Transcription
Hey there, Dr. Mark here. And today, I'm going to show you how to create a nutrition plan for clients, how to onboard them with the exact words to say in an email, and how to assess what they're eating now so you can create a plan that will get them insane results and grow your business.
I'm going to walk you through three different examples: easy, medium, and hard. So make sure you hang around till the end so you know how to navigate a challenging coaching situation. Today, you're going to see the exact step-by-step process to start working with a nutrition client. So let's dive in.
So, the first client we have here is a male. He's 54 years old, he's 185 pounds, and he's 5'11". He works a desk job, but he does train hard, and he's worked under two previous coaches. For goals, here's what he would like to accomplish. So this is in his own words here: "My current goals are to maintain energy, build muscle while losing fat. Spring is coming, and I'm looking to lose the winter fluff. I'm 185 pounds currently and looking to work my way down to 170 pounds." So he's been under his own direction the last 18 months and is looking for something new.
So, even if he's no stranger to tracking, here's what I got him to do before we started. I got him tracking three to five days just to do an assessment before we started things up. I wanted to see where he was at now and how I could help, as well as describe my coaching process, which is going to be like onboarding him into my system.
So, here's what I did next. So this client is no stranger to the actual coaching process and tracking, and he's already on board. But what I really need to hammer down is my coaching process and what I expect from him so he knows exactly how things will work, how I want to coach him, and what the expectations are around checking in. Again, I'm going to include a video of me describing this process as I look over his nutrition, but I'll also reiterate that in an email in written text. If you want these exact words and what I'm going to send over to this client, make sure you comment "onboarding" below, and I'll make sure the template gets over to you.
So, we have this first client here, client number one. He's a male, 185 pounds, 54 years old, 5 foot 11". He is moderately active. Sometimes I just use both of these exos, both out and kind of get a better sense of where the average is between the two of them if I have someone that's kind of describing being in between two different levels of activity. Got a basic idea of how much calories he's burning just at maintenance based on these calculations. He has described to me that he's worked with a few coaches in the past, uh, wants to has a little bit of conflicting goals in terms of maintain energy, build muscle, uh, while losing some fat and getting leaner. So I really want to just take a step back and think about, okay, where are his priorities? What's his primary goal? What would be nice to have? Just so we can kind of shift that focus. For the most part, and through conversation and what I'm seeing, I think his primary goal is to get leaner over the next little bit to, quote unquote, for him, lose some of that winter fluff. So he's really looking for this as someone that's experienced with tracking, which a lot of your clients are going to be at times. They're going to come to you, they're not going to always be completely new. This is someone that has a better, has a pretty good idea of what they need to do, just wants a second look, a second opinion, kind of reinvigorate the process around getting back into it and getting another set of eyes on things. That's why coaching is so important, is because we can, we allow ourselves to be, you know, objective about the process. When someone else is looking at things, it's tough to do with our own stuff. That's why I have coaches, that kind of thing. But that's kind of what I'm getting into the sense here.
I'm also looking over here because I got his actual intake form on this side, just so you guys don't think I'm a little spacey. Uh, but so what I'm looking here is we got some, we collected some information from his tracking. Here's what he's doing right now in terms of five days worth of data. He started at 185 pounds, and we saw a slight trend of this coming down throughout the assessment period of the five days. And based on that, that, you know, my first kind of, uh, spidey sense going off is, hey, he's probably in a deficit already, just based on that. And that's confirmed by when we look at his overall intake, uh, over the course of this. Right, this is an average for this number. We take, you know, the 2130 that we saw over the five days, divided by his body weight in kilograms. I give this a number to get a sense of, is he at maintenance calories using the deficit right now? This is showing 25 kcals per kilogram, which is in a deficit around 15%. If we think about, you know, 30 being the lower end of maintenance, 10 of that would be three and three, so we're right, you know, 20 deficit would be 24. So he's already in deficit, which we're seeing based on his numbers here. If there's, so, you know, if he continued to eat this way, he would continue to lose weight, um, which, you know, we're seeing. If anything, um, for someone looking to get leaner, his protein intake could probably be higher. He's not necessarily doing anything wrong here, this all looks pretty good, but his protein intake could be higher. So that would be one of the first things I suggest. Let's keep your calories somewhat similar, but bring your protein up too, closer to 185 grams, which is going to be about 15 grams more, half a serving generally more per day. With the others, do the same, keep the calories somewhat similar, and start there.
