How to retain your gym members ... tip 2

Encourage socialization between members

Did you know that the type of fitness clubs with (anecdotally) the highest member retention rate are tennis clubs? To be more specific… contract tennis clubs where members are given a fixed time to practice, and play against the same people each week. Why? Well, the secret is in the socialization. Working out becomes an excuse to see friends, shoot the breeze, and perhaps enjoy a coffee or drink afterwards. When you’ve got friends at a particular club, you’re much less likely to cancel your membership or move to a different club, since you would lose that social aspect. Makes sense, doesn’t it? So have a think about ways to boost interaction between your members. Maybe run semi-personal training sessions with small groups, so that group members all get to know each other. Maybe run social tournaments (ping-pong anyone?), or simply have a “happy hour” at the cafe. You can also use special promotions to encourage members to get their friends to join. One of the ways Gym Master membership software enables encouragement of socialization is via our email facility. Firstly a user can select a number of different customer types via our extensive reporting tool.  This could be users that have not been to the gym in a while, members of a similar age group or people that like to attend the same classes.  On running the report you then get the option to send out an email where you could invite these members to a social event or attend a new class or small group training session.  All great ways to build new friendships and strengthen current relationships. Stay tuned for next weeks tip on improving customer retention. For more information or to download our free demo of Gym Master lite go to  www.treshna.com/gym