Segmenting Strategies for Success

Mark Miller, the COO of Merritt Clubs, shares segmenting strategies for success and how to deal with different membership groups in 2021.

In my last column, I talked about how as we continue through 2021 we’re likely dealing with three different membership groups: People who’ve fallen off the wagon, reluctant stragglers and the new marketplace. Here are some segmenting strategies for success and dealing with these distinct groups:

Have a strategy and action for each. Expect to fail and know it’s OK — that is where we learn and grow, and eventually, we will find the solution.
Get all teams involved.
Do not accept no for an answer — get rid of the excuse, let the egos go and learn.
Create new programs and avenues for them. Do not sell the sizzle, sell the outcomes: the mitigation of disease, the healthy lifestyle, the buildup of immunity, the safety measures we enforce and the connections.
Enroll them in something, give them that next step, cross market and promote each other.
Hire team members who have the energy and alignment to fit your culture and attract people to us.

It is a new, changing world, and an exciting opportunity for us to reimagine, reinvigorate and rebuild. The only way to discover our limits of what is possible today is for us to go beyond them into the impossible.

On the flip side, here are some ways we could lose people:

Fear, misinformation, not educated or not aware of what we have done.
Poor onboarding.
Service delivery error or friction that caused them angst.
Disengaged team members.
Another reason unknown because it’s a blind spot or maybe we did not care enough to really dig and ask.

The point is we must be willing to get entrenched in seeking answers, and adapt and adjust. The world of fitness is not the same, nor will it ever be.

While the world feels uncertain, there is a path forward. We will embrace the new consumer perspective, ride part of the digital wave in supporting our members, and we will invest in tomorrow by advancing our thinking and actions through a hybrid approach of services that are in-person and online.