Who should deliver Inductions?

How to increase induction percentage with limited staff – have everyone deliver them?

If you read this blog regularly, you’ll know we encourage ‘inductions’ for new and returning members in order to improve early engagement, visits, habit building, and ultimately member retention. The question of who should deliver this important appointment came up at a recent workshop, and sparked an interesting discussion.

What’s an induction called?

Before we get into the discussion, and possibly some controversial hot water, let’s talk about the ‘induction’. This term is often used in the fitness industry, but more and more clubs are quite rightly using different names for this appointment, such as Activation, Welcome session, Step 1, Consultation. All have their merits, and we honestly believe anything other than ‘induction’ is a good name.

What’s in an induction?

More important is the content or tasks within the engagement, which we’ll call a welcome meeting, as that’s what was settled on in the workshop. Welcome sounds, well, welcoming. And a meeting is softer than a session, implying that it doesn’t have to be a workout, or could include a coffee. Again, there’s room for debate as to what should and should not be included in the first appointment. But for context, in this workshop, staff had decided on a friendly welcome, check the members level of confidence and comfortability, and chat about their goals. Optionally, there was the choice to explain or demonstrate the app, do a body composition, and always offer a follow-up appointment.

If you’re thinking ‘What about health and safety?’, then you’re stuck in the 90’s. It was a way of selling the appointment a long time ago, but doesn’t wash any more. 

The induction effect

There’s lots of data showing the effectiveness of welcome sessions, and lots of articles (on this blog alone) about how important they are. But when you have limited gym staff, or reduced staffing times, as this client did at a dual-use site (school shared facility), it’s difficult to fit more welcome sessions in. 

Who’s better, Who’ll do?

So, the question arose – who can deliver a ‘Welcome Meeting’. And having just defined the content of the session for this particular organisation, it was a great question! The group thought about it and concluded that it didn’t need a particular level of qualification, e.g. a gym instructor, to deliver a Welcome Meeting. Reception staff, managers, swim teachers, group exercise instructors… these last two examples are perhaps seen as busy roles, or as specialist staff, but another interesting discussion was around welcome meetings for non-gym members.

Some baseline training may be needed to help staff with empathy or listening skills, along with the right questions to ask and a checklist. [The Membership Retention Essentials course developed by GGFit and FutureFit for Business is a good place to start!]

Measurement for improvement

Some team members might be resistant to this change, especially if they feel stretched already. Measuring Welcome Meetings will help to demonstrate how they benefit everyone. Generic industry measures are available, but looking at specifics for your club or chain will help manage change. Check the increase in number of appointments delivered, how it affects first month visits, and always ask members for feedback afterwards. These stats will create a virtuous circle to sell more appointments, both initial and follow-up. 

Inductions (Activations) and First Month Visits

Body composition and programmes

You could argue that a body composition check needs a qualified coach to explain the results and educate the member, which is true. But this could be booked as a follow-up appointment. In the same way, someone who wants a programme could be introduced to a coach at their welcome meeting, and then look forward to getting support, rather than dreading a programme appointment with someone they don’t know. 

Apparently, some members still expect a programme to be written for them at the first session, in which case, you perhaps do need to book them in with a coach. To be clear, we’re not excluding coaches or instructors from delivering Welcome Meetings, just increasing the resource capability to deliver more of them, and then book more follow-up appointments, usually with a coach. It’s about flexibility to get more members to get started on their health and fitness journey with more confidence and comfort. 

Make it easy for everyone

Inductions, or Welcome Meetings, don’t need to be 1-hour sessions that are both hard to sell and hard to deliver. They could be booked for 15 minutes, and might sometimes only take 5 minutes, but if you can deliver more of them to more members, they’ll all get more engagement, and stick around longer.