Successful entrepreneurs share several common traits; they’re optimistic, determined and know how to turn their dreams into reality.
Mark Sisson is a perfect example of someone who has used their entrepreneurial prowess to turn their passion for health and fitness into several highly successful business ventures including:
- Primal Health Coach – first online ancestral health coach school
- Primal Blueprint Publishing – publisher to over 25 ancestral health books
- Primal Kitchen – paleo and primal friendly condiments, supplements and snacks
- Primal Nutrition – premium, state-of-the-science health supplements
If you’re a passionate health advocate interested in pursuing a career as a successful health entrepreneur, then this post is for you, as we’ll explore some exciting healthcare business ventures you may like to consider.
1. Open a Wellness Center
If you’re a passionate advocate of holistic care, then maybe you should consider running a wellness center.
A wellness center offers a range of alternative healthcare options, including but not limited to:
- Aromatherapy
- Herbal medicine
- Acupuncture
- Massage therapy
- Health coaching
How to Get Started
You don’t need to be qualified in all areas of alternative care offered at your center. Instead, you can lease a large professional office space and subdivide the space into smaller offices for the other alternative practitioners to sub-lease from you.
To encourage other alternative practitioners to join your wellness center you can offer:
- A centralized receptionist
- Parcel shipping
- Central record keeping
- Any other additional services that would typically be required for the operation of business
Then, once you’ve gained some experience and success with your wellness center, you can consider franchising your business model.
2. Open a Fitness Club
Statista reveals that as of 2016, the global health and fitness industry generates more than 80 billion U.S. dollars revenue per year.
If you’re passionate about getting your local community more active, then running your own fitness club could be a clever business strategy for you.
Fitness clubs can take on many different forms, so it’s important that you decide on the best model for you and your clientele.
Large Fitness Center
Large fitness centers offer something for everyone. They are usually kitted out with equipment and machines, have a large studio for group fitness classes, and offer personal training.
If you’re interested in running your own large fitness center, you’ll likely need a significant amount of start-up money, so having a solid business plan to take to a lender will be hugely important.
CrossFit Box/Boutique Studio
Smaller-style fitness clubs such as a CrossFit box or a boutique studio usually have a large open space with free weights, squat racks and pull up bars. Their emphasis is more on the coaching, rather than having lots of machines and equipment.
CrossFit boxes and boutique studios appeal to clientele looking for a more personalized approach to coaching and people who enjoy the community feel associated with these smaller fitness clubs.
How to Get Started
If you’re looking to run your own fitness club, you’re likely to require some basic fitness qualifications. However, it’s not essential for you to be an expert yoga master or an elite CrossFit athlete in order to run your chosen fitness club.
Instead you could:
- Form a business partnership with someone who is more experienced with the fitness side of the business
- Employ or contract staff to train your members
With both these options, this leaves you time to focus on the administration and/or nutrition aspects of your fitness club.
There’s also an opportunity to franchise your fitness club in the future.
3. Host a Health Fair
A health fair or expo is similar to a trade or craft show, except all the vendors are part of the health, wellness or fitness industries.
With an increasing number of online-only health and wellness shops and businesses, the demand for a health fair is also growing. A health fair provides your vendors with the opportunity to showcase their products and services in person, without the commitment or financial overheads of running their own physical store.
How to Get Started
The frequency of your health fair will be determined by demand from both your vendors and your attendees, but ultimately, your health fair could be run monthly, quarterly, bi-yearly or even annually.
To get started, firstly hire a suitable venue in your local area. If the weather permits, a park or community square could work well. Inside venues could include a town hall or a school gymnasium.
Profits can be made from charging:
- Exhibitors a booth fee to display at the health fair
- An entry fee to the general public upon admission to the health fair
If you want to work flexible hours and from home, this may be right up your alley.
4. Develop a Health-based Smartphone App
Are you highly innovative, teach-savvy and passionate about making a large-scale impact on the world?
Maybe you should consider developing a health-based smartphone app?
We are growing increasingly reliant on our smartphones, with over 2.3 billion smartphone users worldwide in 2017.
