Generating high-quality sales leads in the club business takes work. Any industry consultant will tell you that buddy referrals are still the best source of leads, and word-of-mouth from an existing member is critical. Getting the leads while they’re hot is key. Within a week to a month after a new member joins your facility, send them a marketing piece allowing them to easily bring their friends to the club for free. Most club management software companies have a marketing piece already established for this purpose. These pieces typically have built-in “guest passes” for the members’ friends or other individuals the member chooses.
The keys to making this “Bring a Buddy” system work are:
• Be sure there’s a reward for the existing member (e.g., a free month for each referred guest that decides to join).
• Offer an enticing gift for the guest (e.g., two weeks of club usage at no charge)
• It must be a turnkey solution. The file is easily created – ideally, automatically from the software – and the mailing goes without a hitch (e.g., every two weeks no matter what).
• Your marketing piece must be professionally created, printed, and it must look good.
Offering a significant reward, like a free month, whenever members refer a friend may seem like a lot to give away. In the larger scheme of things, it’s actually a small investment compared to the dollars spent on other advertising that may or may not be reaching your target audience. Your member is qualifying the leads for you. It’s money well spent.
Another option to reward members for referrals is to discount their dues on an ongoing basis per month as long as the referred person remains a member. Your computer software should easily allow you to do this. If a typical member pays $50 per month and they’ve referred two people who join and you discount their dues $5 per month for each new member, that’s equivalent to $120 savings to the member per year – but, $1200 more in dues to the club per year…and a profit margin of $1080. Your software can be set-up to track and indicate if a referred person cancels or expires, thus changing the original member’s dues accordingly.
Be sure to follow-up on new members with phone calls and/or emails reminding them that the passes are coming. Have a sample of the piece in the sales office for new members to see when they sign-up- this is a good tool to help them recognize the piece more easily when it arrives in their mail. It can even be promoted to new members as another benefit of joining your club.
Offers to prospects can vary from free weeks to a set number of visits allowed, any of which should be trackable in your software. When using a professional piece from your software vendor, the passes can often be coded with a bar code or date like some membership cards, and the passes can be activated when brought into the club. Track your guest-user information using your check-in capabilities and contact-management tracking software for prospects. Use your software program to communicate with the referred prospects via email to welcome them; tell them about club activities; encourage them to use the facility and take advantage of their free time. Capturing the prospect’s photo in your software when a pass is redeemed will allow your front desk staff to learn and use the prospect’s name. This showing of friendliness will be inviting to the guest and may help promote their joining.
Typical expenses for this type of marketing piece include the printing, envelope, postage, and administrative labor to put them together. Average cost should be no more than $1.50 per piece, maximum, all included. You should only pay by the piece, with no set-up fees. Your club management software does the tracking and file creation, and that’s a cost you’re probably already absorbing and accustomed to paying. A professionallooking piece, generated automatically, should be imprinted with the member’s name on each guest pass. It will have a spot to put the guest’s name and the date the pass expires or ends.
If using a “Bring-a-Buddy” piece for your new members doesn’t interest you, consider using it just once a year as a “thank you.” You can send it to all of your members in early June to “beef up” summer traffic before any slow downs, or at the beginning of January to help make the New Year kick-off even stronger. You can tie marketing like this to other inhouse promotions, like gift raffles, to add a little more incentive.
Industry studies show that members who stay the longest are those who’ve created and established friendships, bonds, and enjoy the club environment. These are often those who have workout partners to keep them motivated, and coming back on a regular basis. Price alone may be an initial decision-maker, but it’s not what keeps them coming back.
Carole Oat is the National Sales Manager for Twin Oaks Software. She can be contacted at 866.278.6750, or by email at coat@tosd.com, or visit www.tosd.com.
