Club operators know that image is everything. It’s arguably more important today than it’s ever been before.
Your brand is tied to its image, and its image is tied to your Member Experience.
The way your members -- and the rest of the community -- view your gym has a huge impact on the success and growth of your Club.
Is your gym notorious for having a friendly staff? Or, do people associate your Club with being impersonal or unwelcoming? Are you attributed with having a safe, clean environment? Or do members think that you're facilities are messy and poorly-kept?
These factors drive your Member Experience. It’s essential to know how people perceive your Club and the “Why” behind that perception.
Why Your Members are Your Best Marketers - Create Gym Referrals Organically
If your members have a good experience, they will speak highly of your brand, acting as your best referral network. But if your members' experience is unfavorable or mediocre it reflects poorly on your image and kills your opportunities for growth.
If your Club doesn’t have an established brand - something for which it’s known -- now is the time to do something about it. The best place to start is the curation of your Member Experience.
Why?
Because the Future of Fitness IS IN the Member Experience. You can have the best equipment in the world, but if your Member Experience is subpar, equipment alone won't grow your business.
Quick Tips to Improve Your Member Experience:
-Create high-quality touchpoints with your members
-Encourage feedback
-When you get feedback, actually listen to what your members are saying and try to implement changes
-Align your Operations with your company’s value/mission statement
-Communitize your gym by offering guest passes to your happiest members
-Identify members that seek better fitness results and connect with opportunities to achieve them, make them feel valued as a customer
If you feel out of touch with your members, you have to start somewhere. Your Member Experience won’t change overnight, but it will start to change incrementally if you focus on one thing at a time.
Offering the RIGHT Incentives for Gym Members
Clubs that, pre-pandemic, worked to create a great Member Experience are way ahead of the curve. The new generation of gym-goers want to have a relationship with its gym of choice. It’s not only about the equipment or the amenities or the friendliness of your staff. It’s about offering members a great experience as a whole to develop trust which fuels relationships that are built for longevity (i.e. retention).
A relationship involves listening and adjusting - reading and reacting. Bring transparency to that process. Let your members see and feel connected to the changes that are taking place as a result of their feedback.
Your members likely have been isolated for the last year-plus. The community you build around your Member Experience can be everlasting if you choose for it to be.
You could say that we’re back to “Business as Usual,” but there’s nothing usual about where we’re at today versus 15 months ago from today. And that’s not a bad thing.
The Bounce Back isn’t just “underway” anymore, we’re just “back”.
Your head might be spinning right now trying to figure out where to begin. Well, for the last year we’ve been preparing for this moment, working on features and plays that Operators can run to build a great Member Experience.
If you need help, don’t be afraid to ask for it. This is what we do at MXMetrics.com. Any fitness Operator out there can use our platform, but it’s about how they’re using our platform that actually drives results.
Email Blair.McHaney@mxmetrics.com to set up a 30-minute Member Experience Health Check.
