Gym Marketing Activity during the Corona Crisis

Marketing Activity During the Corona Virus Crisis

The biggest question our clients are asking during this testing time is, "should I still be marketing my business, and if so, How?"

My instant response is of course "YES".  Don't stop selling.  Even if you have taken the decision to furlough staff and to mothball the business for the next few months.  You need to keep your business and brand in front of your clients and your potential new customers. 

You don't want to be in a position where you are starting from scratch once the Prime Minister announces are re-opening.  When that happens, the big players such as Virgin, Pure gym, David Lloyds, Banatyne will switch their marketing spends on and as a franchise or independent club operator you simply won’t get a look in as they will simply outspend you on Google Ads, Facebook and Instagram.  So now is the time to build your brand, let people know who are, get more followers on your social media, more clients in your database and make sure you are ready to fire out of the blocks with a solid plan.

I appreciate many clubs are running online classes, virtual PT sessions and even nutrition advice support.  These are all brilliant and great ways of maintaining contact with your members and clients. Don't stop doing this as its important to maintain what you have.  The ideas below are set out to help you move beyond those who are already avid supporters of your business.

So below are just some of the activities you should be considering over the next few months:

Google/Bing Places/Apple Maps

Whilst your website and its SEO are important to your visibility, more importantly is being registered with the various search engines.  Search Engines drive the internet and the maps section is one of the biggest search criteria.  You may not be able to compete with the big companies via ad spend, but you can on ensuring you are visible on the organic searches and on the map’s sections of Google, Bing and Apple.

These are easy to create:

Google - https://www.google.com/business/ & https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/google-my-business

Bing Places - https://www.bingplaces.com/

Apple Connect - https://mapsconnect.apple.com/

Yahoo - https://smallbusiness.yahoo.com/local

You should see Google Business an additional Social Media channel and ensure you load offers, images and activity regularly.  Once or twice per week is sufficient. 

Online Business Directories

You want to ensure search engines not only sees your website but also sees your business on as many other outlets and websites as well. The more your business appears in searches the more trusted it becomes, and the more likely search engines will push you to the top.  Below are some of the national sites you should be on but also don't forget about local business directories that are specific to your area.  Almost all of these directories are free and there should be no need to pay for advanced features

Yell.com - https://www.yell.com/

Thomson Local - https://www.thomsonlocal.com/

Scoot - https://www.scoot.co.uk/

Foursquare - http://business.foursquare.com/

Hotfrog - http://business.foursquare.com/

192.com - https://www.192.com/

Cyclex - https://www.cylex-uk.co.uk/

Approved Business - https://www.approvedbusiness.co.uk/

Best on the web - https://botw.org

Yalwa - https://m.yalwa.co.uk/

Brownbook - https://www.brownbook.net/

Bizify - https://www.bizify.co.uk/

Classfinder - https://www.classfinder.org.uk/

Gymsnearme - https://www.gymsnearme.org.uk/

Yelp - https://biz.yelp.co.uk/

Free Index - https://www.freeindex.co.uk/

Locanto - https://www.locanto.co.uk/

Uk Small Business Directory - https://www.uksmallbusinessdirectory.co.uk/

Opening Times - https://www.opening-times.co.uk/

UK Business Directory - https://www.uk-businesses.co.uk/

Tapology - https://www.tapology.com/gyms/country/gb

The above are by no means a definitive list but they are a good starting point.  It will take some of your time to load your club’s details, but the benefits will be well worth it.  It will increase your exposure.

Aggregator sites:

There are definitely reasons for and against registering your business on these sites and this will be covered in a separate blog post.  However, what cannot be underestimated is the marketing impact they can play. 

By loading your business onto their sites, you get to feed off the back of their huge marketing budgets that these companies have.  If you set up your arrangements correctly you won’t feel the negative impact of lost members to a pay as you go system but will benefit from the potential exposure on their site.  

I have personally used all of these business at a variety of sites and never seen any negative impact on the business.  This is not to say, if not managed correctly they could but as with Group-on, wahanda etc, managed effectively they can bring great benefits

These companies include:

Gympass - https://www.gympass.com/uk

Hussle - https://www.hussle.com/

MoveGB - https://go.movegb.com/

If you are unsure how you should be setting up relationships with these companies then feel free to get in touch with us at ryancharlesworth@blackraccoon.org and we will be happy to advise.