The biggest thing that he's going to need here is that he's, you know, pretty much decided already he wants to go in on this path with me. But I did got to describe to him the actual check-in process. So through this assessment, I'm doing the assessment, here's where I would start, but I'm also going to onboard them in terms of, here are the expectations of us working together. So for someone like this, using my sheet here, I'm going to get them on Monday check-ins, which means that I got to describe to him that he's got to have all of this information in by Sunday night, right? So what it looks like is he finishes eating here on Sunday, enters all the information. He could do this day by day if he wants, which he appears to be doing, or he could do it all on Sunday, put all the information in objectively, and then go to the top of this sheet and fill in some subjective information for me in terms of how the actual week went. I have some questions here like this. If you guys haven't seen this form yet, you want an example of it, by all means, reach out and let me know. Maybe write "what we do is" and I'm going to describe to you this entire process, right? Onboard, o-n-b-o, I mean, it doesn't really know the spelling, ard, in the comments below, and I'll send you over the exact steps and email template that I send to clients to get them started once I've done the assessment. But this is the form that he's going to send once he enters us all on Sunday night. I'm going to give the expectation that I'm going to be looking at things. I have time to look over his stuff Monday morning. So it needs to be in for me to give you the best, most effective coaching service, I need to have everything in front of me so that when I sit down, I can address everything. So that's the expectation. You fill everything out Sunday night. When I get to my desk Monday morning at 9:00 a.m., it doesn't really matter specifically when I do it. I just want to give you, you know, the implication and the idea that I'm going to be doing it at a certain time so people adhere and get me the things that I need to get to be able to do my job. So everything, I'm not wasting any time, I'm sitting down, I'm doing it, I'm streamlined, I'm an effective coach, and I can spend the rest of my time finding new clients. And when done, you know, straightforward and effectively, this is the best way to describe this process and and utilize your time. So that's where I'm going to start with this client, spending a lot of time describing the actual process, but also showing them that I have a plan for him moving forward and what that would look like under my direction. Hope that makes sense.
But now, let's move on to client number two.
So, the second client we have here is a female. She's 140 pounds, 24 years old, and five foot four. She has a fat loss focus. Goals, she says that she wants to get down to 20 to 22 body fat, which we'll talk about and address in a second, and she says specifically that she needs the accountability to get there and is eating too many calories and not tracking macros consistently. So it sounds like she's no stranger to tracking either. Here's what I saw from her time tracking.
My second client here, we have another, uh, we have a female client. She's 140 pounds, she's around five foot four, and 25 years old. Her goals specifically is she wants to get leaner, um, and she's feeling like she doesn't have tons of accountability to get there, and she just doesn't feel like things are much consistent. She feels like she's eating too many calories and not tracking consistently. She'd also mentioned, and you're gonna remember this part, that she wanted to be between 20 to 22 body fat, with which in a lot of cases, people that just want to get leaner, they have this percentage in mind. We just want to think about, hey, you know, is moving in the right direction around getting leaner and having a specific goal important, or is it, you know, is she really bought into that certain number? And someone in this case that doesn't need to be a certain body fat, just wants to get leaner, we always want to always want to make that kind of distinction because she gets too wrapped into a body fat percentage and she's not assessing it in the right way or in an accurate way, she could be maybe a little too invested in that when in reality she just wants to get leaner and look a certain way. So I mean, one of the most important things about being a coach is having those open conversations and expectations around that process, not so much saying that's not important or you don't want to do that, but just talking about what it would mean and kind of going from there. So those are her goals around this process.
What are we seeing in the actual assessment process? So, got three days worth of data for her before we started. Um, and interestingly enough, you remember our last client, there had an energy intake of around 25 kcals per kilogram and looking to get leaner. She's at the same place, uh, and based on, you know, what we know about what she wants to do, she ate here consistently, she would get leaner. She's also mentioned though that consistency is a bit of an issue. So maybe she's giving us what we want to see at this point, and she doesn't do it all the time, and that's why she's in the situation that she's in. Again, that's just our, our kind of our code, putting on our coaching hat and thinking about, you know, adding to the puzzle here and what it would look like. So that could be something that's going on.
