In our newsletter last month, we asked:
What do you believe is the number one social media platform for member retention?
Here are the results:
- Facebook 42%
- Foursquare 25%
- Twitter 19%
- YouTube 6%
- LinkedIn 4%
- Movergy 4%
Unsurprisingly, facebook tops the poll; it is the most popular social network at the moment, and therefore the best for potential member engagement. In terms of retention, your facebook page can be a hub or community of members for discussion; you should be garnering opinion and requesting (and moderating) comments, and monitoring insights such as checkins, reach and ‘talking about this’.
FourSquare – it’s great to see this come in second. The location based social network for mobile devices is a really good way to engage your members more. You can reward your regulars, create competition, and spread the word about your club and products. It links easily to facebook and twitter to increase the general social media buzz around your club.
Twitter – interesting to see twitter so high on a retention list, but there’s the nature of surveys. Practising the ‘art’ of the 140 character message is certainly a good way of keeping your existing members engaged. If you keep your tweets informative and non-salesy, you should be able to deliver extra value to your members. This is a great retainer, and shares can mean referrals.
YouTube – similar to twitter, we see YouTube as a useful add-on if you want to keep your members informed and add value to their membership. Health or exercise tips from YouTube can be embedded into your newsletters or facebook page, which could bring members back to your YouTube channel for more.
LinkedIn – the business networking site is more focused on business-to-business networking, but a company page can list services, and personal recommendations from your members can be a good retention tool, particularly for personal trainers.
Movergy – we think this came up in ‘other’ due to our slight bias towards Technogym clubs. Movergy is like Facebook for active people to share your passions and experiences, LinkedIn for experts where a PT could add content and see their members activity, or a Trip advisor for fitness operators where prospects check before they commit to a contract at a facility.
Although it received no votes, Spogo also deserves a mention as the new ‘rightmove’ for the fitness industry. Run by the Fitness Industry Association, it enables people to find and book sports and physical activities
In summary, the best social media platform for member retention is the one that your members use, and the one that will best serve their needs. Ask your members what they want, and what they want from it, and then go and build it, or bend one of the existing platforms so that it fits!
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