Social Media:

Now your social media activity is a blog or even 2 in itself but I will try and give you a few ideas of things you could be doing now that will help you create a following as well as leads for when your business re-opens.

Remember we are focusing on building your brand here and not on member retention

 - Set up a private group page on Facebook for Members.  This allows you to offer those who continue to support you a private service just for them as well as an opportunity to engage with fellow members, many of those who know each other but not well enough to be friends

       i. Discounted virtual PT sessions

       ii. Members only competitions

       iii. Nutrition seminars via zoom

       iv. Encourage members to post their home activity or food images

       v. Post recipe idea's

       vi. Group challenges - set a challenge and get members to post their results and videos

The aim is to create a strong community online.

Other Ideas:

 - Create a regular fitness blog and post 1 article a week. The subject can be anything fitness related
 - Run a competition each week for people to win free months, free PT sessions, free t-shirts (or other stock).  Make them fun, get people to send in their at home training pictures. 

 - A workout of the week for people to follow

 - As with pre-sale activity, run a campaign for people to register their details for fantastic membership offers when you open. Limited number of places available

 - Push posts about your unique Selling Points (USP's) why are you different, why do members love you so much

 - If you are continuing to run online classes and PT then don't be afraid to advertise this as something non-members can pay for.  Encourage new members to join your club now.  Maybe have an incentive to do so.  Obviously don't undercut those members who have agreed to continue to pay, instead give them an incentive they can take up once you re-open.

 - If you are confident enough run Facebook or Instagram Live events to answer people fitness questions.

 - You should join as many local Facebook groups in your area as possible.  This can include local selling groups, mother and baby groups, fitness groups etc etc.  Many local communities have their own communication groups. Ones I have dealt with before and worth a look are Ruddington Mums and Epsom and Ewell families.  Both these groups have huge influence in their communities and well worth you making a connection with and building a relationship.

Members:

Don't forget to continue to sell to members.  Its great if members are continuing to pay for your online services and continuing to support your business.  You should though:

 - Be sending regular communications to members - possibly as a newsletter

 - Send referral offers to encourage them to get friends and family to join your online classes

 - Offer free trials of online personal training with a discount for those who sign up. Discounting now will mean less revenue but get the client engaged now and they will continue as a full paying client when you re-open.

 - If you have the skill base, offer members nutrition planning and support

Your Lead Database:

Don't allow your leads to go cold.  You have worked so hard to generate these leads over the last 6 -12 months. Don't now leave them to become cold and worthless as you really will be starting from scratch.  There are some easy and low impact items you can do now to keep contact with those potential new members

- Weekly E-mails - Simply send your prospects some fitness updates or articles each week.  These don't need to be long just quick snippets of advice and could include:

      i. A weekly workout

      ii. Link to a fitness article

      iii. How to train through the crisis advise

      iv. Stretching advice

      v. Nutrition advice

      vi. Exercise from home for beginners

      vii. Exercise with your kids

Let’s be honest the key here is to send something that people will read and thank you for sending. It needs to be regular and it needs to be friendly and informative

- Send them an offer to join your club now if you are running online classes.  Many people are stuck at home and yearning to be part of a community.  Give them an incentive and don't be afraid to continue to sell.  The aim though is that these offers should form part of a communication set and not as individual emails.  Start by sending advice, information, help and support articles first to build trust.

- Don't be afraid if you have time to call your prospects and thank them for their enquiry and ask them how they are getting on with their training from home.  They will appreciate the call and your concern.  This is not a sales call but simply a keep in touch call.

Corporate Activity:

Now you might think I am going mad here but here me out.  This really is a great opportunity to start making connections with potential corporate partners.  Remember who your audience is here.  Even those who are furloughed will still be reading e-mails, linked in and other business channels.  The nature of their work and position will mean they will not have switched off.  The big difference now though is your message won’t be a hindrance to their work but in fact a highlight and something they can get stuck into.

There are a number of ways you can start to build your corporate database:

 - LinkedIn - There are a number of ways you can find the right people:

       i. Google search businesses in your area and use this as a search reference for you to use on Linked in.  Once you have found appropriate people look for HR directors or managers in those companies.  They can either support directly or push you to the right person

       ii. Complete a LinkedIn search for your area

       iii. complete a job title search in your area

Remember when sending connection requests, always include a brief comment to explain who you are and what you are looking to achieve.

