On average, 12% of new members join during January – making January the busiest month for gyms and health clubs.
January is – and has always been – the peak of the season. To help you cope with the New Year’s resolution rush – and retain as many members as possible – we have gathered some tips for you.
New members joining your gym might do it based on New Year’s resolutions regarding exercising more, being healthier, losing weight or something else. In their mind, they will have an overall, but yet fluffy goal.
And fluffy goals often turns into too high expectations which can lead to frustrations when things aren’t moving along ‘as planned’ – at the end leading to demotivation and lack of success.
That’s a vicious circle that can cause your members to quit the gym before getting started for real.
To keep your new members’ motivation on top, it can really pay off helping your new members set realistic long-term goals.
You can prepare a handful of questions to ask your members when joining your gym.
Questions like:
Based on the member’s answers, help them formulate a specific and realistic goal.
Examples of goals could be:
If you want to take it up a final notch, print out the goal, and make it tangible. It’s much easier for your member to cope with when they get their goal physically handed to them.
Even though, you might get a lot of new members during the first days of January, don’t forget your crowd of loyal members who uses your facility throughout the whole year.
You need to approach these two groups very differently. It’s important that your new members feel welcomed at your gym. Chances are that you might already have a great onboarding or welcome program ready, so it’s easy for your members to get started.
However, the extra focus on new members might take some of the attention away from your loyal members – which you don’t want to neglect during the New Year’s resolution rush.
Instead, make an effort to make it convenient for your loyal members to still use your facility, even though it might be more crowded than usual.
For instance:
A study from Foursquare found the day that most members will fall off the wagon and quit their New Year’s resolution. The day is: The second Saturday of February.
Researchers found that from January 1st until the second Saturday of February, the percentage increase in the number of visits at the gym outweighed the percentage decrease in the number of visits at fast-food chains. However, after this day in February, numbers started to move back to normal.
Use this finding to your advantage. Have an extra focus on retaining your new members at the very beginning of their membership journey at your gym.
Examples of how to retain new members past the ‘Fall of the wagon’ day:
You will most likely feel a rush at your gym from the very beginning after New Year’s. More members will fill up the space and use the machines, the class facilities, the locker rooms etc.
When more people are walking in and out of your facility, it might be useful to have more staff available to give a hand.
Some extra manpower can cover tasks like:
When getting some backup, you can make sure that the service and experience at your gym remain the same even though it feels like rush hour. It ensures that both your loyal and new members are taken well care of throughout this peak season.
You are probably all set with your online sign-up flow when starting out the New Year's resolution rush in January. However, are you making your potential new members aware of how easy it is for them to sign up from home?
By encouraging more new members to sign up from home, you can minimise the lines at the reception – which is time-saving for both your members and staff. Also, it will be a much more smooth and convenient experience which will give your new members a great first impression of your business.
Examples of how to promote online sign-ups: