Obtain hundreds more customers for your struggling fitness club, in the presence of several large and intimidating competitors in an increasingly crowded marketplace.
Problem:
Your fitness club is boring.
Despite your professions of awesomeness, in reality there is almost nothing original about your business or your service experience.
You’ve got elliptical machines.
You’ve got free weights.
You’ve got protein bars for sale.
You’ve got spinning classes.
You’ve got personal trainers wandering around.
You’ve got flat screen TV’s hanging from the ceiling.
You’ve got yoga action.
You’ve got nice showers.
You’ve got a sauna.
Your oversized postcards show pretty people doing crunches.
All that stuff is boring.
Every one of your competitors does that stuff, too. Don’t trick yourself into believing that it makes you special, because it doesn’t.
And don’t believe your own ethereal promises of how you make your customers feel like someone special, unless they’re the ones saying those words. Otherwise, no one is believing or feeling it besides you.
The 2-Step Solution:
Step 1: Find a way to be different.
What can you do that would actually make your fitness club different from every single other club in the area? I mean genuinely, truly, undeniably different? In a way that your target market would care about, and find irresistible?
Some questions that might help:
What is every other club afraid of doing? What has no one ever done before? What could you start doing that would allow to claim the title of being the “only” fitness club that offers it?
What if you were the only fitness club to offer:
A bottomless protein shake bar?
Complimentary protein bars?
Lifetime personal training sessions?
Super-expensive training outfits with your club’s branding on it?
A meet-and-greet with local recognized celebrities?
An amazing massage with every single workout?
A complimentary shuttle-service?
What does your target market’s idea of the “ultimate fitness club” look like? Why not take a few minutes to ask your 50 best clients right now, and see what they say? Their answers might surprise you.
Here are four kinds of related questions you can ask them:
Ask them what they wish you would start doing.
Ask them what they wish you would do more of.
Ask them what they wish you would do less of.
Ask them what they wish you would stop doing.
And then, once you have the data, look for consistencies in the responses. Did the majority mention the same stuff? Great! Then you have some clear indicators as to where some edges can be explored in your service experience.
Step 2: Speak to the true motivations of your target market.
Why do people work out?
Actually, that’s too ambiguous, so let’s get more specific.
Let’s segment your target market a little bit, and assume that your best bet for new members are men who are 18-34 yrs old, and women who are 25-45 yrs old.
Target #1:The 18-34 yr-old male.
Question: Why does he work out?
Answer: So that women will look at him, and want to meet him.
Right?
Guys are pretty simple creatures. They like women, and they work out (generally speaking) so that women will find them irresistibly handsome and attractive. Efforts to pack on the pecs, shred the abs, and thicken the triceps are all with this goal in mind.
So why is it that NONE of the hundreds of fitness club postcard designs that you’ve ever seen have ever tapped into this reality? Why are there only ever pictures of pretty people doing yoga, or crunches, or sporting a silly smile while doing a spinning class?
What if you had a postcard design that showed a couple of women admiring a guys attractive body, and whispering to each other “Wow, look at that guys chest…”.
A stock photo along these lines would be great as a starting point (here’s one I quickly designed):
And the back could be connected like this (I quickly designed this one for illustrative purposes, too):
Do you think that an 18-34 yr-old male would find that motivating? You bet. And yet, no fitness club has ever used this approach.
Target #2:The 25-45 female.
Question: Why does she work out?
Answer: So that women will look at her, and secretly admire her.
Right?
This one is counterintuitive to guys, because every guy likes to think that women only care about what men think, but the truth is, most women who are concerned about their appearance are more concerned about what other women think.
For emphasis, I’m going to restate the point I just made a moment ago: So why is it that NONE of the hundreds of fitness club postcard designs that you’ve ever seen have ever tapped into this reality? Why are there only ever pictures of pretty people doing yoga, or crunches, or sporting a silly smile while doing a spinning class?
What if you designed a postcard that showed two women admiring how good another woman looked, and whispering to each other “Look at how she looks in those jeans…”
Do you think that would resonate with a 25-45 yr-old woman? Sure it would. And yet, you’ve never seen a fitness club use these angles.
Why do you think that is?
It’s just easy. Every club just defaults to copycat mode, and pumps out the same boring stuff as everyone else, hoping desperately that it will somehow work.