 - Hunter.io - This website allows you to search for individual actual direct e-mail address if you know the company name.  Be aware that the site cannot tell you whether those people are based in your area and so for large multinational companies this can increase the work required.  It can though give you a good starting point.

 Local Business Relationships:

The above can also be used to connect to local businesses who you would like to create a future relationship with for when you open.  A good connection point is you are trying to create a member’s discount scheme and would like local companies to join you in creating this.  There are benefits for both parties and no money needs to change hands.  You should look to create links first with high traffic businesses who can help you as well in return, independent businesses are also best as there are no corporate chain to worry about

     i. Restaurants

     ii. Cafe's

     iii. Running/sports shops (independent ones are best) - Up and Running are always up for linking

     iv. Barbers, hairdressers and beauty salons

Don’t forget, not only can these companies help by putting out your flyers and maybe putting up a banner in their shops, but they are great at word of mouth but usually have high street or prominent locations for future outreach activity

Review your Website:

Spend a few hours going through your website page by page. Look at how you can improve it.  You should look to revamp it even if just a few minor changes.  Your members, clients and prospects will be spending large amounts of time on the internet.  You need them to want to stop on your site again.  If nothing has changed then there is no reason for them to revisit

The design may be hard to change but you can change some images, update some of text and add some new features

Only you will know how you want the design to look but this is your chance to make it better and more engaging

Your future Plan:

While working on all of the above you should be looking at creating your pre-opening plan.  Everyone will be treating their opening as a pre-sale.  We know we probably have another 6-8 weeks minimum in lock down.  You need to take this time to create a plan. 

We will talk about this plan in a future blog but to get you started you need to start thinking about:

- Pre-sale/Pre-opening offer - launching 4 weeks out

- Members "Thank You" 

- Your Ex-member offer and campaigns to bring them back - a Rescue plan

- Your Personal training offers

- Your Group PT offer

- Your Outreach activity plan - the big boys will be everywhere!

- Your social media plan

- Your staff training strategy

- Your Business plan/Budget numbers for the rest of the year

- Your brand design material, internal and external.

- Start to interview for new staff or new freelance PT's

I will attempt to expand on all the sections mentioned above to give you more ideas and support at this time.  If you would like more a more personal approach to how I can help, please don't hesitate to get in touch.  We offer remote support for businesses from Just £349/month and with no onsite visits at the moment we have the time to take on some new clients and support your efforts. Get in touch today

ryancharlesworth@blackraccoon.org
07929369658
www.blackraccoon.org

Get your gym ready for success - Now is the time to get ready

The Covid-19 Gym closure should be your opportunity to shine

You are right to be thinking that this pandemic has had an incredible impact on our industry.  Despite all the efforts there will be casualties in this crisis and business owners will lose their clubs.  As we know know, the industry is not awash with cash, many clubs are independent operators living month to month and the loss of revenues that this will cause could very well send them under.

However, that does not have to be you and there are ways to ensure you survive and thrive once we are able to re-open. The key is to take a pragmatic view of your business and work out what works for you and then ensure you do this well.  I have tried to highlight a few options that you have available:

Should Members continue to pay?

You should be able to answer this question by simply asking whether you are still providing a service?  If you are maintaining an online service with at home workouts, online classes, nutrition advice then you are well placed to ask members to continue to pay.

I am not sure you can enforce this contractually though and so should be offering people the option to freeze if they prefer.   The best way to ensure that only those paying receive the services you offer is to create a private Facebook group and only allow access to those members continuing to pay.

The point to stress here is, if your services won't live up to expectations then don't deliver them.  A poor service, poor deliver will only cause members to leave, if they cancel their Direct Debit getting them back will be very difficult.

Stopping your main source of income is a massive decision for your business and should not be taken lightly.  However, if you cant maintain or deliver a service continuing to take money may actually be more detrimental in the long term.

The industry is about to undergo a massive change, with online services taking over, well at least for the next few months, the challenge now is how you manage this short term change so it does not impact you long term

What help is available?

We all know the Government has attempted to put in place options to help businesses.  Not all these are working as they should and we hope that in the next few weeks action will be taken to change this.  However from what I can establish the following options are there

The following link highlights everything the Chancellor has set out:

Government Guidance

Should you offer online classes?

For obvious reasons almost every clubs is getting their teams to deliver online classes.  I have seen some amazing efforts and some that lets say, do not offer the best version of the clubs personality.

