Generating Innovative Referrals

Q: With the influx of new members at the beginning of the year, do you know of any innovative strategies to generate more referrals? – Submitted by Nadya Kostek, owner of Ultimate Health & Fitness

A: It goes without saying that referrals are the most important part of any health-club-marketing plan. I would even go so far as to say half of your new members should come by way of referrals. Unfortunately, many clubs implement boring referral programs or worse, no referral program at all.  Here are three unique and effective referral programs you can implement during the first quarter of the upcoming New Year to help turn one new member into two or three.

Gift Card

Gift cards are hot this year. People love giving and receiving gift cards, and your club should capitalize on this recent trend. These fitness gift cards have the same look and feel as a credit card and have a very high level of perceived value. A coupon is easy to discard, but it is difficult to throw away a gift card because it has such a high-perceived cash value. If your enrollment fee is $69 and your monthly rate is $30 per month, put a value of $100 on the gift card.  It’s essentially the same as offering free enrollment and first month free, but the tangible gift card that they can see and feel and recognize as very valuable makes all the difference.

You can provide these to your members to give away as stocking stuffers to friends and family. You can give a few of these to new members in exchange for the names and contact information of friends and family. You can mail these to members who haven’t used your club in some time. To avoid misuse, you should have a statement on the back stating: “Total amount on card can be used toward fitness services only. Not valid for use by current members.”

Refer-a-Friend Feature On Your Web site

This is a very simple strategy that works extremely well. Have a page on your Web site that allows your members to input the names and contact information of their friends. In exchange for this information, you will provide them with some type of incentive: A printable coupon for a free month of tanning, personal training, a t-shirt, etc. Creating this page is very simple for any Web designer.  All you need are fields for the referrer’s name and e-mail address along with fields for their friend’s name, e-mail address and phone number.  The system will automatically send an e-mail to the friends on behalf of the member.

You can even implement this at the point of sale. Once you finalize the membership agreement, open your refer-a-friend page on your computer. Ask them to scroll through their phone for the names of five friends or family members that they feel will benefit from a membership. Offer them something good: $20 in club bucks, a month of tanning, a ticket into a referral drawing, a t-shirt, a $20 bill, whatever it takes. Remind them to give you names of people likely to be interested because if one of their friends joins, they will receive another gift.

Win a Free Car

This is a big one, and requires a bit of legwork on your part, but overall a very doable and highly effective strategy. Strike up a deal with a local automobile dealership (they are likely struggling right now and will welcome the opportunity). You simply pay the lease on a new car for one year on behalf of a member. You should be able to arrange a free or at least a deeply discounted arrangement thanks to your ability to barter a few memberships for the management team. Worst-case scenario you’re looking at a small lease on a new car for one year and you’ll create an amazing word of mouth marketing opportunity for yourself. The winner is the person who refers the most new members.

The dealership can justify the loss thanks to a write off for their business, some free memberships to your club and intense promotion by you to your member. Plus you’ll be promoting your free car in all of your club’s advertising as well. You will generate tons of PR and lots of members you would not have attracted otherwise.

There are dozens of referral program possibilities. Many are boring, while many others are used throughout the year and lose their luster at the beginning of the New Year. Try one or all of these three referral strategies and you will get your members talking and their friends joining.

Answer provided by Curtis Mock, a contributing columnist for club solutions Magazine, industry consultant and executive director of gymsuccess.com. Curtis welcomes all questions and comments via e-mail at Curtis@ClubSolutionsMagazine.com.