After the recent gym closures, different clubs will have different outcomes. Survival and sales will depend on many factors. How long have you been closed? What was your financial position before you closed? What is your relationship with landlords, banks and suppliers?
And there is the financial damage to your business during the months you were closed.
First, you have the normal member attrition you would have if there was no pandemic. Second, you have the additional cancelations because of the pandemic. And finally, while you were closed, you could not replace your normal cancelations or coronavirus cancelations with new sales.
In many successful fitness clubs, face-to-face selling has been essential to success. But most proven sales systems depend on face-to-face conversation. Depending on the public’s willingness to engage with sales staff in an office, this may present problems for gyms.
Here are my six suggestions for sales success after the coronavirus lockdown:
1. Think about your process and how you can make it feel safer for potential members. Consider sneeze guards between the salesperson and prospect.
2. Do as much sales training as possible while you are closed. The more experienced and skilled a salesperson, the more confident they feel dealing with situations.
3. Use direct marketing to target all your past members. Many of these past members may not need a full sales presentation to be resold. Use personalized direct mail, SMS marketing and email marketing.
4. Use direct marketing to target all leads who have toured and not joined. Again, they may not need a full “face-to-face” sales presentation.
5. Use marketing automation systems to communicate with potential members. Marketing automation systems work with your customer relationship management system to send marketing emails to leads.
6. Rewrite your emails to answer all the fears, worries and concerns potential members have during a face-to-face.