Don’t fall into the same trap with your club.
If you’re looking for some help to get your fitness club back on track, then I can help you. Drop me a text or call to 416-859-3171. Or, if you wish, you can first learn a little more about me here.
P.S. If you know someone that would enjoy reading this little article, please feel free to share it with your friends on facebook, using either of the two links below.
If you liked this post, you’ll probably like these, too:
2-steps to saving your fitness club
Posted by Kevin Dubrosky
Objective:
Obtain hundreds more customers for your struggling fitness club, in the presence of several large and intimidating competitors in an increasingly crowded marketplace.
Problem:
Your fitness club is boring.
Despite your professions of awesomeness, in reality there is almost nothing original about your business or your service experience.
All that stuff is boring.
Every one of your competitors does that stuff, too. Don’t trick yourself into believing that it makes you special, because it doesn’t.
And don’t believe your own ethereal promises of how you make your customers feel like someone special, unless they’re the ones saying those words. Otherwise, no one is believing or feeling it besides you.
The 2-Step Solution:
Step 1: Find a way to be different.
What can you do that would actually make your fitness club different from every single other club in the area? I mean genuinely, truly, undeniably different? In a way that your target market would care about, and find irresistible?
Some questions that might help:
What is every other club afraid of doing? What has no one ever done before? What could you start doing that would allow to claim the title of being the “only” fitness club that offers it?
What if you were the only fitness club to offer:
What does your target market’s idea of the “ultimate fitness club” look like? Why not take a few minutes to ask your 50 best clients right now, and see what they say? Their answers might surprise you.
Here are four kinds of related questions you can ask them:
And then, once you have the data, look for consistencies in the responses. Did the majority mention the same stuff? Great! Then you have some clear indicators as to where some edges can be explored in your service experience.
Step 2: Speak to the true motivations of your target market.
Why do people work out?
Actually, that’s too ambiguous, so let’s get more specific.
Let’s segment your target market a little bit, and assume that your best bet for new members are men who are 18-34 yrs old, and women who are 25-45 yrs old.
Target #1: The 18-34 yr-old male.
Question: Why does he work out?
Answer: So that women will look at him, and want to meet him.
Right?
Guys are pretty simple creatures. They like women, and they work out (generally speaking) so that women will find them irresistibly handsome and attractive. Efforts to pack on the pecs, shred the abs, and thicken the triceps are all with this goal in mind.
So why is it that NONE of the hundreds of fitness club postcard designs that you’ve ever seen have ever tapped into this reality? Why are there only ever pictures of pretty people doing yoga, or crunches, or sporting a silly smile while doing a spinning class?
What if you had a postcard design that showed a couple of women admiring a guys attractive body, and whispering to each other “Wow, look at that guys chest…”.
A stock photo along these lines would be great as a starting point (here’s one I quickly designed):
And the back could be connected like this (I quickly designed this one for illustrative purposes, too):
Do you think that an 18-34 yr-old male would find that motivating? You bet. And yet, no fitness club has ever used this approach.
Target #2: The 25-45 female.
Question: Why does she work out?
Answer: So that women will look at her, and secretly admire her.
Right?
This one is counterintuitive to guys, because every guy likes to think that women only care about what men think, but the truth is, most women who are concerned about their appearance are more concerned about what other women think.
For emphasis, I’m going to restate the point I just made a moment ago: So why is it that NONE of the hundreds of fitness club postcard designs that you’ve ever seen have ever tapped into this reality? Why are there only ever pictures of pretty people doing yoga, or crunches, or sporting a silly smile while doing a spinning class?
What if you designed a postcard that showed two women admiring how good another woman looked, and whispering to each other “Look at how she looks in those jeans…”
Do you think that would resonate with a 25-45 yr-old woman? Sure it would. And yet, you’ve never seen a fitness club use these angles.
Why do you think that is?
It’s just easy. Every club just defaults to copycat mode, and pumps out the same boring stuff as everyone else, hoping desperately that it will somehow work.
Don’t fall into the same trap with your club.
If you’re looking for some help to get your fitness club back on track, then I can help you. Drop me a text or call to 416-859-3171. Or, if you wish, you can first learn a little more about me here.
P.S. If you know someone that would enjoy reading this little article, please feel free to share it with your friends on facebook, using either of the two links below.
If you liked this post, you’ll probably like these, too: