I was at my local Whole Foods and snapped this picture of their rack of free local publications. Inside of every issue I saw dozens of local events advertised, many that would be of particular interest to Health & Fitness Minded individuals.
People are searching for everything, all the time. A quick blog post about how you are offering a special discount to participants of one of these events may be found by your next customer.
You are probably well aware of the explosive popularity of YouTube, and you’ve probably noticed you are seeing video easily accessible on all sorts of websites. No question video is a great way to highlight your studio…..it can tell your story in a very compelling way.
Were you also aware that the presence of video on your website is viewed positively by Google? It increases your online findability, and this is a major marketing benefit. The tools to create and distribute video are so inexpensive and easy to use, there is very little reason not to integrate a few videos into your online presence.   Here are a few ideas on how to use video (click here to see actual fitness studio examples).
There are obviously professionals that can help you produce quality video, but if you or a friend have a few basic tools and some tech savvy, you can create video content that gives a cool sense of your studio. Even a few brief minutes can be quite effective.
The big news at this years IDEA World Fitness Convention was the launch of Fitness Connect, which is the world’s largest fitness professional directory, connecting more than 16 million consumers to more than 100,000 fitness professionals with credentials verified by the top 14 fitness certification bodies.
While I was at the convention I met Jason Davis -IDEA’s Internet Revenue Director.
Jason walked me through a demonstration of Fitness Connect and while I watched I was struck by how intuitively it was designed and it became very easy to see the potential value it could bring to both individual fitness professionals and fitness clubs and studios.
During my interview with Mike Bannan we discuss additional details about why I feel strongly that your Fitness Studio needs a profile on Fitness Connect.
You may listen to this episode here or use the link in the right side bar to subscribe using iTunes and have every new episode downloaded automatically.
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Cyclists enjoyed seeing this and followed it back to my website LocalClimbs.com
When asked why he robbed banks, famous bank robber Willie Sutton simply replied, “Because that’s where the money is.”
Is your fitness studio marketing message “where the cyclists or runners are?”
I had this idea (which you are free to use by the way) during the Tour de France. The announcers are constantly explaining the percentage grade of the climb for many of the mountain stages of the race. I wondered how my local climbs compared to climbs in the Tour so I went out and measured a few just for my own knowledge. “I bet other cyclists (or fitness enthusiasts) would appreciate knowing this” was my next thought.
Being the marketer I am, I couldn’t help but think if could use this to drive traffic back to a website. I don’t have my own indoor cycling studio so I created www.localclimbs.com and included it in the stencil I used to mark six popular climbs around where I live.
NOTE: I learned later that many municipalities frown on people painting their streets. So check with them before hand. An alternative would be an inexpensive yard sign that you could pre-print with your studio name and then add the grade before placing them on the side of the road.
Here is where local search becomes very important.
With Google Analytics installed on this site I know exactly what traffic I have driven and how visitors found the site, i.e typed in www.localclimbs.com or searched for the words “local climbs.”
Do you use the Yellow Pages any more? I don’t and I’m frustrated whenever I find a new one on my front porch because it goes right into the recycling can.
When I’m looking for anything, I start with Google. I want the basics; Movie, location and time. That’s it. I don’t want to have to look up the phone number of a local movie theater so I can call and listen to a 5 minute recording about; where they are located, “Playing in Studio #1 Toy Story 3, 12:50, 3:30…. I search for Toy Story 3 and Google, because they know where I am, gives me local listings with the exact information I want (location & time) + additional links to more info if I want it.
It’s just so much easier and faster to search online. They movie theaters understand this and are continuously updating their sites with the latest information.
I was curious as to who still uses the Yellow Pages to find local information. So I Googled Yellow Pages vs Google and found this interesting article from last year that included this chart that shows who still uses the Yellow Pages and who is using search (Google, Yahoo & Bing)
What age is your typical client / customer?
Based on this chart, how are they looking for you?
Are you attracting all three types?
We see three distinct types of people, searching on line who are (or could be) interested in your Fitness Studio. Bill and I discuss each in this episode and how we suggest attracting them.
You may listen to this episode here or use the link in the right side bar to subscribe using iTunes and have every new episode downloaded automatically.
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Do you use of Word of Mouth Marketing to promote your Fitness Studio Business? Have you considered how Word of Mouth may be dependent on Online Findability to be successful?
Bill and I discuss how we see word of mouth marketing and online findability as interconnected for a number of reasons. We see this interconnection as crucial to bringing new clients to your studio.
You may listen to this episode here or use the link in the right side bar to subscribe using iTunes and have every new episode downloaded automatically.
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Here at long last is the Fitness Studio Marketing Podcast episode #1.In it Bill Pryor and I explain “why” we have undertaken this project. Information about the book I mention, Start With Why can be found here. You may listen to this episode here or use the link in the right side bar to subscribe using iTunes.
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If you have an iPhone, Blackberry, Droid or other Smart Phone you probably use the GPS Maps feature to guide you around town. Because all of these phones know exactly where you are, if you search for “Yoga” in the map’s search field you will get Google map results showing businesses offering Yoga near your location.
Have you done a similar search for your format to see if your studio shows up? What did (or didn’t) you find?
I had some extra time while I was in a western suburb of Minneapolis and thought I would try this test and see what I would (or wouldn’t) find….
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We recently found out very directly how many new customers we were getting from online searchers…..it was an eye opener. Early in our studio’s history, we deployed a popular, powerful and highly effective business tool called Mindbody Online. Most people think of Mindbody Online as primarily an online scheduler — which it certainly is, but it also contains a variety of tools to help manage and market your business. Since we have a small studio and very little staff, we have built a business heavily reliant on our customers interacting through our website. They make 97% of their purchases there, they learn about promotions there and they book classes there……it’s great, because it means we can focus on our classes and events.
Here’s the thing. Since you MUST create an online account to use our studio, we employ a Mindbody Online feature that REQUIRES new customers to tell us where they heard about us. That field is the only other required field other than name and email address. Periodically we create reports. Here is one that covers 60 days of our business.
Here’s what this report shows. In a 90 day period, we had just over 150 new customers register online. The largest single source was of course “word-of-mouth”, but guess what? Second largest source was “Web/Google search”. We have been in the same town over 5 years, yet 20% of our new customers found us by searching online. That is a huge number when you think that these are the new people to incite new “word of mouth”. Yikes! After seeing this data, we started thinking long and hard about how to maintain strong visibility online. You betcha.
