I watched my vet cut Gizmo's. He holds him away from his body, so that he's suspended in mid air. He'd start to cut his nails, and when Gizmo would start to object or struggle, the vet would drop him down a little, like pretending that he was going to drop him. I don't know if it was that this took Gizmo's attention away from what was happening to his nails, or if he quickly got the message that a struggle meant a "drop", but after repeating this a few times, the vet was able to cut them without a problem. We do it the same way, but my dogs don't fight it at all anymore.
This might sound mean, but dogs, especially our little ones, can really hurt themselves struggling against us when we try to cut their nails, and they need to be done.