Online Fitness Marketing For Business Leaders

Technology is the reason for the fitness industry to grow tremendously. With the advent of the internet and social media, marketing has changed.

Social media and other digital platforms are the prime cause of making and lifting the worth of the fitness industry. People do face challenges in marketing, but with every hardship comes fruitful results and rewards.

The marketing strategy and planning for gyms and fitness businesses are now driven by social media. Billions of people interact daily through social media, and that’s why the gym ads show up on social media and not on TV.

This social media-driven marketing helped the gym to attract massive numbers of customers through fancy content like photos and videos on YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter accounts.

Every fitness club has at least a page or web address that helps them reach out to their potential customers and offer different packages.

Whether they’re relatively new members of the industry or have been in the game for a while, they’re always making room for improvements for local businesses, and to help you out, here are online fitness marketing strategies that will help your business.

The Primary Goal of Every Fitness Marketing Strategy

The evolution of digital technologies is profoundly changing how people live and do business and, in the process, transforming and reshaping the fitness businesses.

Think of digital marketing as an ongoing process. While your initial strategy might yield promising numbers, having a quarterly calendar in place to continually assess your B2B strategy is essential. Trends change, demand shifts and strategies should always be open to change.

As consumers continue to prioritize their health and actively search for healthy alternatives to prevent lifestyle-related illness, fitness businesses fulfill that demand and thrive as a result.

However, in a sector where the scope and uptake of digital technologies vary wildly, the resulting opportunities and challenges in online fitness marketing strategies have created an uneven playing field.

This is exacerbated by a growing gap between tech-driven and globally connected organizations and traditional micro and small businesses, often characterized by low-tech gym or fitness business practices.

A digitally agile workforce is imperative for most companies today. And getting there means bringing everyone along.

To support businesses in their digitalization journey and overcome common fears around resource, capacity, and lack of financial resilience, an achievable roadmap for digital change (which reflects the skills, budgets, and capabilities available) will encourage employee buy-in. Speaking of digital opportunities, let us discuss the opportunities the fitness industry has gained from the recent pandemic.

Opportunity in the Fitness Industry Post-Lockdown

The pandemic gave a few industries the perfect opportunity to widen their scope, leverage technology, and reach the masses. The fitness industry has witnessed massive growth in the last decade and is ever-increasing. This growth may have slowed down due to pandemics, but it also opened the doors to the digital space, which was never fully exploited before the lockdown.

Consumerization of the fitness club (a $100b industry) is inevitable. The pandemic has brought the idea of the club into the house on a wider basis than before. Hence, the opportunities are much bigger than ever before to shift the relationship away from old-world economics. —Michael Gale, Forbes

The fitness industry had started its digital journey pre-COVID-19 times, but the pandemic has accelerated the push in this direction. Online fitness marketing strategies can also see unprecedented growth. And rightly so, considering the economic recession looming over us, there will be less income to spend on staying fit in the future. 

Digital fitness marketing ideas could be a lifesaver. Also, when a million people adopt a new way of working out in a short period, it transforms the workout culture altogether.

Digital technology and business models offer significant commercial opportunities even for brands that aren’t fitness businesses.

But there’s no one-size-fits-all solution. The best way to start any business is through a comprehensive digital maturity and effectiveness audit.

To get the engine running, we’ve listed five fitness marketing strategies to keep a note of.  

5 Marketing Strategies For Your Fitness Business

There’s a saying that goes, “If it’s not broken, don’t fix it,” and though this may apply in certain cases, the same thing cannot be applied to successful fitness. A point often overlooked is the rapid change happening within the industry. The wellness market is anticipated to continue to expand in the next few years—and for providers to grow their fitness business, their marketing strategies need to be able to keep up with it.

Offer A Carrot

Undoubtedly, no one can resist a ‘carrot’—and frankly speaking, the principle of rewards for reaching another level can be observed everywhere; for example, an employee’s carrot is their job title. They’ll work hard to hit certain benchmarks, and in return, they will earn a higher title. Rewards spark a constant motivation for people to work harder—which then became an excellent fitness marketing campaign.

Fitness marketing ideas like these can easily be implemented for existing and potential customers. As a matter of fact, some fitness studios have developed rewards or tiers for their fitness programs.

By offering a carrot to your members, your fitness business can guarantee new customers build a wellness habit.

Recognizing Winners on Social Media

Taking the carrot principle further, you’ll want to recognize your clients. The great thing about this online strategy is it tackles two major components of your digital marketing campaign: social media marketing and content marketing.

Users are active on social media platforms because these channels offer a fun and easy way to network, keep in touch with friends and family, and stay connected with what’s going on in the world. Typically, users are not on these channels with the expectation that they are going to be marketed to. But this does not mean that social media users aren’t following and interacting with their favorite brands.

Whether they are looking for deals, enjoy entertaining content, or just want to learn more about the brand, social media users are open to engaging with brands on social media channels.

