Are you making similar mistakes in your fitness business that cause many gyms to fail? Part of the reason why gym businesses fail is the implementation of incorrect fitness marketing strategies.
Marketing for fitness companies is not as hard as it may seem. Some people fail because of overcomplicating or neglecting the required time and effort.
Numerous fitness marketing ideas are similar to digital marketing strategies. You must create valuable content to educate your audience, spread the word on social media, and target the right people at the right time.
Why Is Fitness Marketing Important?
You opened a gym, hired the best trainers, and installed fantastic machines. What you didn’t do is spread the word about it through flyers, social media, signboards, etc. How are people going to know about your excellent services?
Regardless of how unique your products and services are, marketing is essential to educate people about them.
You can manage your gym’s reputation through fitness marketing, gain consumers’ trust, learn about the fitness industry, and know what works and doesn’t. It even allows you to build a loyal customer base by telling people why you’re better than your competitors.
Practical Tips to Grow Your Gym Business
You must be consistent with your time and effort for these fitness marketing strategies to be fruitful.
1. Build a Presentable Website
Image taken from Strikingly’s user’s website
Your website is your best salesperson who doesn’t need days off, gives as much time and attention as your customers want, and everyone at the same time. Here’s how you can make your gym website effective.
- Upload fresh content and high-quality graphics.
- Include information like the gym's location, booking details, and class schedule.
- It must be well-structured and have a stunning appearance.
- Create a great user experience.
- Make your website suitable for mobile and desktop devices.
Before searching for a website developer, let us introduce you to Strikingly. It is a website builder that allows you to create mobile-responsive websites without coding or web designing experience.
Why should you build your site with Strikingly? It is less expensive and enables you to develop your website within minutes, for which a developer might take several months.
Simply choose the template you like from more than 200 free templates and customize it according to your preference.
Image taken from Strikingly
Strikingly offers numerous features to help your gym business grow, such as a bookings section for your site and an e-commerce store.
2. Consider starting a blog
One of the most helpful fitness marketing ideas is conveying valuable information through blog posts to build trust with your audience. You can research fitness-related keywords and include them in your posts to boost the SEO ranking of your website.
You can use tools like Semrush, Ubbersuggest, and Google Analytics to find relevant keywords.
Furthermore, you can enable RSS feed, offer blog email subscriptions, categorize your posts, and activate Accelerated Mobile Pages to create a great user experience for your blog readers. You can include these features in your blog easily with Strikingly.
Image taken from Strikingly
3. Run Ads on Social Media
Running social media ads is one of the best tips for the marketing fitness industry. Almost everyone uses Facebook, Instagram, and other social networks. It’s time you create a social media page for your gym and post actively.
You need to know the right and wrongs of social media ads before running them, or you may lose money.
- Design a simple post. Don’t make it cluttery by involving too many things.
- Include a catchy (not clickbait-y) headline and a clear call to action.
- Ensure the text is readable and the colors match your brand’s palette.
- Write a concise description of your product or service.
- Include a link that takes users to your landing page.
- Select the correct audience. Numerous social media platforms allow you to be as specific as targeting people according to job titles, hobbies, location, age, gender, etc.
Running social media ads can also help remarket your business. For instance, a potential client visits your website but leaves without completing the CTA task. Advertisements can act as reminders and send them back to your site, hopefully making them sign up for your membership this time.
Know your target audience and what social media platforms they use more than others, then run ads on those sites only.
4. Try Video Marketing
Videos marketing is part of content marketing. You can record videos of your gym, trainers giving quick advice, a sneak peek into daily classes or short exercise routines.
Post those videos on your website or social media networks that promote video content like Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, etc. Your work isn’t done here. Engaging with your audience is essential if you want these fitness marketing strategies to be more effective. Check and reply to comments and direct messages regularly.
5. Post Client Reviews
Image taken from Stirkingly’s user’s website
Showcasing testimonials is a crucial element of fitness marketing strategies. When people come to your site and like everything about it, they need that last push to click on the “purchase” or “book” button.
Your client reviews will give visitors a reason to trust your business and encourage them to try your services.
6. Know the Best Time for Marketing
You must know when your business should be booming and when it may be down, so you know when to implement your fitness marketing strategies. Most gyms see an increase in sales at the beginning of a new year. Therefore, you must start your fitness marketing campaign by mid-December.
Don’t stress if your fitness business is slow during June, July, and August. Gymnasiums tend to be quiet in these months.
7. Send Newsletters
Newsletters can be a great addition to your fitness marketing campaign. They help build a personal connection with readers and educate them about your services. You can announce new products, services, discounts, or events through newsletters. They are low-risk and high-profit.
You must avoid these things while marketing through emails.
- Sounding too salse-y.
- Including either very few or too many links.
- Writing like a bot.
- Make your design cluttery with lots of images.
- Spamming and sending excessive emails. Two to three newsletters are enough for a week.
Consider these tips to make your email marketing campaign a success.
- Purchase a custom sender email, and consider matching it with your website’s domain, like yourname@domain.com.
- Keep your emails short and to the point.
- Greet, as you would, a friend. Don’t use “dear madam/sir/name.”
- Avoid using all caps for the subject line.
- Make the subject line catchy but not clickbait-y.
- Include no more than five links. Ensure your links are relevant to the reader.
- Give only one and clear call to action.
- Send some emails to the readers only. The newsletter’s only purpose should be to educate people on the fitness industry.
- Send a welcome email as soon as someone subscribes to your newsletters.
8. Co-market With Other Businesses
Reach out to other businesses in the fitness niche, not your competitors, for instance, a restaurant known for healthy meals or a brand that sells healthy juices. You can partner with them and promote each other on social media platforms or link to each others’ websites. It’s a win-win situation for both. You introduce your clients to your partner’s business and drive their consumers to yours.
You can also partner for a giveaway. Ask people to help you both grow by following your social media accounts, then select random winners. As a gift, you can offer your products/service along with your partner’s.
You can try a paid partnership with fitness influencers if not with other companies. They are entrepreneurs like you but earn by promoting other people’s businesses.
9. Organize an Event
Organizing events can create brand awareness. They can either be physical or online. In physical events, you can arrange short fitness challenges to encourage people to involve and giveaway your product or service as a reward.
Remember the newsletters and co-marketing strategies? Bring them in now. Tell people that you’re hosting an event through newsletters. And consider co-hosting an event to increase the budget.
For online events, you can invite a renowned personality in the fitness industry. Or arrange one-day online classes. The options are endless. Just think of ways to motivate people to participate.
10. Start a Referral Program
A referral program is when you encourage people, specifically your customer base, to share information about your fitness business with potential clients. Decide a reward for the referee and referrer. It can be a free trial of your products or services.
Stay faithful to your promises to make your program successful. You can promote it on your social media pages, website, and newsletters.
Fitness marketing strategies are not limited to the ones listed above. Brainstorm and research to understand your target audience and competition. Studying your competition can help you determine your potential consumers’ pain points and what you need to do to stand out. It can also spark unique fitness marketing ideas in your mind.
