Sneaking Exercise Into Your Daily Routine

If you've set a goal of getting in better shape and you wish to hire someone to help you work toward this goal, a personal trainer is the right fitness professional for the job. If you have a large circle of friends on social media, it's possible that you may know someone who works in this capacity, which can make connecting easy. It's also possible that you're friends with a fitness influencer and that you may be thinking about hiring him or her to help you. Your best bet is a legitimate personal trainer, and here are some ways to differentiate between this person and a fitness influencer.

The Trainer Is Accredited

One of the easiest ways to differentiate between a legitimate personal trainer and a fitness influencer (who may be masquerading as a trainer in some way) is to determine who has proper accreditation. There are a few recognized accreditations for personal trainers, and any person who works in this field will be happy to share his or her accreditation with you. Often, a personal trainer will use the acronym for his or her accreditation program after his or her name. Fitness influencers rarely have such accreditation, which means that they lack the proper training to safely help you.

The Trainer Likely Works In A Gym

While there are certainly a lot of personal trainers who can work with you online or visit your home, it's highly common for personal trainers to work in gyms. This is another good way to differentiate between legitimate trainers and fitness influencers. Reputable gyms will only hire trainers who are accredited, so a trainer who works at a gym and can meet you there for your sessions will be a good choice. Conversely, fitness influencers might tout the benefits of working out from home by watching videos — but that may be because they can't actually work with clients in a gym.

The Trainer Won't Recruit You

The relationship between a personal trainer and his or her client is simple — the trainer gains an understanding of the client's fitness goals, and then works with him or her to realize these goals. If you end up speaking to a fitness influencer, there's a good chance that he or she could attempt to recruit you early on. For example, if you tell the influencer that you wish to lose weight, he or she might talk about helping you — and then suggest that once you've lost weight, you can also be a fitness "coach" on his or her "team." You won't encounter such a scenario with a legitimate personal trainer.