standards, and comparatively to the rest of the industry until now, I still know there are major gaping holes in my business. Each of my boot camp locations are doing consistently over 40K per month in total sales, but I think there’s even more potential. I also feel the time is ripe for location number three, but it’ll take an overhaul of my own schedule and the systems in my business to make that a possibility.That’s exactly what I got from my meeting with Sam, and much much more. He’s one of the only people I even respect enough to take advice from in these areas. But I know that Sam is a guy that genuinely wants to see people succeed. These are the rarest kinds of people that you’ll ever find, and it’s an essential trait in a coach. With some of the other so called coaches in this business, there’s always an ulterior motive in mind. With Sam, I know I can implement what he’s told me because he has my best interests, not his own ego, at heart.Right now I’m going to share with you some of the major points that came up during my day long meeting with Sam. If you pay attention to these points you’ll save yourself the trip to Cali, and end up overhauling your own business as well. But the best advice I have is to hire Sam and go to his events. The more you learn from this guy, the more you’re going to see your business and lifestyle grow.Until now, I’ve been going totally seat-of-my-pants. The schedule between me and my trainers was in flux every week, I had a few private clients that were coming in at different times, and I didn’t have set times I was handling key business tasks. Sam put me on a schedule to make sure that I knew what to do, when to do it, and what to expect every week.This has been a major improvement not just for me, but for my staff as well. They’re more relaxed, can predict their schedules better, and are more productive as a result.The first question Sam asked me when planning my schedule, was “what do you love to do most”?I told him work out, but that I had to cut corners on it to make time for business. He said this is absolutely unacceptable. Not only is it one of my favorite things, but it’s a critical success area for me as a leader in my business. That was the main thing we spent a lot of time finding blocks in my schedule to make time for. Once we had that in place, we were able to plug in everything else. Me and Sam juggled my employee hours, got rid of private clients, and made time for rest and recovery just to make time for one of the most important things in my life. This was such wise and important advice on his part.Through a little questioning Sam discovered the biggest time-suck and weakest ROI in my business was the personal training I was doing. Even though I charged high rates, they in no way justified how they were taking away time from my priorities and the core business. I looked to transition my private clients to other trainers. They weren’t going for it. So I simply had to get rid of them. This has given me tremendous time to recharge, focus on the core business, and focus on growth.

For my trainers, it was obvious that I needed to set up a hard schedule so they all know where to be and what time to be there. He also advised I do the same for my manager. This has been harder to implement, since her schedule is a lot like mine (just handling the biggest priority that’s currently on her plate). But we’ve been getting better with this.

Sam asked me what my long term vision is. What I want my life to be like in five years. Although settling down isn’t currently on my priority list, watching Sam and his daughter hang out and have fun the next day really got me thinking about what’s most important in life.

That’s the key consideration in everything Sam does. Does it give him time? He decides how he plans his business deals and every aspect of his business with time in mind. His most important thing is the time he spends with his family, and money is secondary to that.

He recommended I take a full three days off from my business a week. I now take the entire day off from Friday to Sunday. Although I still work on these days, I do it from home and remote locations. This keeps me totally recharged and able to give even more on the days I do work. I may up this to four days off a week very soon.

I asked Sam whether it was a good idea to look into other business idea. He said with the current holes in my business, I’d be crazy to go into some other area. I should stay with bootcamps, grow and optimize the current businesses, and then at that point possibly open another bootcamp. Trying to go into some other greener pastures is foolish. This advice got me focused and I’ve achieved more and made my progress in my plans to open another bootcamp and improve things at the current ones, now that I’m not distracted.

This was the biggest piece of advice Sam gave me and the one that’s paid off the most. He told me that as the owner, the most important thing for me to do is put in face time. When I’m at the bootcamp, never be on the phone or working on my computer, or anything stupid like that. The main thing I need to make time for is schmoozing with my members. This is what they come in for and it’s what no one can duplicate – the actual owner taking the time to get involved with the members. I’ve changed my whole schedule to make more time for this, and not only do the members feel better, but sales have shot up as well. I’m also training my key people like my manager and head trainer to focus on putting in more face time. This was such transformational advice that it’s hard to believe I wasn’t doing it before.

Sam told me to find someone to carefully look at my books at the end of every month to find out where the money is going and what it’s being spent on. You’ll be surprised what you find when you have someone looking at your expenses and finding out if there are any red flags. I’ve also told my billing girl to give me more detailed sales reports so I know exactly what I’m making, what I’m spending, and how much of it is profit every month.

There you go. I’d like to say I already knew everything here, but the truth is I wasn’t implementing any of it. It took sitting down with someone I trusted to realize what I was doing wrong, and to finally make some changes. It makes me shudder to think that I’d still be doing business as usual had I not met with. In the meeting with Sam, the info he gave me, and the changes I made, there are hundreds of thousand of dollars of future business in just the points above. I’m looking forward to following up with him and refining what I’m doing even more next time. And this is reason number 1000 on why Sam’s the only person you should consider as a coach for your fitness business. If you don’t take me up on that advice that’s fine – makes more time for him to focus on me and help my business succeed.