Practice on volunteers, selected from a pool of yogi colleagues, friends and families. It’s important to get the newbie-jitters out of your system, before you start working with paying clients. Most people would welcome the opportunity to have a free private yoga class. This is where you can work through techniques and strategies for “talking” an individual through a pose. That experience is very unlike a group class of demonstrations and adjustments. In the 1:1 situation, it is just one client and yourself. Be sure to ask a lot of questions and follow-up questions in each pose. How you feeling in that pose are is too general. Most people will say fine, even if their knee hurts or their hip is uncomfortable. Instead, try for tailored questions with follow up; are you feeling the stretch in the right hip flexor, is it too much, too little. Then adjust your client accordingly. Teaching to their deepest needs to enable a profound experience of the yoga will build your yoga career.  Word of caution: once you begin gaining private clients, you will need to taper off the freebies.

Word-of-mouth is the key to building a loyal following and sustainable business. Tell everyone you know, that you are now offering private yoga classes. If you are a studio owner, you are a unique position. Begin or end each group class with an announcement and short explanation of the benefits for clients in taking private yoga classes. Some studio’s offer a free taster or discounts enticements to members. Be sure to include these promotions on your website, at the sign-in desk and in any promotional materials, along with bio’s of the private yoga instructors. Try to keep the schedules and fees open or on request. This allows room for plenty of and flexibility, customisation and optional extras valued by private clients. As an owner you may want to teach the privates yourself or select “pairings” of students with instructors, selected from your pool of experience teachers. Freelance instructors and those new in the “private yoga” sector, should approach their studio owners, gym managers and fellow yogis.  Tel them you are now offering private yoga sessions.  In my experience, studio owners and managers are always happy to help with referrals.

Make use of every opportunity to network. This is where business cards come in handy. Coffee mornings, fun-runs, charity events and wine tastings are where people get together and talk. When they find out you are a yoga teacher, they will be interested, curious and where you teach. Make certain the cards include links to your website and clearly state private yoga as one of the services you offer. Equally as important is to cast the net far and wide. The most successful private yoga teachers I know establish wellness business partnerships with their local homeopath, acupuncturist, chiropractor and health food store. Some have branched out to spa and hair salons, teaching privates after close of business, and leaving stacks of business cards for referrals.

Think yoga off mat. Health providers for many corporations and institutions require employers to offer wellness and lifestyle support to employees. I once taught a series of lunchtime yoga classes in a corporate conference room at a business park! The latest yoga research confirms the benefits of a regular practice for stress, weight loss, eating disorders, back pain and mild depression, all of which were afflictions suffered by my clients before the each begin practicing yoga. Touching base with business park managers, Human resource departments and wellness coaches will see help you to get a foothold in the private world of corporate yoga.

Be visible. One yoga instructor, I know built a successful private practice on the back of a weekly donation class at the local library. His “found” clients would never have walked into a studio, but they were comfortable attending an event at the library.  Another yoga teacher friend, whose day job was to tutor kids with special needs, found her yoga skills to be transferable?  Soon she had a steady stream of parents requesting weekly after-school yoga classes for their kids. I was once approached at my local gym by a scientist holding a conference at a nearby college. He asked if I would lead the group of scholars in breathing and stretching sessions between seminars. He also requested that these sessions take advantage of the nice weather and beautiful gardens. I took the gig. Not only was this one the most enjoyable weeks in my yoga calendar that summer, it was also rewarding both financially and spiritually. None of these scientists had practiced yoga before, but they did have the curiosity and sense of humor to try it – for the first time – in public.