Writing for Fitness – An Interview with Rob Fitzgerald

I’ve been editing articles and helping out at EliteFTS for a number of years, and it all started from a text exchange we had on my way to work one morning. Dave’s always looking for more article submissions – and better ones – and I suggested coming to a Learn To Train seminar at EFS to give a presentation on how to do this the right way, since most of the people who go to Dave’s events are trainers and people looking to make money in the fitness industry. Dave figured an eBook would be a more effective way to get the word out, so we started putting some ideas together.

Why is it necessary, though? What is it about the writing you see in the industry that compelled you to want to do something about it?

In my first book, which had nothing to do with fitness, one of the “characters” was a professional boxer I’ve been friends with for a long time. He had a great quote that I use all the time: “There are two things every man thinks he’s an expert at, but isn’t: driving and fighting.” I totally find this to be true, and being in the publishing industry for a while now, I’d definitely add writing to that mix. Most people think that simply sitting down at a keyboard and putting words to a page is “writing,” but it’s not. There’s a lot more to it than that. It’s a skill that has to be developed, just like anything else – only every guy with a computer thinks he already has it mastered and you can’t tell them anything. They don’t, but they don’t listen.

What’s the problem with writing in this particular industry?

Honestly? I might get myself into a little trouble here, but to me the real problem in the fitness industry is a lack of standards. There are so many ways to get published, especially online, that it doesn’t matter whether what you write is good or not. So many outlets are so hungry for content that they’ll seriously just publish anything, even absolute crap, just to get content online (or, in some cases, in print). The problem isn’t getting published. That can be the easy part. It’s what you’re publishing, and what it’s going to do for you and your career.

What do you mean by that exactly?

Okay, look at the guys who are making real money selling informational products online – and incidentally, as we touch on in the book, that’s the way to make money these days. But look at those guys – you, John Kiefer, Berardi, et al. You all can either write or you have the good sense to pay an editor to make it look like you can. Your work looks professional. People can come to your site, Joel, and the way you write makes it obvious that they’re dealing with a very intelligent guy. You don’t misspell words, you don’t use poor grammar, you don’t crack bad jokes, and you don’t use clichés in every third sentence. You do a professional job of it, and although your information is great, without packaging it the way you do, you wouldn’t have the success you’ve had.

Why not?

Because you only have one chance to make a good first impression, and the first impression you’re making these days, if you want to make any money, is online, in writing. And even if the average consumer isn’t a professional editor, he’s still going to be able to tell the difference between good writing and bad writing, assuming he’s educated through high school and has read a book in his life. To someone like that, who has even a little bit of education, a fitness professional who writes badly is going to come off as unintelligent. I don’t know about you, but I’m not busting out my credit card and ordering products from anyone I think isn’t intelligent enough to deserve my money. This may sound arrogant, and your information may be the best thing in the world, but if you can’t get it across in a way that makes me trust what you’re saying, I’m not buying it. That’s where quality writing comes into the picture. If your writing is not up to par, you’re eliminating a HUGE portion of your customer base before they’ve ever had a chance to see what you can potentially do for them. They’ll tune you out. I’m saying that as a customer, not a professional editor or writer.

Aren’t you nitpicking a little bit with this?

I honestly don’t think so. When you’re writing something for public consumption, you have to look at things a little more globally. Sure, we have the whole crowd of regulars at all the websites that matter to us, which means that certain guys, no matter what they put out, will be able to sell. But, that’s it. It’s finite. As Dave says all the time, there are something like 30,000 powerlifters in the world, so if you’re going to rely on them as your niche market without trying to expand what you’re doing into the general fitness population, you’re limiting yourself. I’m not saying that group is stupid, or that they accept bad writing. I’m part of that group, you know? The point here is that you want what you’re selling to get outside of that group. Inside the group, when you’re known, you’ll sell no matter what. Jim Wendler and several others can put out an eBook about how to take a shit, and the same 1,000 people will buy it no matter what. But if you want to get outside of it and into the mainstream where the real money is, like you’re doing with your products, you have to make damned sure you look like a professional in terms of the quality of your writing. That’s what the best guys in the industry have learned, and that’s what this book is designed to teach people how to do.

What do you think the biggest problem is in terms of technique?

I don’t think people understand that writing is like building a house. You don’t just put a house up in one shot. You have to dig a hole, pour a foundation, frame it, put up drywall, flooring, a roof, insulation, and a crapload of other stuff. Then, once that’s all done, you have to actually put up siding and paint the thing, not to mention the landscaping and the furniture. If you looked at all of that on camera at high speed, it would show about twenty separate “passes” at it before the thing is done. With your first draft, all you’ve done is dug that first hole, yet too many people think that’s what they’re supposed to turn in when they want to get published. That’s not how it works. Your first draft just gets all your ideas on the page. You have to rewrite stuff several times in order to establish a voice, get your ideas across properly, and catch all your mistakes. People have to work a lot harder at it than they think they do.

How will your book help?

As I said repeatedly in the book, it’s not going to automatically make you a better writer. That comes through repetition and practice. When people ask me what’s wrong with their writing, I’ll take their piece and put it next to a professionally edited piece and say, “Look at yours, and look at this one, and study the differences,” but if they don’t have the experience and haven’t done enough reading in their lives, they just can’t see it. That’s fine. It takes time. What this book will do, however, is teach you how that process works. If you really want to learn to do something well, you have to start somewhere. The way we put this book together, it’s filled with ideas that will both make your writing more effective right away and give you a long term plan for improvement. It also contains a ton of advice on how to deal with the people who’ll be deciding whether your stuff gets published in the first place: editors. When we set out to put something like this together, my goal was to write the manual I wished I’d had when I was first getting started in trying to get paid to write. I think we’ve accomplished that pretty well.

You touch on eBooks in the book. Can you elaborate on that a little bit?

Yeah, it’s kind of funny. I’ve edited a lot of the really successful ones, but I’ve never officially put out one of my own, so I waited until I’d gone through the process with this one from start to finish before I wrote that section. I want to see what worked and what didn’t work, at least in terms of the writing and production process. Now that this one is done and on the market, I’m seeing some ways the process can be improved – especially in terms of promoting the thing and making money off it. I think that’ll be the next book in this series.

Thanks Rob! I appreciate the interview and I truly think that literally everyone in the fitness industry, even those that have no aspirations to write, would benefit by reading your book and should buy it. I think that effective communication is such an important skill in any business and writing will always be a big part of that.

I’ll be posting a full review of the book soon, but in the meantime, where can people go to learn more and pick up a copy for themselves?

No problem, thanks for having me on the site. People can GO HERE to get all the details on the book.