Most private soccer trainers charge somewhere between $50 and $100 a session. And most of them are broke — or one canceled week away from it.

That's not a coaching problem. It's a pricing problem. More precisely, it's a what you're selling problem.

The session trap

Do the math on $75 sessions. Twenty sessions a week — a full calendar — is $6,000 a month gross. Then subtract field rental, gas, the sessions that cancel last-minute, the slow months when club season eats your schedule. And you're capped: the only way to make more is to coach more hours.

That's the trap. Your income is chained to your calendar. Every dollar requires an hour of your life, and there's a hard ceiling on both.

Being fully booked and still stressed about money is the signature experience of the session-selling trainer.

Sell programs, not sessions

The trainers making real money — six figures, full-time, without living on the field — sell programs. A 12-week developmental program with a defined outcome. A f...