Gym lead generation ideas for summer

The summer holiday period is a prime opportunity to attract new gym leads and grow your member base.

Often with a new year comes New Year’s resolutions and goals that people want to achieve. Health and fitness is frequently found at the top of these lists as people make commitments to themselves to better their approach to wellbeing. Particularly after a year of extended lockdowns and harsh restrictions across ANZ. With the dawning of the “new normal” (again), your business now has the perfect opportunity to attract new gym leads to your business.

So, here’s a few tips and tricks to acquire new gym leads in the lead up to summer!

Create a lead magnet offer

Do a bit of competitor research and work out what your local competitors are offering so that you can find your point of difference. Try to think outside of the box and don’t just immediately discount memberships or waive sign up fees. Excessive discounting won’t do any favours for your business of your member’s expectations when you suddenly have to raise your prices.

These new members are going to expect to always pay big discounts because that’s the way they signed up. And any membership price increases in the future may send them straight to a competitor down the road who’s trying to reel in new business with big discounts.

Instead, focus on discounting where it makes sense. This includes showing you can provide additional value to your members, and give them a gym experience where they feel comfortable and welcomed rather than sold to. An experience will win over new members faster than price will.

Another popular lead magnet is running a 6, 8 or 12 week fitness challenge that is open to everyone including prospects. This is an easy way for you to lock a potential member in for several weeks of valuable relationship building time. It gives you an opportunity to show these prospects everything you have to offer.

Offer free sessions to gym leads

Offering free sessions to the local community can help you make a great impression of yourself – which is so important around the busy holiday period.

Getting your gym leads to come in for a free session is a classic gym lead generation method because it works! Potential members LOVE to try before they buy, and can you blame them? Not all gyms are the same, and most won’t suit a member’s needs.

Just make sure to capture every lead that walks through your gym so you can follow up with them! MyMemberSales gym lead management software is a great tool to help you keep track of every single lead, reach out to them a crucial touch points in the buyer journey, and help them convert to a sale. Click here to learn more about MyMemberSales today!

Shout about your pools facilities

We don’t need to mention that it gets toasty in Australia and New Zealand during the summer holidays! So if your gym is lucky enough to have a swimming pool as one of your facilities, then that would be a point of difference to highlight in your gym lead generation marketing campaign.

Make sure to shout about it on social media with heaps of great images, stories and video content to really show off how great your facilities are during the hot weather.

Don’t forget social media

Speaking of social media, it’s the best place for you to get in front of members and leads alike long after your staff have gone home for the evening. It’s the kind of place where you can be front of mind with your target market and serve up content they want to engage with. This could be things like tips for improving nutrition and choices in the lead up to the holidays, quick but effective workouts, or funny, relatable Tik Tok videos.

When you share interesting and relevant content with your audience, they will be more open to the more sales-y content you post, because they won’t feel like they’re being sold to all the time. They’ll be more receptive to what you’re offering, and ultimately your lead generation campaigns will be more effective in the long run.

When the time comes for a harder sell, Facebook ads are a cost-effective way to get results.

Offer kid-friendly classes

Kids and teens are your customers too! Cater to this niche market and run group fitness classes for kids over the summer break. Not only will it be a great way to engage your younger clientele, it will also give their parents an opportunity to complete their own workout out on the gym floor.

Likewise, if you have a few teenagers signing up to your gym, offer classes to them (or at least a few PT sessions) to help introduce them to the gym in a safe and educational way. The worst thing that can happen is young teens coming into a gym, loading up a bar with far too much weight, lifting with incorrect form and injuring themselves as a result. So start them off the right way and offer them some education so they don’t learn the wrong things from uneducated sources.

Want to learn how to keep your summer holiday gym leads engaged so they convert to a long-term paying customer? Check out this blog right here!