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Your Fitness Business

Enhance Your Business With Wellness Coaching

by Sarah Koszyk

July 2011

Wellness coaching is hot, hot, hot. Many trainers are now combining their exercise coaching with this form of coaching technique to enhance their client's results.

What is a Wellness Coach and why should I look into it?

Wellness coaching incorporates various counseling techniques, such as motivational interviewing, which allows a trainer to perform an assessment with the client and establish a collaborative problem-solving and goal-setting situation. Wellness coaches have the enhanced skills to help their clients figure out what goals they want to accomplish and the action steps needed to take to reach those goals. Also, if finding internal motivation is a challenge, a wellness coach can use their tools to bring out that internal motivation within their clients and make those health goals a reality.

How to become a Wellness Coach:

Various coaching schools are available. Here are 3 schools in no particular order:

  • Wellcoach: Also endorsed by the American College of Sports Medicine, this coaching school provides both virtual and in-person classes to get certified.
  • CoachU: CoachU also has an advanced Master's and International coaching program in addition to the basic in-person or virtual training program.

Benefits of becoming a Wellness Coach:

  • Enhance your client's experience. Coaching can assist your client with making lifestyle change outside of the immediate training sessions which can focus on the client's needs, values, visions, beliefs, and goals. Coaching can help a client set, establish, and implement an action plan and define the goals they want to reach.
  • Increase your pay scale. With the added enhancement of your counseling skills and your exercise expertise, you can charge your clients more due to the fact that they are getting additional benefits.
  • Build better relationships. Having a coaching background can allow you to listen to the needs of the clients better which can enhance your rapport with them. Increased client satisfaction results in increased word-of-mouth referrals which results in increased business opportunities.

Maintaining our client's satisfaction is the number one goal. Becoming a certified Wellness Coach can enhance the ability to identify the needs and maintain the motivation of our clients. The time and cost of the certification process is definitely worth the end result.

Sarah Koszyk is a Registered Dietitian and Nutrition Coach at Eating Free, an online adult weight management program. She also provides in-person nutrition coaching at a private practice, MV Nutrition, in San Francisco, CA, where she specializes in sports nutrition and adult and pediatric weight management.