The reason why consumers may be more receptive to your brand message on social media is that social media allows you to be more conversational and show a different side of your brand. The content that you publish on these channels contributes to your brand personality and helps you demonstrate your brand voice.

On social media, you can make authentic connections with your leads and customers rather than just delivering direct marketing messages. This fitness marketing strategy is something that consumers are generally more responsive to.

Encourage Reviews

For most people hoping to start their wellness journey this year, search engines are their greatest companions. They can look up fitness studios and gyms or personal trainers in their locality and take a look at the reviews from their previous clients.

Rising competition has made this online business field much more complicated. Brand building is no longer a couple-month job anymore. It is that difference maker that is next to none.

Encouraging reviews is one of the more established fitness marketing ideas out there, and its importance has been further highlighted by SEO.

A good online review can set everything straight and give you a confirmation that you’re on the right track and that your fitness marketing strategies are well and truly working. You can’t just read what the magazines, newspapers, or other websites are stating about you. Whatever the customers think always occupies top billing, i.e., the top spot.

Use the Power of Hashtags

By first knowing how to market your business to customers, you can develop a good strategy for hashtag use. If your customers are a younger demographic, they’re more likely to use social media and engage with hashtags, as well as appreciate their use of them.

Hashtags are modern fitness marketing strategies, and they are essential. They show already engaged users that you are relevant and follow what’s on-trend. This will help customers stick around and support your brand longer—especially if your target audience is in a younger demographic. Using hashtags to market your business to customers shows that you follow social media trends and want to extend your reach.

Creating a business hashtag is easy. A hashtag can be made from any word, phrase, or acronym as long as there are no spaces between words within the phrase and it is preceded by the pound symbol (#).

When using a hashtag, make sure you add it to your post instead of just throwing at followers a list of hashtags without context. This will confuse users, which can lead to disengagement.

Also, avoid hashtagging a million different things in one post. It’s overwhelming for users to see more hashtags than words. Many local businesses gain quality leads using hashtags.

Remember, your goal is not to show up in every search; it’s to show up in the right searches. 

What’s most important is hashtagging relevant keywords or phrases that can bring new customers to your fitness clubs. Only use multiple hashtags if each hashtag is extremely relevant to your post or your business. In addition to hashtag overloading, also avoid repeating the same hashtag multiple times in one post.

You may use the word or phrase again, but adding the hashtag in front of every instance of that phrase will not increase the effectiveness of the hashtag.

Be Casual and Genuine

One of the best online fitness marketing strategies in the market is soft selling. Social media marketing offers a more personal way to connect with your target audience. With this in mind, businesses opted for a softer approach in terms of selling their products.

For instance, a fitness club would often seek out influencers who can try their programs out for a certain period of time as part of their fitness marketing campaigns. These thought leaders would then write about the said services on their social media platforms, recommending them to the gym’s potential customers.

Today’s consumers trust influencers more than brands due to their expertise and reputation. Hence, it’s best for businesses to wind their approvals first to win their clients through their digital marketing efforts.

Create a Buyer Persona

Marketing can’t be based on guesswork. You need to define your buyer personas to understand better who your ideal customers are, what they value, what their pain points are, and what it takes to motivate them.

By identifying the customer personas, you can tailor your marketing efforts. It also helps you connect with customers in more meaningful ways so as to derive real value.

Buyer personas are very useful tools to help you understand your customers and prospects better. They include what influences your customers and motivates their purchase decisions. It’s crucial to develop detailed personas for your business if you want to get a full understanding of what makes your customers tick. Otherwise, you are only using guesswork, and that guesswork may not pay off.

In order for you to reach your new clients effectively, you need to have an in-depth understanding of their needs and motivations for joining fitness centers. Before you start working on a marketing plan that will attract new clients, take the time to get to know them and discover new ways you can deliver a personalized experience from them.

When members feel like their providers care about them, they become loyal to them, and this ultimately leads to a boost in customer retention.

Make a Comeback with Fresh Marketing Ideas for your Fitness Business

As the world slowly reopens starts, several businesses in the fitness and wellness industry are looking for new marketing tips that can lead them to discover new opportunities. But with the number of online marketing tactics available around the world, the search can become overwhelming for some.

Luckily, there are digital marketing agencies more than willing to join budding businesses in their journey to success.

Work With Us!

At Creatitive, we understand the importance of developing and delivering the best fitness marketing strategies. That is why if you would like to develop the best online marketing content that adapts and resonates with your business. Contact Us! We will provide you with all the elements and materials that you need in order to succeed.

FAQ

Which Social Media Platform is the Best Option for implementing my fitness marketing strategies?

Each social media platform has a different target audience and tool that helps fitness business owners and designers in different ways. A piece of advice would be to work on your market segmentation before implementing your online fitness marketing strategies.

What are Some Fitness Marketing Ideas I can Implement?

User-generated content, online group fitness classes, and nutritional tips and programs are just some ideas that you can use to improve your online content.