Seeing a new customer walk into the gym is exciting. They are eager to start working out and achieve their fitness goals. The first few sessions are wonderful, but then you’ll notice that some of the customers are starting to lose interest. Priorities change. They don’t feel the same level of excitement anymore. Workout begins to feel like a chore. That’s when you lose customers.
The general marketing statistics show that gaining a new customer is five times more expensive than retaining an existing customer. While this is true, it feels like retaining a gym customer is harder than finding a new member. Gyms and fitness centers have lower retention rates than other types of businesses, which is not surprising.
However, you must focus on Gym Member Retention to build an authoritative presence in the competitive market. Recent studies show that gym members intend to attend their training around 9.5 times per month but only manage to attend 4.17 times. That means gym members come to work out only half the time they actually intend to. This increases the risk of losing customers once the membership period ends.
You need to have a comprehensive customer retention strategy to ensure that the gym members don’t lose interest or drop halfway through. You should aim to increase the subscription renewals for the membership.
Here are the five best strategies to increase gym membership retention rate and establish your business in the market.
• Create Engaging Content
What has content got to do with exercising? We’ll explain.
You cannot rely on your members to stay motivated or know everything about fitness. Training them during the session and ignoring them until the next session is the easiest way to lose members. You need to build a relationship with the members and keep them interested in fitness and a healthy lifestyle. You achieve this by creating content to share with your members.
Types of Content
- Blog posts- microblogs and complete guides
- Infographics for easy understanding
- Gifs and videos for training
- Health and wellness tips
- Recipes and dietary information
- Printable calendars, goal charts, or lists
- Brief instructions to use new exercise equipment, etc.
Advantages
- The same content can be shared in multiple formats
- Content is omnichannel-friendly (post it on social media, website, or share through apps)
- Establish yourself as an industry expert
- Show members that you care about their health
- Content never gets old and can always be updated
You can send newsletters, text messages, social media posts, etc., to your members to stay in touch with them during non-training days.
• Personalize Training, Challenges, and Pricing
Personalization is the keyword in today’s world. People want exclusive products and services customized to suit their specifications. Fitness, by default, requires personalization as everyone is different and has different health goals. Continue to pay the same level of attention to every customer even after they get into the pattern. It can become difficult as you gain more customers. Hire more trainers and assign them to individual members.
Create challenges based on the member’s goals and limitations. A series of achievable challenges will keep the members interested and make them competitive. People like it when they clear a level or complete a task before others or within the deadline. Work on this competitive spirit to retain gym members.
Similarly, pricing is a crucial factor and can send your members to a competitor if you are not careful. You need to establish that your aim is not to grab their money but to help them become healthy and fit. Offer special discounts, a couple of complimentary training sessions, or a free dietary plan for being a valued gym member.
• Invest in Customer Retention Software
Call it gym membership software, retention software, or customer engagement tool. The purpose of using technology is to streamline your backend work and automate a few recurring tasks. It also allows you to stay in touch with your customers beyond social media and other communication channels.
Though you can get customer retention software built from scratch, companies like Gleantap offer customized apps and tools for cost-effective prices. For example, Gleantap provides marketing automation, sales CRM tools, and one-to-one messaging services. In short, the customized software has everything you need to manage the membership database, marketing campaigns, and direct communication with customers. The app uses customer data to run analytics and help you build better strategies to retain each customer.
• Encourage and Celebrate Their Success
Sharing content and setting goals is just one aspect of customer retention. You have to be enthusiastic about members achieving their goals and reaching milestones. Celebrate their milestones with them and other members in the gym. You can make small announcements to congratulate the member on their success. Gifts and reward points are a way to celebrate a member’s success in reaching the milestone.
You don’t need to offer expensive gifts or plan elaborate parties to encourage members. Something as simple as a winner badge or a small gift coupon is enough to express your intent. Add extra reward points to their member’s accounts for them to redeem when renewing the gym membership or buying a fitness product (if you tie up with a brand).
• Build a Support Group Online and Offline
Build friendly relationships among the members of the gym. Groups on Facebook, WhatsApp, Messenger, or the gym membership app can be a place for members to unwind, relax, ask questions or joke about. Create a similar group within the gym. When members feel comfortable and connected to each other and the trainers, they will continue to stay with the gym and stay focused on their fitness goals.
Become important and irreplaceable to your members, and you can be sure to retain a majority of them despite the challenges and competition.
Gleantap has been providing customized marketing and engagement tools to gyms and fitness centers since 2017. The software can be easily synchronized with the database to send automated messages, track customers’ progress, perform analytics, and do much more to make your gym business successful.
