7 online marketing measures for your gym

The corona crisis has been going on for several months now and all industries are suffering as a result. Especially the gyms. This is because many members have cancelled their contracts because they were unable to train and may have felt a bit neglected by their studio. The reason for this is that many gym operators do not value communicating with their members even outside their own premises. So that you don't have to face this problem too, you should better prepare your communication, and therefore your marketing, for such difficult circumstances. In this blog post, we will show you 7 online marketing measures that you can implement immediately so that you can reach your members in any situation.

What is online marketing for a gym?

The competition between different gyms is getting stronger from year to year. In addition, it is less and less important what you actually offer in your studio, but increasingly on how you sell yourself to the outside world and how you communicate with your members. The easiest way to communicate is via the Internet. Simplified, this is exactly what online marketing for your gym is. Online marketing generally has two primary goals. On the one hand, acquiring new customers by generating leads and, on the other hand, improving customer loyalty so that your members stay with you for a long time. In addition, online marketing at gyms, just like in all other industries, consists of various areas. These include social media marketing, content marketing, and search engine optimization. Social media marketing is relatively self-explanatory, as it is primarily about the measures that take place on social media such as Instagram and Facebook. Content marketing describes a process in which you offer potential customers valuable content, such as blogs or videos, in order to attract their attention. Finally, search engine optimization deals with measures that are used to make it easier to find in Google searches.

Measure 1: Analyze the target group

The basis for optimal marketing is detailed planning. In order for you to be able to properly plan your future marketing activities, it is essential that you know your target audience and analyze the needs and interests of your target audience. There are various ways to analyze your target group, but you should use all of them in certain parts so that you understand your target group. To find out the needs of existing members, you can interview them. It's the easiest way to get information. However, you also want to reach out to potential new customers, of course. To learn more about this group of customers, you should research fitness industry forums on the Internet or read online reviews. It is also very important that you visit trade fairs regularly to be aware of current developments. This analysis gives you a rough picture of the composition and interests of your target group.

You then need to consider which platforms are the best for reaching this target group. If you look at the area of social media, there are many different platforms and providers that are used by different people. The most common ones here are Instagram and Facebook. If the members of your gym are mostly middle-aged or older, then you should focus more on Facebook, as users here are a bit older on average. Instagram, on the other hand, is primarily used by young people. However, regardless of who your target audience is, you should at least be represented on both platforms so that you can reach every potential customer.

Once you've chosen the right platform, you'll need to decide how to target your members. In principle, do you want to please everyone or do you prefer a more familiar atmosphere with the “you”? The visual language of your marketing is also crucial. This is because different customer groups react differently to certain images. You should think about this point in advance, but the optimal approach often emerges with growing experience.

2nd measure: Optimize your homepage

In addition to social media profiles, your homepage in particular is the most important point of contact for potential customers. If you don't have your own homepage yet, the first thing you should do is create one. There are also various online tools that make creating a website child's play. When creating a new homepage or optimizing an existing one, the design is particularly decisive. To help you develop a functional and appealing design in this area, we have another blog post where you 8 tips for successful web design find.

In addition to the design, the functionality of your website must also be right. This means that, on the one hand, all links and buttons must work, but on the other hand, that your website also offers appropriate functions. Perhaps you want to offer members the opportunity to order products, such as protein powder, online or buy 10-card packs. Automatic appointment scheduling is also a frequently used tool that makes your life and that of your customers easier.

Now that the basic structure of your website is in place, it must also be filled with content. The content on your website should be professional first. This means that you should use factual language and, above all, avoid mistakes. It is also important that visitors to your homepage can quickly and easily find all relevant information about your studio there.

The last point that concerns your homepage is SEO. SEO means search engine optimization and deals with how to optimize your website so that it appears high up in searches on Google or other search engines. Among other things, keywords, i.e. the terms that potential customers search for on the Internet, are very important here. So that you can be found here with the right keywords, you should optimize the texts on your website according to these terms, i.e. use the term frequently. To find the right keywords for your homepage, you can use free tools such as Ubersuggest use. There you can enter the search terms and see how often they are searched for. SEO has a few other facets in addition to keywords, but it's enough to focus on keywords to get started.

3rd measure: Online marketing for your gym on social media

Your profiles on social networks also need constant care and attention. Because today, a large part of online marketing takes place on these platforms. It is therefore important that you have a high-quality and easy-to-find profile that you draw the attention of your members to. The best way to do this is to print the names of your profiles on all promotional material that you use. You can also use displays or the like specifically to promote social media or contact your members directly about them.

Aside from paying attention to your profiles, the quality of the posts you publish must also be adequate. It's best to publish content that adds value to the reader or photos that look professional. You can also use the reach of social media to draw attention to special promotions or events. If you can encourage your members to share your content, you'll reach an enormous number of people. In order for your members to also want to share the content you have published, they must interact with you on social networks. What this means is that you should respond to comments and messages so that members know that you care about them.