The biggest thing that stands out here in terms of the rest of the macronutrients and how they contribute to her overall calorie intake is that protein intake, very low. If anything, it's actually almost not enough protein for a 7 individual that has no body composition goals at all. An average of 60 grams of protein per day, that's going to be the first thing that we're going to address and talk about in an assessment. I'd point that out right away and say, "Hey, most of your progress is going to come down to you eating more protein, keeping the calories in check." So that's the first thing we're going to address. We also want to remember though, that like, if we went to, if we doubled this right off of that, that would be way too much for her to consume. Her habits wouldn't catch up, she'd have a hard time doing that. The other two macronutrients, carbohydrates on the higher end of things. She has, like I would consider this to be a carb-heavy diet. It is quite, um, high, especially for someone looking to get leaner, which isn't a bad thing. I think a lot of people come into these situations thinking, "I can't eat any carbohydrates at all." I think we're actually coming at this from the opposite end of the spectrum. With her, fat is on the lower end of things, in terms of like, right in the middle of the range comparatively, compared to carbs that would be on the lower end of the range. So really, what we're doing is making the push to her including more protein-based foods, managing the carbs, not eliminating them, managing them, and bringing them down a little bit so that she can continue to get leaner and pushed out a little bit. So for starting numbers, someone like this, again, if you think about her average 236, we'll bring the carbs down a little bit, swap that out with a bit more protein. Not going to anything crazy right off the bat, 105 grams of protein, 200 grams of carbs, and 50 grams of fat. One of the biggest trends you'll see in people looking to improve their body composition, specifically trying to get leaner, is that when we look at these numbers, quote unquote, eating healthy for them would be including more whole, unprocessed foods, a lot of fruits and vegetables, and sometimes whole grains. Not everyone thinks that way. If they feel like they want to get leaner, they don't always understand that they can do that, but their protein intake is definitely low. I'm going to explain to you a few other trends when we get back to the video here, but that's where I would start with this individual. Essentially, once you've seen enough of these situations, you start to put people in boxes, and that's not a bad thing because each individual is different, but there's trends for sure, without a doubt. We start to pick up on them, and that kind of that starts to guide our coaching process and the insight and guidance we provide to these individuals and how we start them out and how we begin to start putting together their nutrition plan. Hope that makes sense.
I've done this assessment and onboarding process nearly 3,000 times in the last 10 years, and most new clients, regardless if they have tracked before or they're just getting started, fit into three main categories. The three main trends here are: number one, not enough protein; number two, too much protein; and number three, not enough food overall. And chances are, once you start doing this process, you're gonna see the exact same thing.
Let's move on to our last client example today, and remember, this client is a bit more challenging based on what he wants to accomplish and where he's coming from.
So, the third client we have here is a male. He's five foot ten, approximately 231 pounds, and 36 years old. Here's what he told me he wanted to accomplish. So he says he wants to gain strength, lose some fat. He lacks an understanding of nutrition. And some basic notes here, where he got back into training just before the pandemic, and he hasn't stopped training since. He's also lost 25 to 30ish pounds and kept it off by intermittent fasting and following a mostly carnivore meal plan. So he's just starting a six-week kettlebell program in the next few days, and he's also training Jiu-Jitsu.
Okay, so this is a bit of an interesting and tough case because based on what he's described, he has seen some success, but the carnivore diet and intermittent fasting are both pretty aggressive diets, as well as they can be pretty restrictive, but they've clearly helped him. So as an evidence-based coach, I always want to get people results, but in an effective way. But I'm also trying to do it in the least invasive way possible. So we want to get more specific around what he wants to accomplish and why, to mainly see if I can find some middle ground here.
We have client three again, someone that wants to accomplish gaining some strength and making sure that whatever they're doing in the gym is paying off for them in terms of, you know, putting on some muscle and feeling like they are stronger and seeing that performance in some of the movements that they're doing, as well as getting leaner. And you'll remember that this individual started off this process by losing quite a bit of weight with the carnivore diet and intermittent fasting. So two relatively actively restrictive diets and like pretty, um, I would say, I mean, they're not, they're not very user-friendly. You got to be quite committed to it, and it's one of those things where maybe not entirely sustainable as well. So I want to, as an evidence-based coach, think about, okay, this individual's clearly had some success on that. Me saying, "You shouldn't do that anymore," might not be the best approach because they enjoy it. And I'm also a client-centered coach, so I want what's best for them within what we know to be true, what's going to be effective, and kind of go from there. So if anything, based on what we're seeing here, let's find some middle ground and see what we can do.