The question as to whether you should offer them really comes down to whether what you are delivering is worth while and drives your brand and member retention.  The other challe

If what you are offering is not the best reflection of your club, its staff and the clubs personality then surely you would be better to point your members in the direction of online sites that do deliver great online classes.  There are plenty out there that would not push your clients into the hands of competitors but would offer a better service for members than possibly you can provide.

This does not mean you don't continue to communicate with members, what it does do though is offer them training tools that allow them to maintain their training

Should you offer online Personal Training?

Absolutely!, there should be no reason why your coaches/trainers can't continue to offer 1-1 services. This may take some practice and planning but every personal trainer should be looking to continue their sessions and services.

Where clients don't like the idea of a zoom session, then home workouts, nutrition planning etc should be the main products.

You may have to review prices and the deliver but I strongly believe that online personal training will see a massive boost by the end of this.  Personal trainers should really be looking to jump on board or they will miss a massive opportunity

What communications should I be sending out?

You should be looking to send out some form of communication every week.  This can include:

- Newsletters
- Nutrition advise sheets
- Work outs of the week
- Members questionnaires
- Offer free home work out advice
- Ask for positive news stories

Should clubs should look to continue their social media activity

In a world ruled by content, social media and internet marketing this has to be a definite yes.  Don't slow down your social media activity, keep posting regularly, keep your business and brand in the face of the consumers.  With huge swaiths of the population now stuck at home, social media use is sky rocketing.  You need to get out from the norm and try different things

What this closure does do though is allow you to be more creative with your posts

You don't have enough club content anymore to drive your social so look for new idea's

- Positive news stories from round the world - people love to share the
- Member challenges and encourage them to post their own videos
- Great content you have seen from other pages
- Motivational words
- Funny stories/Memes
- Don't forget to sell your club
- Talk about your USP's
- Offer free advice
- Share you members stories
- Encourage people to sign up to your mailing list for insider news and offers
- Run weekly competitions to win t-shirts, online personal training, free class passes, 1 month nutrition advice, protein powder you have left that could go out of date etc etc
- Put out club videos such as club walk throughs, image carrosels

What Marketing should I be doing?

Lets be honest, most clubs are struggling to pay their rent, let alone find money for marketing. There are though plenty of things you can do that will cost nothing:

- Ensure your Google Business, Bing and Apple maps accounts are up to date
- Load your business onto online business directories such as Hot Frog, Free Index etc
- Work on your corporate activities - with people spending more time at home getting people to respond to link in contact requests should be so much easier.  A simple message is all it takes. Corporate relationships can take months to establish so now is a great time.
- Local business contacts.  As above make connections to other local businesses.   Everyone will be open for ways of building relationships when you open back up.  Why not start now
- Look at taking this time to create your marketing plan and this should be treated like a pre-sale plan.  Give me a shout at ryan@blackraccoon.org if you need support
- Upgrade your website - now is the time to make those much needed tweaks. Especially if you build it yourself and there is no cost associated to it.
- Contact your members and get them to sign up to your newsletter.  Offer an incentive for when you open for them to refer friends
- Treat the next 2 - 3 montsh as your clubs pre-sale.  You are starting again. what should you do, how should you build up the excitement

What Planning should I be doing to re-open?

You will never get a better opportunity to plan and create the club you have always wanted.  You will have been running your club from the trenches.  Now you have an opportunity to sit back, survey what is great and what needs changing.  Then plan for those changes.

Whilst most clubs will be engrossed in delivering their online classes, not many will be looking 3 months ahead and think...."What do I need to do to be better than I was before I closed"

We will go into this subject further in my next blog but I meet so many clients who tell me "I just don't have time".  Now you do, don't waste it!

Strip your business processes, offers, plans, structures etc down to the bone and ask yourself.  Is this the best i can do?  if its not, then change it

Finally, you should create your sales and marketing activity plan, more on that another time


So What Now?

This is your time to shine.  this is new ground for every club in the country and despite what you may feel.  Indpendent and smaller clubs really do have an advantage here.  Your brand is way more flexible, the owner is often the general manager and so certainly isnt being furloughed.  Your business is still live and can make the required changes
No, you may not have the same financial resources but you do have the passion, the on the ground experience and the relationship with your clients that most of the big clubs don't.

So go out there and grab your peice!


If we can support in any way please get in touch

ryancharlesworth@blackraccoon.orgwww.blackraccoon.org07929369658