Since the advent of low-cost clubs, it has become customary to ask new joiners if they are experienced. Aside from building rapport, a big factor for this question is to see if the member needs a welcome session (induction). Whether the member is joining online or in-club, you might think it removes a barrier to joining, but it puts lot of new members at risk!
You know from all the research that members stay longer if they have a welcome session. Yet lots of clubs look for excuses not to deliver one. If you want to get your members to stick around longer, you need to eliminate these excuses, and sell the welcome session to as many members as possible. Let's translate a couple of objections:
- They say: I had an induction before…
- They mean: …and it was a terrible experience!
- You say: Tell me about it, and I’ll tell you what our members think of our welcome session.
- They say: I know what I'm doing…
- They mean: I’ve got no idea what I’m doing
- You say: We don’t want to tell you what to do, we just want to learn more about your goals and help you get results because then you’ll stay longer.
Nuffield Health’s research on member experience in 2018 showed that over half (55%) of Brits at the gym don’t know what they’re doing. What’s more, nearly half (46%) have no specific goal in mind, and of those who do, three quarters (74%) have no deadline for achieving those goals. Click here to read the article.
Feedback loop
The two big problems with the ‘Induction’ are that members don’t want to have it, and gym staff worry that it’s not valued. Changing the name from an Induction helps a little (try Welcome Session, First Appointment, Step 1, etc). But getting feedback from members who’ve had a welcome session can be a bigger boost. The feedback will generally be very positive and can help to show staff and new joiners how valuable the session is. Collect real member comments and publish them internally and externally to help to sell the welcome session to more new members.Measure retention
Showing the effect of the welcome session can also help. If you log welcome appointments in your front of house system, you can look at average length of membership or monthly cancellations and compare members who had a welcome session with those who did not. Every site is different, but our most recent case study shows members with a welcome session are 22% more likely to stay for 12 months than those who had no onboarding appointment.Follow-up with all members
Ask every member who has a welcome session for feedback. But also offer every member who turns it down another opportunity to book the appointment. This could be an automated email, or part of the 7-day courtesy call. Not many will change their mind, but a few will, and you’ll improve your retention as a result. Second chances do work in this case.I’ve been a member here before
Some previous members may have had a welcome session before, but it’s hard to prove if, or when they did. So, it’s always worth recommending that they have one now. The experience today should be much better than it was 5 or 10 years ago, lots will have changed in your club, and the member’s goals will be different too.“The rest were ex-members”
A multi-site trust focused on improving welcome session uptake in 2018, and reported 80% of new joiners booking the appointment. They claimed they couldn’t improve on this percentage, because 20% of joiners were ex-members. We pointed out that these members had experience of leaving, and unless there was a record of them having had a welcome session in the previous year, they were missing out. In fact, booking most of these ex-members in for a welcome session would reap even bigger benefits for the club as they would stay longer this time.Lesson: find a group of members who don’t have inductions, and think about why they are missing out.
Sell the benefits
Use your genuine member feedback and stats to help sell the welcome session. Take those quotes, and the effect measures to show why it is best (or mandatory) for every new member to have a welcome session. It’s not about health and safety!
Finally, you need to ensure your welcome sessions, first appointments, or whatever you call them are a great experience for the new member. Not only do they ensure your new members make at least one visit, they need to ensure that they keep coming back. Ask about their previous experience to start to build rapport, but then keep listening to the new member throughout their first session, and you’ll have a much better chance of hanging on to them.
Guy Griffiths is a coach to independent gym owners, and a member retention specialist. His mission is to help more people to be fitter and healthier by turning clubs into highly successful businesses with super loyal members. Guy’s book Stick Around (strategies to keep your gym members motivated) has 4.9 stars on Amazon, and his next Retention Bootcamp is on 27 Feb. Find out more at ggfit.com/events
This article was originally published in the February 2020 issue of Gym Owner Monthly.
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