If you have a big following on social media, or you’re still working at building up your following, being a fitness influencer can be a very lucrative career. There are countless ways to make money as a fitness influencer, so which ones are the best?
Here are the top 8 ways to make money as a fitness influencer in 2023:
1. Sponsorship deals
Sponsorship deals are one of the most common that you’ll see fitness influencers make money on social media. With a loyal and strong fan base, brands are willing to pay a hefty sum to get their product in front of your followers.
As a fitness influencer, the general types of brands that will work with you are supplement companies, fitness apparel brands, and meal prep companies. The key is to build strong and long term relationships with the brands, so it’s not just a one time post type of thing. You want that recurring revenue baby!
Depending on the size of your audience, they may give you a base monthly salary + affiliate commission for every person that buys from their site using your link. Although, this is pretty rare. Most brand to influencer relationships either work on a per post basis, or just affiliate links.
Pros:
Can make money from a single post (not a lot of work)
Cons:
If you do it too often, your following can view you as a “sell out” unfortunately. Make sure to only agree to do sponsored posts every so often, not all the time.
Not recurring revenue. The goal of having a following is that it compounds, and sponsored posts don’t. While this is a good option for fast money one time, if you’re thinking about long term, the best thing to do is have an income stream that pays you every month, regardless of if you post about it or not.
If the company decides to no longer work with you, that income stream is completely gone. Make sure you have another stream of income that you own completely.
2. Online Coaching
Online coaching is gaining serious popularity among fitness influencers because it’s a great way to make some money from the following that you already have. For example, you can create customized workout plans, meal plans, and even offer one-on-one coaching sessions over Zoom.
Pros:
Can charge high amounts of money because it’s completely customized to the client.
Develop a good personal connection with a small amount of clients
Cons:
You need to understand marketing pretty well to do this at a high level. Don’t expect to list 1-1 coaching for $500/month and have people buy it immediately. A common practice is having an application form that people go through, then contacting them later and using sales skills to close them over the phone or on Zoom.
Providing 1-1 attention to each and every client requires a lot of time by the fitness influencer. If you have the time to do that, great! But if not, it may not be the best option for you.
3. Selling Digital Products
Digital products are things like workout programs, guides, and nutrition ebooks that your followers will pay for. Creating digital products is a great way for fitness influencers to make money because once it’s made, it’s completely passive. Simply list the products on an online store, put the link in your bio, and wait for some sales.
Pros:
Completely passive income. You can write these programs in a few hours or days and all the sales will require zero work. Make sure you have an automation set up so that when they buy a product, it automatically gets sent to their email to make it REALLY passive.
Cons:
It’s not recurring revenue. Let’s say you make a program and sell it for $50. You get 20 sales and that’s $1,000! Great work. But, after that $1,000 comes in, those customers are done paying you.
Now I know you might be thinking, “Well, I have a lot of followers, so I’ll just get more people to buy.” The problem with that is for a sustainable following, you need to give more than you take. It’s like the sponsored posts. The more you post, the more you “ask” from your followers. All influencers come to a point in time where they realize that their following is capped. Only so many people will buy a product from you, so the best way is to get recurring revenue. We recommend the book 1,000 True Fans for more info on this.
4. Creating an app
Launching an app is the perfect way for fitness influencers to monetize their following. Try offering exclusive content like workout videos, programs, and nutrition plans that they can’t get elsewhere. As an influencer, people want to learn from you personally. They want to feel a closer connection, so a big selling point is a community within the app. A community lets them share their progress, ask questions, and receive feedback on their goals from you personally.
Pros:
The best form of passive income: Not only is the income from the app passive, but they pay to use it every single month, so it’s recurring. Rather than selling a one time digital product, you can now charge $15 all the way up to $50 per month, so that your members are paying without having to buy another program or meal plan.
The ability to offer 1-1 coaching on top of it: A great way to get paid more from your app is to offer 1-1 coaching as an upsell. In our opinion, this is a better option than going right to 1-1 immediately. Why? There’s a term in marketing called “foot in the door” that means once people pay you for something one time, they’re more likely to buy something from you again.
Pro Tip: Link an application form or calendar link directly in your app, that way members have the chance to become 1-1 clients easier.
The ability to sell: Big influencers have a unique opportunity with apps. That is the ability to sell them for a massive payday. It is not uncommon to happen either.
Chris Hemsworth sold his app, Centr Fit, for $200 million dollars!
Kayla Itsines, a fitness influencer, sold her app, Sweat, for $400 million dollars! Talk about some serious money.
Cons:
While an app is completely passive, building one can be quite expensive. The average cost to build an app is $40k! But, if you don’t have that kind of money lying around, there are companies that do it for far less. Here at AppRabbit, it’s less than a fraction of the cost, and has all the same benefits.
So, what’s next?
There are many ways to monetize your following as a fitness influencer. What you choose to do is completely up to you, just make sure you’re giving the most value to your followers as possible, and ask yourself these questions:
Do I want completely passive income or something that requires more work?
Do I want to promote other people’s stuff or something that I own?
What is my goal income, and what is the best channel to get me there?
Now you know the exact strategies to make money as a fitness influencer. With these strategies, you’ll see an increase in engagement, revenue, and your following very soon.
Building an app? Request a demo with AppRabbit today and make more money from your fitness content.
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