We get to know Casey Young in this Trainer spotlight episode of FITLETE Radio.
GEORGE: Introduce yourself and tell us a little about what you do and your background.
My name is Casey Young, and I'm a registered dietitian and certified personal trainer. I have a bachelor's and a master's degree in nutrition. I've been a registered dietitian for about the last 20 years and a certified personal trainer for about five years. I started my business about six years ago, and right now I typically work with women over the age of 40 who are trying to get fit and lose fat. The primary focus of my business is to help women, is really just to empower women. A big focus of my training is strength training and really just trying to help women gain confidence and get strong and help them focus on their fitness and their functionality and gear them up for independence as they age. We like to focus on overall health and well-being instead of just focusing on becoming skinny and focusing on the scale. We like to emphasize overall health and well-being. I work out of my home, which is in northern Michigan, close to the Wisconsin border and way far up north in the upper peninsula of Michigan. It is cold here in the winter, but the summers and the falls are beautiful. I do work virtually. All of my services are available virtually, and I do have clients that I work with all over the world, actually. The majority of my clients are in the United States. I have a lot who live in Canada, and then I have clients as far away as Australia. So worldwide are my clients, which is wonderful.
GEORGE: Tell me a funny or interesting story about yourself that help's us get to know you as a human.
I've got a little funny story to help tell a little bit about myself and maybe help you relate to me as a human being because we are all imperfect in our own ways. So I do like to get out on my bike. I live in Michigan and I take advantage of the beautiful summers here and the beautiful falls and I get out, I like to go on my mountain bike. There's a trail not far from my house, so I enjoy biking. My husband, not so much, but him being the supportive person that he is and him wanting to spend time with me on my bike, he actually bought an electric bike in hopes that he could like keep up with me, so to speak, on my bike. So we decided that we're going to do some bike rides together and one of the first times we were out together with his new electric bike, we went to a trail, a mountain bike trail not far from our house, and I was looking forward to this because I love the trails, I love going out there, it's beautiful that time of year, and I like to just go out and tear it up on the trail. So he's behind me, we just get onto the trail and we're probably out there for maybe like a minute or two and I'm leading and I was about ready to just give her and I turn around and I give him this look like, you ready, you ready for this? And he's like, let's go and I come back around, face the front of the trail and I overcompensated and all of a sudden there was a tree, like right, kind of right in front of me, just off to the side, but my handlebar hit the tree, like there was no time to make any adjustments. So my handlebar hit the tree, it was a tiny tree, but it hit it and it just threw me from the bike and I went down to the trail, crashed my head, thankfully I had my helmet on, but I fell to the ground, hard, and like so hard my Apple watch was like screaming at me like, do you need an ambulance? You know how it like goes in that emergency mode, but thankfully I was okay, nothing broke, maybe a minor concussion perhaps, but a little bit of a learned lesson, like gotta like eating some humble pie, you know, not showing off for my husband, not like trying to like tear it up when he's just getting out there with me. So that's my story of being real for all of you.
GEORGE: What strategies do you use to attract and retain clients in your personal training business?
A couple of strategies that I use to attract clients in my business is social media marketing. This really has been how I've been able to grow my business to serve clients worldwide. I mean I'm from a teeny tiny community in rural Upper Peninsula of Michigan and sometimes I just kind of had to pinch myself like how my business has grown and really it's because of the social media audience that I've been able to attract and I think a big reason is that I've just been relatable to a lot of people. I've heard that time and time again from clients. They found me on social media but it's been because I've related to them as a woman myself over the age of 40 and I've talked about different struggles that they themselves have felt and so I think just being relatable to your target audience is huge and right now I'm you know in the social media world. I continue with that aspect through TikTok and Instagram and on Facebook and then I also have started a podcast so I think that's helped not necessarily attract new clients but I think that helps with retention of my current clients because my current clients really appreciate some of the information that I'm providing often on my podcast and then again I think just that relatable piece has been a key component of how a lot of my clients have stuck around in my program because I do have a lot of clients who have been with me since the beginning of my services when I started this virtual fitness program almost five years ago and they they keep coming back and you know a lot of my focus is progress not perfection and we talk about you know we're not trying to have the perfect body we're trying to be perfectly confident in the body that we have and our focus is on health and how do we how do we set ourselves up for success in the future as strong and independent women as we age and so I think just you know striking striking accord with with the values of the women in my program I think is is what keeps them around and helps with the retention.
