It’s okay to be excited about creating a website. We were also just like you after all. The problem though is that people tend to forget themselves with website creation and take things top to bottom, instead of bottom to top.
For instance, if you’re going to create a website, what’s the first thing you need to do? Check out a reasonably priced domain name right?
Wrong!
The first thing you need to do is ask yourself why you need a website in the first place, ideally with a pen and paper by your side. Because that’s where the success of your website lies.
And, quite frankly, you can’t afford to go rushing into things when you want to create a personal
trainer website. There are over 1.8 billion websites on the internet today, and more than 200 million of them are very active. That’s quite a lot of internet to get lost in.
So, if you’re going to do this, it’s best to do it right from the off.
To help you get things rolling smoothly, we thought up this article that explains five things you need to consider before starting up your personal trainer website. Let’s dig in.
This is the first thing you need to do. Get a quiet place, pull a writing pad and pen close to yourself, and think critically about why you need a website.
This thinking phase is underrated these days because everyone generally thinks it’s a good idea to own a website. The data confirms this too. According to Searchengineland, 88% of consumers check online for information, offers and reviews before they make a purchase. So, your customers are definitely on the internet.
But you know what’s worse than having a website? Yeah, having a crappy website. It doesn’t make sense to pour resources into creating a website before you think about what you want to achieve with the website.
In this thinking phase, it’s important to clarify your unique value proposition. What do you want to showcase through your personal trainer website that is unique to your business? What role does expect the website to play in the overall scheme of your personal trainer career?
It’s just as important to identify what kind of website you don’t want to have. While there’s no need to be absolutely exact with your thoughts at this stage, you’ll find that it gives you a lot of direction and clarity for the journey ahead.
And you’ll definitely need that because it can be easy to get overwhelmed when you start checking out designs, logos, themes and whatnot.
Now that you’re clear on why you need a website and what you want to showcase with it, you need to be sure that you have enough to showcase on the website.
Your identity as a personal trainer is linked to the unique value you promise your clients when they take a punt on you. Every page, picture, text, font and piece of real estate on your website needs to display this identity.
If you’re just starting out as a personal trainer, then you have to think up the identity from scratch. This works well for you as you can integrate it into every part of your business easier. If you already have a business and are looking to add a website to your assets, you’ll be looking at isolating your value proposition and imbuing it into your website.
You would also need to communicate your business identity through your logo, mission and the features of your products or services. So make sure you sit and have a good long think on this one.
The substance of your personal trainer website is the content on it. Content is what invites new visitors to your website and motivates them to try out your services. This content is also called copy.
Your website content includes the text you would ordinarily have on your essential pages like the Home, About, Services and Contact pages. You should also recognize right from the off, that it should include a blog where you can share industry tips and information that attracts readers.
It’s important to think carefully about what your website copy will look like before you start the process of creating the website. In fact, one popular strategy is to write the copy long before you create the site.
This way, you can tell your story first, organize your thoughts around the services you want to offer and then pick a design that suits the narrative.
Understand right from the off that creating a personal trainer website is not a “build it and they will come” situation. You need to appreciate that it will need ongoing maintenance and updates.
Since you’re going to be busy attending to your clients and all, you’ll need to start planning for some permanent help with managing the website.
This is especially important as there are many websites out there. If your website stops providing new and relevant content, it will quickly sink into the dark abyss of the internet. You won’t rank
favourably on search engine results pages and hot new prospects won’t find your site.
So you have to commit to developing and updating the content on your website constantly.
If you’re thinking you can leave the website for month-long stretches before logging on and doing something new, you’ll be better off working on your voicemail instead.