Be Health & Fitness: Using social media to increase members

The brief

A quick intro the business ➞ it’s a women’s fitness club based in Northampton.

The club is run by a personal trainer, Becki, who holds group fitness sessions across Northampton from Monday to Saturday.

Becki wanted to use social media to attract new members to the club, and also retain her existing members.

She also wanted to change the narrative to fitness – moving away from the numbers on the scales, with focus on feeling your best and being yourself, among a group of like-minded women.

The work

With this project, there was a clear need to understand the thoughts and experiences of our target audience, and the problems they face when it comes to fitness and feeling good about themselves.

Without going into the granular characteristics, that’s women aged between 30 and 50.

Let’s point out the obvious first: I’m not a woman aged between 30 and 50.

However, as a social media manager, it’s in my remit to get a deep understanding of a business’ target audience and ideal customer.

So, I did. That included research by speaking to Becki, speaking to my wife, and speaking to my sister.

It was then about creating a content plan to play on those thoughts and feelings and showing that becoming a member of Be was part of the solution.

And while that would support audience growth and an increase in enquiries on social media, we needed to be proactive with an engagement and outreach plan to get members through the door.

Here’s what the project included:

• Strategy
• Brand design
• Content creation
• Outreach strategy
• Inbox management
• Monthly analysis

Authenticity

One of the feelings women have about joining a fitness club, or a gym, is nervousness.

Nervousness to join generally.
Nervousness to walk into a room of 20 strangers.
Nervousness to work out in front of those said strangers.

And self-doubt.

“What if I’m too slow?”
“What if I sweat loads?”
“What happens if I can’t lift the weight?”
“What happens if I can’t do what the others do?”

But what’s unique to Be is that it’s a community of kind, welcoming women, led by a woman – a 30-something-year-old mum of one.

Becki is kind, warm, friendly person who would do anything for the women in her community, and we had to show that in the most authentic way.

The brand had to take on the persona of Becki. Our tone of voice was informal, warm, welcoming and real.

Our content plan included personal, first-person posts from Becki, and our strategy on Instagram Stories was to make it Becki’s personal diary.

We had to position Becki as a relatable person, make people feel like they know her, and let them know that there was no need to be nervous, regardless of their ability.

↳ The result: Becki was voted Northants Best Fitness Instructor for 2023, which was voted for by the public.

Engagement and outreach plan

Success in marketing generally comes down to four simple things:

1. Attention: Can you get the attention of your target audience?
2. Interest: Are you able to make them interested in what you do?
3. Desire: Do you give them the desire to work with you?
4. Action: Can you get them to take action and buy?

That’s called The AIDA Model, which was created in 1898 by businessman Elias St. Elmo Lewis. Yet it’s still very relevant and accurate in 2023.

To support step four, we created an outreach plan which included reaching out to relevant new followers and regular engagers of our content on Instagram.

There’s a lot of power in one-to-one conversations on social media, and that was proved correct when it came to this project.

↳ Result: A ~50% increase in members – the ultimate aim being achieved