Why I built MatchMyTrainer

A few years ago, I was living in a small town and wanted to find a personal trainer. I had come off social media completely, cold turkey, as part of trying to make my life better. That was a personal choice, but I hadn't expected it to make finding someone to train with quite so difficult.

After struggling to find anyone online, I eventually worked up the courage to speak to a trainer in the gym. They asked for my Instagram so we could organise things there, which brought me straight back to the thing I'd stepped away from. I also didn't know their prices or exactly what they offered, and when I found out, I couldn't afford them at the time. Having finally got myself to ask, that felt embarrassing.

They were a popular, well-reviewed trainer, but that was hard to appreciate just from seeing them in the gym. I would have liked to look through what they offered in my own time and work out whether it suited me and my budget before starting that conversation. Social media works well for plenty of trainers and clients; I just wanted another way to find someone now that I wasn't using it.

That experience stayed with me, and it became the starting point for MatchMyTrainer. I wanted people to be able to find a trainer, understand what they offer, and see the price without having to work up the courage to ask for the basics.

Building something that feels familiar

I've worked in software for a long time, and clunky websites grind my gears. When you've gone somewhere to do something fairly ordinary, having to figure out how the website works can be enough to put you off. With MMT, I wanted someone to sign up and think, “Oh yeah, that makes sense,” because the information is where they expect it and the next step feels obvious.

I'm always happy to help when someone needs it, but I don't want people to need a guide just to use the website. I care about it feeling fast, smooth, and responsive, whether someone is looking through a trainer's services or sorting out their own availability. There's also the small matter of dark mode, which I love. Sorry, not sorry for that particular design choice.

I've been building MMT for a few years, with a lot of evenings and weekends over the last twelve months spent getting it out the door. My own experience gave me a reason to start, but working with a trainer using the platform helped me understand much more about what it needed to do.

Working with Sam

I met Sam, our first trainer, in person, and we worked together on the problems he was having and how MMT could help. He now uses it for class bookings every week, which has brought a very practical side to something that began with me trying to find a trainer.

When you're running a class, you need to know who's attending and who's paid, as well as keep track of people dropping out or booking through a session pack. You also need to be able to block out time when you're unavailable. Working through those things with Sam helped me see how the booking and payment side fits into a trainer's week, alongside actually running the sessions and keeping people coming back.

That's who I want to build for: trainers who want to spend their time coaching and running their business, with a clear view of their bookings and payments. Stripe processes the payments, while MMT brings together bookings, packages, class places, and calendar availability. My aim is to make those jobs easier to manage, without each one depending on another message or a separate note to keep up to date.

Making it easy for someone to book their next class is part of that too. It won't guarantee they keep coming back, but it gives them a straightforward way to book again and gives the trainer the information they need to prepare. Our guide to how MMT works covers the practical setup, and there's more detail about managing attendance and bookings in the group class guide.

Where I want to take it

Alongside those everyday tools, I still want to solve the problem that started this: making it easier to find a trainer in your area and book something that suits you. The simplicity I have in mind is the feeling of booking a taxi through Uber, where you know where to look and what to do next. Choosing a trainer takes more thought, of course, but finding their details and making a booking shouldn't be the difficult part.

Getting there means building up both the trainers offering services and the clients looking for them, and I know that will take time. There won't be a trainer for everyone in every town straight away. In the meantime, trainers can use their MMT page with the clients they already have, just as Sam is doing with his classes, while we build towards helping more people find them.

I want MMT to be useful to the trainers using it today as well as the people who might discover them tomorrow. Working with Sam has helped me understand what that means in practice, and I'd like to hear from more trainers about the things that make their working week harder than it needs to be. You can get in touch here or read a little more about MatchMyTrainer.

For a closer look at the design, I've also written about the move from orange to blue.