Hybrid Member Journeys

In this extract from a recent webinar, Guy talks about how the traditional member journey evolved as the fitness industry accelerated online fitness during lockdown, and where it must develop to include hybrids of in-club and virtual fitness experiences.

There are many examples of hybrid journeys, we talk about Metabolic Balance and Exercise Referral here. Others include summer/winter split memberships, bootcamps, running/cycling clubs, relaxation, and meal prep.
Please leave questions or comments below.

How to Develop a Successful Customer Feedback Strategy

Here's the Elevate session that Guy chaired earlier this month with Andy Glover (Places Leisure), David Hopkins (Proinsight Mystery Shopping), Paul Roberts (MyCustomerLens) and Lucy Findlay (Elevate)

It was a great session with lots of learning for all.

Why is feedback so important? Andy talked about immediacy, expectations, prioritisation, and mindset at Places, and discussed their brilliant response rate to member surveys.

David explained how compliance and brand are as important as the process for a lot of Proinsight clients.

Paul said that succesful companies are now listening more, not only to customers, but to staff, prospects, and ex-members.

With emotions driving more behaviour, its more important than ever to be close to your key stakeholders - members and staff.

Feel free to add any more questions you have in the comments...

PT WITH ME IS GREAT BECAUSE…

Imagine if all your clients had to complete a tiebreaker in a quiz or competition. How would they complete the above phrase? How do they see you? Why do they train with you? And does what you sell match what they are buying?

Good listening is one of the most important skills if you are going to be an excellent personal trainer. You need to listen to your clients’ needs, which are constantly changing. Let’s explore how you can learn more from them, and use this feedback to help your business to grow and evolve.

Understand your market and your clients

ADD VALUE AS STANDARD

This September is going to be make or break for many fitness businesses. It is time to deliver value to your members, and this starts with removing the concept of free. 

Through lockdown, there has been a lot of free fitness. Many memberships were frozen or suspended. Clubs offered fitness for free through apps and online portals. Members and non-members alike have been following workouts and classes on Zoom, Facebook and YouTube.

The average UK club 12-month member retention was around 51% pre-lockdown. In other words, 51% of members typically stay for 12 months or longer. But member retention rates for free online fitness are significantly worse. Joe Wicks lost 50% of his viewers in just one month. Some say it was a fad, but so is joining a gym for many people. 

How can you boost the number of members coming back to your fitness business?

How many of your members have returned in the first month of reopening? Clubs we have spoken with range from 20% to 80% of members back. The lower figures are sometimes low because they are based on pre-lockdown total membership, and the top end are often based on optimistic feelings (or visits, rather than memberships).

Who has not returned yet?

Where we have accurate measures, the return rate after one month of reopening is around 50%. This immediately creates a segment of members who have not yet returned, who we need to campaign to get back into the club. One email will not suffice, but we will come back to these members in a moment, because there’s not so much an elephant in the room, as an elephant who’s NOT in the room…

Getting back with your Ex… members

As gyms in the UK start to re-open, it might seem too soon to start thinking about ex-member campaigns. But as your loyal members return, and you start to measure your capacity, it is likely that you will need to get some ex-members back too, to boost your revenue. 

We’re going to explore when you should be getting in touch with members who have cancelled, how and what you need to say to them, and how to balance this message to ensure you keep your regular members happy.

Gym Owner Monthly - The Big Interview with Guy Griffiths

Gym Owner Monthly, August 2020, Guy Griffiths talks data, motivation, bridging the gap between exercise and technology, and recovery in the Big Interview

How did you get into the fitness industry?

My mission is to help operators to support their members’ health and wellbeing. 

After 12 years as a consultant and ultimately as director of sales and marketing for a banking software firm, I was looking for something more meaningful. I wanted to help people to be healthier and fitter, rather than help banks to make more money. I had always been a regular gym member, and knew retention was an issue, but that exercise data was under-used.

I talked to staff at the clubs where I was a member, and other clubs around London, and built connections with a few suppliers. I networked relentlessly online and at events like the FIA (ukactive) conferences, LIW (Leisure Industry Week), and SIBEC. I supported and presented at the IOU (Independent Operators Unite) events at LIW.

Without the experience or biases of working from the ground up, I think from a member’s perspective, often questioning the status quo. When the answer is “because we’ve always done it like that”, it is usually time for change.

Re-opening Reality Check - How many members are coming back?

I'm an optimist, but also a realist. There's a lot of talk about 80-90% of members returning to health clubs when we re-open, but this is mindless optimism.

The video below explains how it's more likely to be 20% in the first month, and for the member engagement campaigns we've sent, and conversations with partners in other countries, this is a much more realistic estimate.

Health, Not Fitness

Now the UK fitness industry finally has a date that we can come out of lockdown, it’s a good time to reflect on the past few weeks, months, and even years. 

There’s been a lot of rhetoric, debate, and disbelief that it’s taken so long for the UK government to allow gyms to re-open (in England, at least). Particularly when pubs opened before gyms. As the fitness industry, we see ourselves as part of the solution, but it shows that we are in our own bubble. 

If we’re talking about fitness, people have managed without gyms and leisure centres over the last few months. There are many other ways of keeping fit, as many fitness enthusiasts and newcomers have found. [There are other ways of enjoying a pint or glass of wine, but let’s leave that for now]. Gym memberships only cater for 15% of the population, and unless we change our message, mission, or purpose, this is unlikely to change.

Inductions – This time it IS about health and safety (and retention) - Gym Owner Monthly Article

It will soon be time to welcome many of your members back to your club. This presents you with a huge opportunity to make a fresh start with all members, regardless of their experience or expectations. First impressions matter, and this time around they matter more than ever.

Inductions are a cornerstone of good member retention that I often talk and write about. Articles in GOM Feb20 and Oct19 both reference onboarding and inductions, but not as mandatory health and safety appointments. As we re-open, we can use the health and safety argument to ensure all members get this key interaction. To be clear, this is not a 45-minute one-on-one appointment, more of a fast-start speech that you deliver to all members.

Why is the induction more important than ever?