Becoming a Personal Trainer For Dummies

Want to turn your passion for fitness into a lucrative career? Each year, more than 5 million Americans use personal trainers to take their workouts to the next level—and this plain-English guide shows you how to get in on the action. Whether you want a part-time job at the gym or a full-time personal training business, you’ll find the practical, proven advice you need in this indispensable resource.

Becoming a Personal Trainer For Dummies is for you if you want to become a certified personal trainer and start your own business—or if you’re a certified trainer looking to improve upon your existing practice. You get a thorough overview of what it takes to get certified and run a successful business, complete with expert tips that help you:

• Find your training niche
• Study for and pass certification exams

• Attract, keep, and motivate clients
• Interview, hire, and manage employees
• Update your training skills
• Expand your services

This user-friendly guide offers unique coverage of personal trainer certification programs, including tips on selecting the right program and meeting the requirements. You’ll see how to develop your training identity as well as practice invaluable skills that will make you a great personal trainer. You also receive savvy guidance in:

• Choosing the best fitness equipment
• Creating a business plan, a record-keeping system, and a marketing campaign
• Performing fitness assessments
• Developing individualized exercise programs
• Advancing your clients to the next fitness level

• Managing legal issues and tax planning

• Offering additional services such as massage and nutrition consultation
• Training clients with special needs

Complete with ten great starter exercises and a valuable list of professional organizations and resources, Becoming a Personal Trainer For Dummies gives you the tools you need to get the most out of this fun, fabulous career!

Want to turn your passion for fitness into a lucrative career? Each year, more than 5 million Americans use personal trainers to take their workouts to the next level—and this plain-English guide shows you how to get in on the action. Whether you want a part-time job at the gym or a full-time personal training business, you’ll find the practical, proven advice you need in this indispensable resource.

Becoming a Personal Trainer For Dummies is for you if you want to become a certified personal trainer and start your own business—or if you’re a certified trainer looking to improve upon your existing practice. You get a thorough overview of what it takes to get certified and run a successful business, complete with expert tips that help you:

• Find your training niche
• Study for and pass certification exams

• Attract, keep, and motivate clients
• Interview, hire, and manage employees
• Update your training skills
• Expand your services

This user-friendly guide offers unique coverage of personal trainer certification programs, including tips on selecting the right program and meeting the requirements. You’ll see how to develop your training identity as well as practice invaluable skills that will make you a great personal trainer. You also receive savvy guidance in:

• Choosing the best fitness equipment
• Creating a business plan, a record-keeping system, and a marketing campaign
• Performing fitness assessments
• Developing individualized exercise programs
• Advancing your clients to the next fitness level

• Managing legal issues and tax planning

• Offering additional services such as massage and nutrition consultation
• Training clients with special needs

Complete with ten great starter exercises and a valuable list of professional organizations and resources, Becoming a Personal Trainer For Dummies gives you the tools you need to get the most out of this fun, fabulous career!

Melyssa St. Michael: Melyssa St. Michael is a certified personal trainer and certified nutrition consultant. She was named one of the top 40 entrepreneurs under age 40 by Baltimore Magazine in 2001. Setting out to “raise the bar” in the personal-training industry, Melyssa founded her first personaltraining company in February 1995. She rapidly expanded her business into a thriving entity with over 2,000 clients, a 3,000-square-foot state-of-the-art personal-training/nutrition facility, and a staff of ten full-time trainers. Currently, Melyssa consults within the fitness industry and is a renowned fitness expert appearing on national news channels, including CNN, CBS, NBC, and ABC. She has been interviewed by such publications as the Los Angeles Times, U.S. News & World Report, SHAPE, Muscle & Fitness, and the Sunday Times (London).

Linda Formichelli: Linda Formichelli is a freelance health and fitness writer who lives in Massachusetts with her writer husband and two cats. She is the co-author of The Renegade Writer: A Totally Unconventional Guide to Freelance Writing Success. She’s a karate enthusiast (okay, she’s a karate freak) who enjoys sipping port and reading weighty tomes (okay, it’s lemonade and Archie comics). Linda has an M.A. from U.C. Berkeley in a subject completely unrelated to writing.