(S.S. #5) Grains aren't evil, progression over variation, and more

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1. For the last friggin' time: grains aren't evil - Jerilyn Covert

Too many people today take a reductionist view of nutrition, says Susan Kleiner, PhD, RD. “With this kind of thinking, it’s easy to cut out entire food groups like whole grains, if you think they only offer carbs.”

Kleiner, author of The New Power Eating, calls that point of view “a huge misunderstanding, with serious health consequences. Whole grains contain thousands of compounds that work in synergy to impact our health.”

So what do you say to clients who tell you they avoid all grains? First, Kleiner says, you have to respect their reasons and validate their feelings. Only then can you offer some alternatives.

The takeaway: Encourage them to look past what Kleiner calls the “the fluffy double-wrapped sandwich breads in the grocery store.” Sourdough is a good choice. Seek out reputable brands like Great Harvest Bread Company and Cairnspring Mills.

2. The real value of social media - Daniel Freedman

It’s easy to mock Instagram trainers who seem to know nothing about training and everything about marketing.

But there’s no denying the power of social media when qualified people use it the right now. Take Milwaukee-based trainer Dylan Clark, for example. He recently landed a new online client who paid in full up front.

Her rationale for choosing Clark? “I see your posts and updates often, which is ultimately what led me to reach out to you specifically.”

“She was basically already sold,” Dylan told me. “It was less about 'if' she should do it. Mainly, she just wanted to talk to me about 'how,' and how much.”

The takeaway: This same power is available to you. Share enough of your personality—your passions, your quirks, your formative experiences—that potential clients and customers feel they know you before you meet.

Go deeper: In “How to Build an Online Following from Scratch", seven well-known fitness pros reveal their origin stories—how they first got attention, and how they capitalized on it to build successful, diversified businesses.

3. Variety isn't progression - Lou Schuler

If you made a list of the exercises most often butchered, the kettlebell swing would probably be near the top. It usually ends up as a slow-motion squat-front raise combination, even when the person is working with a trainer.

Each time, I wonder why it’s in the program. What’s the point of doing an explosive hip hinge if you’re neither hinging nor moving explosively?

The problem, as Gray Cook explains in this video, probably comes down to one or more of these issues:

The client has pain bending forward or backward.
The client doesn’t have sufficient hip mobility.
The client has never developed good form on the deadlift.

Take the last one first. Because the swing is a progression from the deadlift, Cook says, “you’ll always be overcoaching swings” if you put them into the program of a client who isn’t ready.

Why would you do that? Probably because you’re confusing variety with progression, Cook says.

Variety is simply changing things up. Progression means you’re advancing a client from a simple movement pattern to one that’s more complex.

A client who hasn’t mastered the simpler movement pattern—the deadlift, in this example—will always struggle with one that’s more complex.

The takeaway: “The best of the best coaches know what not to coach,” Cook says.

If a client can’t touch his toes, even the best trainer can’t teach him to do a deadlift with good form. “The fact they can’t [touch their toes] means you can’t coach anything that involves bending with any degree of integrity or professionalism.”

4. The power of "pretty good" - Jonathan Goodman

Fitness advice and coaching is not bought based on actual merit.

Regret minimization is the dominant force in purchasing fitness advice and coaching.

Consumers will never cop to it, but if you follow their behavior, you’ll see they rarely spend their money on the best choice in any given category.

Instead, they’ll spend it on products or services with the perceived guarantee of not being something they’ll later regret.

Developing trust through a strong body of work, a great reputation, and a consistently reliable brand will do more to sell your services than any improvement in advertising or sales copy ever could.

The takeaway: As advertising legend Rory Sutherland explains in this interview, consumers flatter themselves into believing they’re “maximizers,” buying only the best products with the most value. But in reality, most of us aren’t searching for excellence.

The majority of purchase decisions actually fall under the category of "satisficing." That is, we seek the minimum satisfactory experience from our purchases, “something that’s pretty good and definitely isn’t awful.” And we don't want to feel like we are going to appear stupid for purchasing it.

It's too difficult to actually find the best solution to a problem. The world's too complicated and noisy for that. So, instead of trying to maximize an outcome, the majority of people seek a pretty good all-round solution with a low chance of disaster.

Go deeper: Sometimes even “awful” isn’t a deal-breaker. Not if the consumer believes the product is so good it’s worth a little discomfort. In this article I published on the PTDC, you'll see that sometimes selling fitness requires a bit of demented theater.