Consequently, the smartphone app development market is predicted to increase globally by over 14% between 2016-2022.
How to get started
- Identify who is going to use your app. Developing your app specifically for your niche market will make your app hugely appealing to them and they’ll be more likely to download it.
- The best smartphone apps have a user friendly interface so make sure your app is simple to navigate.
- Include the latest technologies, such as direct cloud interaction, as this will greatly minimize the internal memory required on your smartphone.
- Decide on how you plan to make money from your app. If your app is free to download, it’s worth allowing advertisements. You can also include a premium (fee-paying) version that includes extra features and no ads.
5. Develop a Health Coaching eCourse
If you’re someone who loves the idea of sharing your health and wellness knowledge on a large scale, then maybe you should consider developing a health coaching eCourse.
This is a clever idea for someone who is looking for a part-time commitment or an additional source of income alongside their health coaching.
How to get started
- Do your research. Take a look at other online courses or think back to any eCourses you may have taken previously, and critically assess what you liked and disliked about them.
- Generate course material. This involves developing your course structure, learning content and methods of assessment.
- Decide on an online teaching platform. Udemy, Teachable and Ruzuku are three of the most popular platforms available.
- Make it social. Many students perform best with interaction with their peers as well as with their teachers. Setting up a private Facebook group is a simple way to achieve this.
6. Start Your Own Health Coaching Business
The prospect of starting your own health coaching business may seem a little daunting. The reality is, it’s not!
How to Get Started
If you’ve decided that you’d like to run your own health coaching business, it’s important to understand the different health coaching models that you can offer your clients, which are:
- Online health coaching. This is a great option for someone who is limited on time. It can take the form of a weekly or biweekly email. Your content can include video modules, surveys and online food journals.
- One-on-one health coaching. This is the traditional health coaching model and involves working with your clients individually on their specific health goal(s). One-on-one coaching can take place face-to-face, over the phone or using an online platform such as Skype.
- Group health coaching. This is a cost effective alternative to one-on-one health coaching. One of the best aspects of group health coaching is the sense of community that forms amongst your clients. Group health coaching works best with between 4-20 participants.
- Running a workshop. This is very much like group health coaching, but on a larger scale. Hosting a workshop at a community event is a great way to promote your business and to attract new clients to your other coaching services.
- Corporate health coaching. This is very much like group health coaching, but in a business setting. A growing number of employers are providing health coaching to their staff. If performed well, corporate health coaching has the potential to be highly profitable.
The model(s) that you choose will be dependent on your time commitment, interests and location.
7. Write a Book
With a booming health and wellness industry, your insight and experience as a health expert is sure to be helpful to the growing number of health coaches, students and wellness enthusiasts, who are looking at ways to increase their own knowledge and education.
If you’ve been working in the health, wellness or fitness industries for a while, you’re likely to have more book-worthy ideas than you realize.
A great way to get your knowledge out into the world is by writing a book.
How to Get Started
Here are some tips to help you get pen-to-paper (so to speak).
- Get started. You can worry about finding a publisher later on.
- Put together an outline. Have an idea as to what you would like your book to be about. You can always modify your outline as your book progresses.
- Do your research. Understanding your topic is key to good quality writing. Take your information from quality resources such as scientific articles, books, blogs, vlogs and podcasts written and produced by respectable experts.
- Generate content. If you’ve been writing a health blog for a while, you’ve already made a headstart on your content generation, as you can use your blog posts as content for your book.
- Schedule writing into your week. Set aside a set amount of time each week to work on your book.
- Get help. Have your writing critically assessed by someone that will give you honest feedback. This could be an editor, or a family member or friend. Be prepared to take on board their feedback.
In summary, we’ve explored 7 health-based business ideas that you may like to consider and they are:
- Open a wellness center
- Open a fitness club
- Host a health fair
- Develop a health-based smartphone app
- Develop a health coaching eCourse
- Start your own health coaching business
- Write a book
These are just a few of the innumerable opportunities available to you. If being a health entrepreneur is your true passion, then go for it!
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