Does charging more make you better!!??
I was reading an article recently about celebrity personal trainers. There seemed to be within the article a real obsession with what the trainers charged and who they trained rather than actually what they did or had learned or achieved.
The article left me with the feeling that they felt the more you charged the better you were at your job. In my experience in the fitness industry this simply is not true. Does this give the message to up and coming trainers that it is more about who you train or charge than what you actually do??!! For an industry with such little regulation this is a poor place to be in terms of quality control. If someone is willing to pay an outlandish fee for an hour of someones time then that is between the two people making the transaction. However let us not fall into the trap of believing that the fee or person makes someone better at what they do. A great job with a super model is no better than a great job with a housewife, let us make no mistake. You are not who you train by proxy. If you want to be a celebrity do it through what you do and say, not who you do or charge.
By default generally the more you charge the less people you will see. Although there will always be exceptions to every rule!! As the amount goes up the smaller the pool of people able to afford your charge. This means that only the very experienced, educated and with a long track record of success should charge the most. Why I hear you ask?? Well if you are seeing less people then you are able to gain less experience and also practice your skill set less. This is where success is built, the hard yards of practicing and refining your craft to get to a level where you can justify your increased cost. We cannot expect to walk straight out of a training course and have a skill set that is worthy of an inflated arbitrary figure. It is the application of knowledge over time to a wide variety of different people that allows people to be able to have those "go to" moments that differentiates them from the crowd and justifies the higher charge.
Ask yourself the question am I worthy of what I charge. It may be that you are undervaluing yourself, but if you are gaining valuable experience to add up to the 10,000 hours of experience that is talked about as being a measure of an expert then almost you are being payed for your education.
If you don't have the level of experience or education and hence skill set and are charging more than those that do, you have to ask yourself why!!?? If it is to be the best then this is clearly not true. If it is to earn more, then money and status is more important than your craft, which is fine if we hold our hands up and state this loud and proud.
The old Stella Artois advert that stated "reassuringly expensive" does certainly not ring true for me in the fitness industry!!