In this episode Dan breaks down how he'd build a fitness business from scratch in 2025, including the exact model, setup, pricing, and marketing he’d use if he were starting again.

What you'll learn in this episode:

• Why Dan would start by designing his ideal lifestyle before building the business
• The overlooked role of community in delivering long-term client results
• How he would structure semi-private sessions to maximise both coaching quality and social connection
• The type of space he’d choose to operate from, and why less is more
• Who he would and wouldn’t work with, and how he’d attract natural referrers
• Why he’d charge premium rates and how he’d justify the price
• How he would keep admin, payments, and scheduling simple and low-cost
• What he’d do differently when it comes to equipment, technology, and gym setup
• How he’d market the business without spending anything on advertising

This is part two of a conversation between Tim Karajas and Dan on the Extension Fitness podcast.

Tim and Dan we explore how to improve retention by helping our clients and members build long-term exercise habits within your business. They talk about practical strategies and mindset shifts you can use to turn your customers into life-time exercisers.

We work so hard to increase retention rates in our business, but if you’re not building habits in your clients, you’re fighting a losing battle against human psychology. Today, Dan explores how to win that fight.

• Why making exercise laughably easy at the start is essential for building lasting habits.

• How identity-based motivation increases adherence to exercise and turns actions into lifelong behaviours.

• Why loss aversion is a powerful psychological driver—and how to use it to help clients stay consistent.

• How to apply the minimum effective dose to avoid burnout and ensure sustainability over decades.

• What mindset traits, like growth mindset and life-structure alignment, are common in people who succeed with long-term exercise.

1. Help clients design a starting exercise habit that feels so easy it's impossible to fail.

2. Ask clients to picture their worst possible week and build habits they can still stick to even then.

3. Reinforce identity-based language by helping clients move from “I exercise” to “I am an exerciser.”

4. Use loss aversion by tracking progress and helping clients see what they risk losing by stopping.

5. Check for alignment between a client’s stated values and their calendar—then help them close the gap.

Dan was recently interviewed by Tim Karajas on the Extension Fitness podcast. This is part one of a two part conversation between Tim and Dan.

Today, you’ll hear Tim ask Dan about whether there are clues he can pick up on when first speaking with a business owner that let him predict whether a fitness business will be successful.

Dan talks about the importance of being unique, how to test new ideas quickly, and the importance of designing your business around the life you want to have.

Tim finishes by asking Dan to distil what it takes to be successful in business down to three points.

• Why being different is more achievable (and more effective) than being better than your competition.

• How niching down—sometimes to an extreme—can unlock loyal client bases and long-term business success.

• What a Minimum Viable Product (MVP) is and how to use it to test ideas with minimal risk and effort.

• Why quitting fast can sometimes be smarter than persisting with the wrong business idea.

• How Dan reverse-engineered his business to support the lifestyle he wanted as a dad.

• A simple 3-step framework for building a successful business through value creation, marketing, and value delivery.

1. Define a unique problem your fitness business solves and make that the centre of your offering.

2. Build a minimum viable product that looks complete from the outside but takes minimal time and cost to test.

3. Use feedback and traction (or lack of it) to decide quickly whether to evolve or abandon your business idea.

4. Focus your marketing on making your uniqueness obvious, not just your qualifications or features.

5. Deliver an experience so good that clients can't help but talk about it—make referrals effortless.