Got three days worth of data for this individual. The first thing that I'm seeing right off the bat, did all three of these cases today have 25 kcals per kilogram of energy intake? Just a moderate deficit? They did. Interesting. So if you continue to eat this way, he would probably lose weight. But we also see that like his course of weight over the course of three days actually go up substantially. This could just be a fluke as well, or, you know, based on when body weight changes dramatically in days, it has nothing to do with body tissue, right? It's much more influenced by the amount of water that we're carrying, to do, you know, changes in sodium and mineral content and that type of thing. It's more to do with hydration, as well as actual how much food is in our guts as well, right? If we go from eating no vegetables at all to two kilos of vegetables, we're gonna have a lot more actual physical mass, regardless of the energy and calories. So we're thinking about that stuff as well. But this could just be a fluke too. With the biggest thing, could also not be, you know, not could not be weighing in at the same time or under the same conditions, right? If this is later on in the day, fully clothed, that type of thing. We're all trying to tease this kind of stuff out. But let's just take it as, you know, an average body weight here.
Protein intake, by all means, on the lower end of things. I think what I want to know from this client is if he is doing some fasting. We want to hear intermittent fasting. I want to know typically, what is the fasting window? Is this someone just someone that's not eating breakfast right away? Are they doing prolonged fasts in terms of like a 16-hour fasting window? Because if the feeding window is narrow to the point where it makes it really tough to get adequate amount of protein in, that might be something that we need to address. Maybe we need to expand the feeding window, maybe we need to focus more on protein. Because at this point, if he wants to get stronger as well as continue to get leaner, he'll get leaner, but it might be at, or he might drop weight, but it might be at the risk of losing more muscle than it needs to be, regardless of what he's doing with training. And I know he had mentioned this is something that he's starting a new training program with some kettlebells and that type of thing, doing some like Jiu-Jitsu and mixed martial arts based training. This isn't someone that just wants to lose a bunch of muscle. Most people don't, but he's definitely not one of those ones. So we got to think about, is the fasting giving away of that? He had also mentioned carnivore diet. And when I see these carbohydrate numbers at an average of 2 grams per kilogram, this is someone that's eating generally enough carbs for someone that's in a deficit. So I'm not seeing something that would be like, I think this individual is probably eating some source of plant-based food. There's no way he's not, right? You can't get this much carbs just from animal-based food. So there must be some starch involved in that type of thing, which I think is reassuring to me because maybe he's done the carnivore diet in the past, but maybe he's more open to something that's more mixed right now.
So in terms of where do we start them off? Energy can stay similar, but protein's got to come up. And again, not so much that it is completely unreachable for him, but something like 165 grams of protein, which is again, is like a serving more per day, is a good place to start. And as we show you like the check-in process in the next couple of weeks, we're going to ramp that up even more, build some confidence and some momentum, get the right habits going, and kind of go from there. How we're going to make up that difference is based on what I'm seeing here. It probably should come from fat, and keep those carbs generally around 200 grams if possible. That ends up being the average here, but I think that's the sweet spot for him to start off on. I think for a client like this, what makes it so difficult is that we don't want to make some assumptions, and we don't want to come in as the expert coach that's going to say, "What you've done was stupid, you should no longer do it." That's not going to serve anyone well, clearly, because this person's seen some success with that. So we gotta find some middle ground there, and it's all about having, not so much I wouldn't say delicate conversations, but getting them to trust you and build rapport that you have their best interest in mind, pointing them in the right direction, and that's ultimately what's going to lead to their success and have them be, you know, stay as a paying client for a longer period of time, which is not only going to be good for them, but also good for your business. So that's what I'm seeing based on this.
So through the assessment process, I did like what I saw. It's important to tease out how much intermittent fasting is still influencing his food levels and can he work in more carbs, especially given how much training he's currently doing. These are all important points that we're going to address now, but also as we work together with this client.
But that's it for today, folks. Three examples of how to start creating a nutrition plan for clients. Next time, we're going to go over how to check in with these nutrition clients. We'll follow up with these exact clients in a future video. Now, as great as all those tips are, if you're really serious about starting a nutrition coaching business, the next thing I'll have you do is check out this video I've linked up right here. Now that you know how to create a nutrition plan for clients, find out the exact step-by-step process to check in with them. So make sure to check it out now, and I'll see you in the next video.