I remember my last all inclusive holiday. I promised myself not to gain on weight, so I went to the gym every day. That’s when I discovered how many different personas you can find there. I divided them into categories. Here’s what you can learn from my findings.
1) SHY GUY/GIRL
This type of member usually looks quite lost and is not self-confident enough. This is the type of member, who needs advice and needs to be approached directly by the gym staff. It’s a very promising member, who can be very loyal.
2) MR UNIVERSE AND MISS UNIVERSE
He is the King of the Gym. She is the Queen. Usually in pursuit for female/male attention or attention in general. This member should be your gym ambassador. We tend to look up to nearly perfect looking people, as they represent all the goals, which we also aspire. A gym ambassador could be a motivating asset to your club and increase retention in general.
3) I JUST CAME HERE TO WATCH
This person seems to have too much time. Visiting gyms is like going for a walk. This member needs a goal - prepare a plan for him/her! Approach this member with a special offer, make him believe he or she can use his/her time more effectively.
4) SMOOTHIE DRINKER
Can you name a person who cannot go for a run, to the gym or a bicycle ride without stopping for a snack, ice cream or smoothie? These members need special motivation - give them one smoothie for free with each PT session.
Take some time to discover your gym personas. As a gym manager you need to be all in one: entrepreneur, marketing specialist and psychologist. Once you find out what group of members attend your gym, you can start working on enhancing your gym performance. The first thing you can do is to connect on a personal level through various automations, which a professional software should deliver. How does that work?
Usually software providers should enable a tagging and grouping functionality, which means you can assign special tags to members and group them into separate categories. Afterwards you can send targeted email, push notifications and SMS Alerts to the specific groups to inform them about special promotions or upcoming events, which they in particular find interesting. This way, you can communicate with different members, specifically addressing their individual expectations. As a result you get better engagement and loyalty, which certainly raises their activity and attendance. Targeting smaller groups at your gym, will allow you to get to know your members better, which is always very crucial in this industry.