Marketing for gyms and fitness groups
Every join has to be worth more than it cost to buy, and the months of tenure after it are where the margin actually sits.
Where the money moves.
January does the heavy lifting and every operator knows it, which is why a click in the first week of the year costs what it costs. The clubs that finish ahead are the ones that filled February and the winter trough, when acquisition is cheaper and the people joining tend to stay longer. So the year gets planned backwards: a funded summer push that does not burn the annual budget in three weeks, a re-engagement wave in March, a winter offer built around training indoors, and a September window before the weather takes people outside again.
Cost per join is only half the number. A join that cancels in week six cost more than it earned, so acquisition is reported against tenure: joins by source, then those same joins at 30, 90 and 180 days, pulled from your billing platform rather than from the ad platform's own claim. Ezidebit, Debitsuccess, Clubware, Glofox, whichever one runs the direct debits, that is where the truth sits. An ad platform counts a form fill. Your billing file counts a member who is still paying.
Multi-site marketing fails on geography before it fails on creative. A club draws from a tight radius, so one national campaign pointing at one landing page sends a Penrith enquiry to a Parramatta tour and loses both. We run club level structure: a Google Business Profile per site kept accurate on hours and public holidays, targeting set on real drive time rather than a lazy radius, a page per club carrying its own timetable and coaches, and lead routing that puts the enquiry in front of the person who runs that floor. In a franchise network, levy spend is accounted for by postcode and franchisees see their own numbers.
Consumer law shapes what an offer can say. A trial that rolls into a paid membership has to say so where the person signs up, a waived joining fee needs its conditions on the same screen as the headline, and the state fitness industry codes set expectations on contract terms and cancellation. We write offers that a Fair Trading complaint would not dent, which is also what keeps chargebacks and one star reviews down. Member transformation stories stay attached to the person who lived them, with written consent recorded and no implied medical outcome.
What we run.
Club level acquisition campaigns
Meta and Google built per site rather than per brand, with drive time targeting, timetable-aware creative and offers that change through the year. Budget shifts weekly between clubs on cost per join, so a strong site is not throttled to prop up a weak one.
Lead to tour to join tracking
Enquiry, contact attempt, booked tour, attended tour, join. The funnel is wired through your CRM and billing platform so the sales floor can see where drop off happens, and spend follows the sources that convert into paying members.
New club presales
Foundation member campaigns timed to fit out and approval milestones, with the waitlist built before the hoarding goes up, seeding through nearby workplaces and junior sport, and a launch weekend run off that waitlist rather than off walk-ins.
Content shot on the floor
Production days in the club with real members and coaches, cut into short form for the whole quarter, plus a coaching line that gives people a reason to follow before they are ready to join. Consent and usage rights recorded per person.
Retention email and SMS
Onboarding through the first six weeks, booking nudges for members drifting towards lapse, and win-back timed to the billing calendar. It is the cheapest join you will buy, because you already had them once.
Questions we get asked.
By matching platform data to your billing export. Every lead carries a source, the join is confirmed in the billing system, and reporting shows spend against members still paying at 30 and 90 days. Lead volume stays as a diagnostic. The join, and how long it survives, is what the budget is judged on.
Yes, and the split matters. Brand, creative, offer architecture and platform structure run centrally, while local budget stays visible to the franchisee with reporting on their own catchment. Franchisees get assets they can use for community work without going off brand, and levy spend is accounted for site by site.
Anything you can substantiate and attribute. Member stories run with signed consent and no health outcome implied, offer conditions appear where the offer is claimed, and an auto-renewing trial discloses the rollover at sign up. That is a consumer law requirement, and it also cuts the disputes your member services team spends its week on.
The economics differ, so the plan does. Boutique lifetime value is higher per member and capacity is fixed per class, so the job is filling named timeslots rather than raw volume, and the coach carries the content. Measurement stays identical: cost per join, then how long that member keeps paying.
Talk to us.
9 services under one team, run against the numbers your business already reports on.
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