Wil Fleming
1. Tell us about yourself and your businessFirst off thanks for naming me PTU member of the week. I am based in Bloomington, IN where, along with resident PTU superstar Ryan Ketchum, I run Force Fitness and Performance. We opened in November of 2008 and have been trying to kick butt every day since. Force Fitness and Performance is a 4000 sq ft facility where we train almost 150 clients on a weekly basis in a semi private and bootcamp setting. My official title besides co-owner is that of Director of Sports Performance. In that capacity I work with mostly athletes, and have a smaller group of about 10-15 adult clients with whom I spend most mornings. I particularly like working with athletes due to my own background as, originally a football player and ultimately an All-American Track and Field athlete at Indiana University. Now that my track career is over, I try to use my experiences that have taken me from a small, slow football player, to a resident athlete at the Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs, to the 2008 Olympic Trials and help as many athletes as possible reach their own goals, whatever they may be. As for Force, the planning stages of our business began years ago when Ryan and I would workout in top level facilities around the country, but began in earnest last year in April. It has been a wild ride going from nothing to our own facility, but every single second has been worth it. 2. How has being a part of PTU impacted your career / business? Wow! In what ways has it not impacted my career and business?? Honestly Ryan and I try to take every piece of advice from the articles that are written and apply it to our business. We follow Pat, Nick, Jim, and AJ on twitter and read everything they post there. Even when it is useless stuff like links to Club Trillion. When we started Ryan was a much better business person than me, and he still is, but he encouraged me to be a part of the PTU community and told me how big of a difference it made on his own personal training business. I don't really know of another industry where the most successful individuals convene all in one place like they do in the fitness industry on PTU. 3. What are your 3 biggest tips for your fellow PTU Members? 1) Get Face time- So I think that this goes back to question 2 but one of the more valuable experiences i have had thus far was the PTU get together at the Club Industry show in Chicago, last October. Pat, Nick, Jim and AJ all took time to meet with everyone in attendance individually and answered every question that people had. They stuck around later and had dinner with several of us, and did even more. This was just a 3 weeks before we were going to open our doors, so to have that kind of access to successful people is amazing. Of course the internet can kind of make this obsolete but the value of being face to face, and in real time, getting your questions answered, but more importantly forming a bond with others in my field was invaluable. So I really can't say enough about this, so much so that my number 2 tip is just an extension of this. 2) Grow your network- I think that it is easy to get into the idea that your work aka your clients results will speak for itself, and the clients will come running in, but you have to reach out to others in your community to get more clients. I spend time trying to just this, I don't leave it up to chance. If i meet someone out in public and the topic of my business comes up I try to get their contact info and see if they, or anyone they know, has any fitness needs. If I don't by chance get their contact info there is a great resource to solve this problem: it is called Facebook. I will request they be my "facebook friend" and send them a message through this medium. It always works, I have had articles written about our business, gained entire teams for training, and gotten dozens of clients to sign up. My 1000 or so "friends" on facebook are kept up to date on my workouts, my clients successes and anything else they may need to know. The extension of tip 1 is that I go out in the community and seek out people to meet. I don't just rely on people coming to our bubble. 3) Don't be afraid to ask- Really don't be afraid to ask for help. Ask the folks on PTU when you have a business question. Ask your clients for referrals. Ask your friends for contact information of influencers in your community. Ask people what you can do to help them. For any of these things the worst that can happen is you get a no or no response. The best that can happen is sometimes out of the realm of your imagination. I don't think that Force Fitness and Performance would have happened if Ryan and I had been afraid to ask for meetings with investors, or been afraid to ask for a loan. It wouldn't have been successful if we hadn't asked for advice, or asked our clients to spread the word, or put us in touch with people that can help our business grow. Personally there is no chance that I would be in the place I am if I had been afraid to ask Ryan if he wanted to go into business to me. So anyway thank you for the honor, if you have any questions or comments please email me at wil@beforcefit.com. and visit any one of our websites. www.beforcefit.com, www.bloomingtonbootcamp.com, www.forcefatloss.com or www.forcefulperformance.com
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