What exactly is public relations? Does a fitness club need PR? Who should lead all communication activities with the brand's environment? How can we differentiate PR from marketing? And how to use it while managing a fitness club?
First of all, public relations activities are aimed at building a relationship with the brand's environment. According to old definitions, PR relied on informing the organization's stakeholders about the company's operations. It is obvious that this is not a one-way communication but a dialogue with the surroundings, in our case - surrounding of a health center. It is a dialogue with the external environment (customers, partners, media), but also with the internal environment of your business which is the team. In definitions concerning the concept of public relations the wording that PR is a management function whose task is the communication of the organization with the environment, shaping (management) of the image and reputation is often repeated. I believe that this approximation of the concept have dispelled doubts, if you had one, does the fitness club need PR? Every organization needs it.
Build a dialogue
PR manager responsibility is to conduct a conversation with the brand's surrounding. Ok, we already know that. But it's not just only about discussions that come from the club’s initiative, it’s more about reactions to inquiries addressed to the brand itself, the team, the club etc. Proper PR responds to comments about the club and is not afraid to take part in a discussion about the gym. You can gain a lot and positively surprise your followers and customers, when joining a conversation conducted on the club’s subject via unofficial communication channels. In order to do so media monitoring is needed and above all, all social media monitoring.
Media monitoring
This is an indispensable tool of every PR manager. I cannot imagine how to manage a brand image without monitoring how they talk about us. Because you do not know where and when they will talk about you, for example on social media forums, who will write about you on a blog, how many people will share it, the most important thing is to use ready-made solutions that provide such information. Thanks to the monitoring you will receive an everyday e-mail update and in the case of very negative comments you can even count on a quick alert. What benefits does it bring? Firstly, by monitoring what is being said about your brand or about the services that you provide you are able to join the conversation and speak on behalf of your fitness club. You can invite and get the attention of new customers if people are looking for services that you offer. An intelligently and unobtrusively conducted conversation from your side can give you many supporters and followers. Secondly, thanks to monitoring you are able to prevent communication crises. This allows you to respond quickly and it increases the possibility of explaining a misunderstanding or fixing a mistake.
Building a brand
I do not only mean the club’s brand, but also the brand of the owners, CEOs, trainers,
Instructors etc. A good PR manager knows that the this is a really complicated process and every detail has an impact on the whole puzzle, that is, on the image of a fitness club. A few important tips why PR is important for your business you can find in article Why do you need PR in your fitness club. Interestingly, part of your PR could be the use of PerfectGym management software as such, as this could be something that make you stand out from the competition crowd. What is more the tool itself can be the part of PR strategy and allow you to build a better communication across different channels.