GEORGE: What is your process for assessing a new client's fitness level and addressing their goals?
A couple of strategies that I use to attract clients in my business is social media marketing. This really has been how I've been able to grow my business to serve clients worldwide. I mean I'm from a teeny tiny community in rural Upper Peninsula of Michigan and sometimes I just kind of had to pinch myself like how my business has grown and really it's because of the social media audience that I've been able to attract and I think a big reason is that I've just been relatable to a lot of people. I've heard that time and time again from clients. They found me on social media but it's been because I've related to them as a woman myself over the age of 40 and I've talked about different struggles that they themselves have felt and so I think just being relatable to your target audience is huge and right now I'm you know in the social media world. I continue with that aspect through TikTok and Instagram and on Facebook and then I also have started a podcast so I think that's helped not necessarily attract new clients but I think that helps with retention of my current clients because my current clients really appreciate some of the information that I'm providing often on my podcast and then again I think just that relatable piece has been a key component of how a lot of my clients have stuck around in my program because I do have a lot of clients who have been with me since the beginning of my services when I started this virtual fitness program almost five years ago and they they keep coming back and you know a lot of my focus is progress not perfection and we talk about you know we're not trying to have the perfect body we're trying to be perfectly confident in the body that we have and our focus is on health and how do we how do we set ourselves up for success in the future as strong and independent women as we age and so I think just you know striking striking accord with with the values of the women in my program I think is is what keeps them around and helps with the retention.
GEORGE: What certifications do you hold, and how do you stay updated on the latest fitness trends and research?
As I mentioned, I'm a registered dietitian and certified personal trainer, and both of these require me to do continuing education. So as a dietitian and certified personal trainer, I have to meet a minimum number of credits every two years for a certified personal trainer, and then every five years as a registered dietitian. So these are just requirements for me to maintain both of those certifications. I'm also just a really avid learner and reader. Like, I am at a point in my life where I am thirsty for more knowledge, and with just starting my business and not having any formal education in business, I am always reading some kind of self-help or business or entrepreneurial book or listening to podcasts, watching YouTube videos to help me learn skills that I don't have or that I want to learn. So lifelong learner, reading books, listening to podcasts, I think you can learn so much. And then just observing others in the industry, I think, can be very, very helpful. And then, you know, just staying on top of different learning opportunities that come along, such as webinars or different conferences that may arise in the field can be hugely helpful as well.
GEORGE: How do you envision your personal training business evolving in the next few years?
I'm really excited about the future of my personal training business. I absolutely love what I get to do every single day. And I love the women in my community and the clients that I have. And I look forward in the next few years to continue to serve these women and expanding the number and the scope of the women that I get to serve in the years ahead. As I look forward a little further, I would love to see my business evolve with my aging self. I don't know if I'm gonna be able to continue to do the services exactly the way I'm doing them now in my mid 40s that I maybe can't continue to do into my 50s or later. It just might shift a little bit. I'm hoping I can continue to be that relatable person. And right now I speak to the over 40 population, but maybe in five years I'm going to start speaking to that over 50 population. And what do their needs look like compared to what do the needs look like now? One thing that I'd love to see myself doing a little bit more of in the future is offering additional mobility trainings and perhaps getting a yoga certification and being able to offer that. I think that'll be a wonderful compliment to what I'm doing and also a way for me to continue to offer training as I get a little bit older and as my body maybe isn't able to handle as much of a load of the high intensity exercise that I'm currently offering.
GEORGE: What do you think are the biggest challenges currently facing the fitness & personal training industry?
I think one of the biggest challenges that we face is just continuing to keep up with technology. I think that there's so many changes that are coming at us on a daily basis. And as an online trainer, this can be overwhelming at times, you know, or the way I'm doing something today might look completely different six months or a year from now. And one of my biggest challenges is how do I keep up with that? And how do I continue to utilize some of the advances in technology to benefit not only my business and my program, but my clients as well. I also feel like there has been a very large influx of online personal training options. And not to say that the market is saturated because I know that there are so many individuals who are in need of services, but I do think that the competition has definitely gotten a little bit increased for online training services.
Want more Casey Young in your life? You can find’em here:
visit: https://inspirehw.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/fit.nutritionist
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Casey.Young.RD.CPT/
Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/inspire-fitness/id1731207251
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