I’m sure I am not alone in sharing my thoughts on how all our lives have been impacted in some way, by the nasty virus; Covid-19 – and indeed how it continues to disrupt!
And one of those industries to have taken a massive hit, is the fitness industry.
I’m Jenni Rivett and I’ve been in this game a long, long time – think grapevines, step aerobics and leg warmers – yes it deserves a LOL! I have always been enterprising by being ahead of emerging trends; from owning my own studio in Durban, South Africa at the age of 19, to teaching classes all over the globe, being voted one of Britain’s top PT’s by “The Best of British” publications and having the great honour of becoming Princess Diana’s personal trainer for seven years.
Fast forward to 2020! To be honest, I never envisaged personal training would become so popular in the 1990’s and lead to a billion-dollar business – let alone being able to train someone online anywhere on the entire globe.
Interestingly enough, six months prior to Covid-19 I had already moved my entire PT business online, to enable me to travel without having to give up my work. It took some convincing, but my clients eventually embraced the ‘Jenni’ method online. After some adjustment to my pricing, I spent the first four months working from different locations around the world and was dubbed the ‘travelling PT’.
It’s been surreal and extremely sad to see my contemporaries struggling through this maze, with the closure of gyms, small studios and private training. Equally, with no guarantees that my online business would survive I’ve had to be proactive and take action to keep my business afloat.
On the positive side I saw an emerging market – the whole world – how awesome! I set out by finding my niche market and began targeting that in a big way. My TRAIN LIKE A WOMAN method narrowed that down to women and given my age I invited a small group of women over 40 to join me for free Zoom classes. With my heart and soul I went beyond the call of duty to help them transform their bodies and within a month the word started to spread.
Four months later my Zoom business is flourishing and growing organically through word of mouth. I started charging a reasonable monthly fee (safety in numbers) and now have close to 200 zoomers from around the world following me three times a week. My goal is to try and double these numbers every month and this requires a lot of nurturing of the existing ‘Jen Tribe’. In addition to three classes per week I offer one wellness/nutrition talk per month and have created a WELLNESS PLATFORM where I share health and fitness tips.
In addition to my Zoom classes, I have ten private online training sessions per week and am a trusted advisor and health professional to WELD. I’m super excited about the future of WELD and hoping to move my entire business over to them to manage for me in the future.