A final but very decisive advantage of social media is easy complaint management. Because a social media profile offers your members an easily accessible channel to address any problems. In particular, it is essential that you respond to all feedback. Most of the feedback you're likely to receive could turn out to be constructive criticism that you can use to improve your studio. You may also receive unfair or offensive messages. But above all, you should react calmly, friendly and professionally to these. Successful complaint management, particularly via social media, usually leads to increased customer loyalty and happier members.

4th measure: Google Ads

Google Ads is one of the most common tools for advertising your own gym online. After creating your own ads, they are displayed in appropriate Google searches. To ensure that your ads reach the right target group, there are two important points to consider.

First, you need to create an ad. On the one hand, a suitable ad title and an attention-grabbing ad text must be selected. You should note that the content of the ad should make a prospect click on it to learn more about your studio. Once you've created and published an ad, it takes some time before you can see if the ad is successful. This can then be seen in the click-through rate, i.e. the percentage of people who saw and also clicked on your ad.

After your ad has been running for a period of time, you'll need to sort out the keywords in your ad. This is because Google automatically displays your ad for matching Google searches and thus collects a list of search terms that may match your ad. You need to sort out this list regularly, as not all search terms really match your ad. You must exclude them so that you only reach searchers who are also interested in your offer. On the other hand, you can also include specific keywords so that your ads always show up for those terms.

In addition to keywords, you also need to regularly optimize the texts of your ads. Because if one of your ads isn't running optimally, it's often due to the content. Because there is no generally valid guide for good ad copy. You simply have to try out a text and see if it works well or not. Regular optimization is therefore essential.

5th measure: Content marketing

Content marketing is a relatively recent form of marketing. This does not promote a specific product or service, but attracts the attention of a target group by publishing content. So you provide the target group with information or something similar and in return you generate traffic, i.e. visits, on your own website or social media profiles. When creating this content, there are two criteria to consider in order to achieve the desired effect.

On the one hand, you need to make sure that you're creating the right type of content. Because depending on which sector you work in, the target group is interested in certain topics. For members of a gym, this is usually interested in topics that have something to do with sport, nutrition or fitness. For example, you could provide your members with training videos showing you how to do certain exercises correctly or which exercises are helpful for different areas of the body. Alternatively, you can also offer cooking recipes or nutrition tips. Of course, that's not all the content you can publish. There are no limits to creativity in the area of content marketing. With content such as the ones mentioned here or completely your own ideas, you have a good chance of reaching many people and generating a lot of attention for your gym.

However, in order for anyone to notice your content at all, you should promote it correctly. There are various ways to optimally design this advertising, which, in the best case, should all be used to a certain extent. Advertising on social media is particularly important, so as soon as you publish new content, you should always create posts about it on social media. You can also draw attention to your content on site at your gym using flyers or posters. Finally, you can of course also promote the created content via Google Ads.

6th measure: Prepare for crisis situations with online marketing

The previous 5 measures should be used to immediately optimize your gym's online marketing. But what if there is another crisis situation, similar to the corona lock down? So that you do not suffer from such circumstances, you must prepare yourself for them. However, this preparation is not easy, especially for gyms, as it primarily depends on customers in the shop. Nevertheless, there are some services that you can offer your customers even if you have a closed studio.

These services include online courses. In doing so, you publish training videos or live streams in which you teach the courses that would normally take place in the studio. In this way, you can keep your members fit even from home and dissuade them from canceling their contracts.

In addition to these online offerings, you should also definitely plan your communication for a crisis situation. Because in addition to courses for home, it is also important that you maintain regular contact with your customers. Social media in particular are ideal for this, as this is also where your members have the opportunity to contact you. Basically, you should consider how and how often you want to publish posts or other information.

In order for your planned communication to be successful, you must make your members aware of this in good time. Your customers should know about your social media and all other communication channels even before a crisis occurs so that you can reach your customers in an emergency. Because this is the only way you can guarantee successful online marketing for your gym even in a crisis.

7th measure: Optimizing online marketing for your gym

Now that you've improved online marketing for your gym, you need to optimize it regularly to stay successful. This optimization affects all areas of your online marketing, because there is always a starting point that can be improved. In particular, your SEO and Google Ads must be reviewed regularly, as there are always new requirements that must be met. In order to achieve lasting success, you also have to adjust your strategies again and again. Because no matter how well they have been planned, current changes result in new starting situations that must be included in the planning.

Finally, you should also consider customer reviews in your optimization process. Because at the end of the day, all measures and strategies only work if you also meet the customer's wishes. Reviews in particular are a helpful tool here. The quickest way to collect reviews, for example, is WLAN marketing package from Socialwave. Because it offers the option to automatically collect reviews and also has several integrated marketing features that you can use to communicate with your members.

conclusion

In this blog article, we have shown you 7 measures that you can use to optimize your gym's online marketing. If you use all these measures for yourself and regularly optimize your marketing, you are guaranteed to reach more new customers and improve customer loyalty with your existing members. You are also better prepared for a possible new crisis situation.

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