How to Create a Compelling Holiday Offer

The holiday season is upon us. Before you know it, it will be Thanksgiving, then Black Friday, then Cyber Monday, and Christmas. During the holiday season, we often see a lull in gym attendance. A great fitness business will respond to the lull with a compelling holiday offer. It’s a great idea to formulate a holiday offer to motivate your members to maintain or start a new fitness routine this holiday season. There are 3 simple steps to creating the most compelling holiday offer: research, build, and promote. Follow the details of these 3 steps to set your fitness business up for success this holiday season

Step 1: Research Your Business Landscape

• Research Your Membership: How do you figure out what your members need this holiday season? Ask them! Send out a survey, talk with your members, and ask your staff what your members need most from your business. Feel free to look into past campaigns too. Have you had a successful holiday promotion in the past? Recreate it this year, or do a spin on any of your successful year-round campaigns.
• Research Your Business: Look into the fitness business as a whole. Take notes on what messages fitness customers best respond to during the holiday season. Be sure to include your competition in your business research too! If another local gym runs a successful holiday offer, there is absolutely nothing wrong with using their offer as inspiration for yours. Again, take notes on the successes you see around you.
• Formulate Insights: Now that you have researched your membership and the industry as a whole, use these notes to find successful trends. Remember that the best holiday offer you can formulate will take into account your member's needs and industry trends during the holiday season.

Step 2: Build Your Offer

• Discount Offers: During the holiday season, we all have presents to buy, trips to plan, and family to host. The holiday season costs a lot of money, so the one thing your members will always be thankful for is an offer with a discount. The good news is that a 30-39% discount is perfect for peaking your membership interest. Discounts in this range actually peak more interest from consumers compared to larger offers in the 70-80% range. Don’t sell yourself short. You don’t need massive discounts to get attention, just something small to peak interest.
• Message Clarity: Make sure your message is clear. Your members should quickly and easily understand what your offer is. It also helps to keep your offer brief and leave less room for confusion.
• Call to Action: In the fitness industry, we spend a lot of time and energy trying to motivate our clients. So, adding a motivating call to action is nothing new. Add a sense of urgency in your call to action to motivate your members to act sooner. Expiration dates are great motivators and can help build a more compelling holiday offer.
• Low Commitment: While we all would love to have our current and new clients commit to a 6-month program, it’s not always realistic. When you are building your compelling holiday offer, try not to put too much pressure for a long-term commitment. A great way to alleviate commitment pressure is to have a money back guarantee. With this added bonus, you can create a sense of urgency without a long-term commitment.

Step 3: Promote Your Offer:

• Blog: An easy way to promote your holiday offer is to incorporate it into your blog. We do it, and it works because you’re reading it right now. If your offer is for a kettlebell class, you could write a blog on the benefits of kettlebell training and include the offer as extra incentive.
• Email: Start campaigning now with your email list to see what works. Track how successful the campaign was, adjust it, and try again. You can do a couple rounds of this before releasing your official holiday offer to see what works best. When you are writing your initial email, be sure that the clear and concise message is visible within 3-5 seconds of opening the email. Most readers will not dig to find the offer, so easy visibility is important.
• Social Media: Social media can be a great way to compliment your offer and get the word out. Be sure to post about your holiday offer. Create stories and encourage engagement from your followers as this will help your promotion and overall social media advertising success.
• Flyers: It is important to reward the members that continue to show up during the busy holiday season. Show your appreciation to these members by posting flyers throughout the studio and offering in-person rewards. An easy way to do this is to embed a discount QR code into the posted flyers.
• Word of Mouth: Word of mouth can be a difficult way to track the promotion of your offer. While you may not be able to influence how many people talk about your compelling holiday offer, you can have staff include the offer in announcements before and after group classes. Encourage your front desk and membership personnel to incorporate the holiday offer into their daily conversations with members and prospective clients.

That’s it! 3 simple steps to holiday success. Research, build, and promote your holiday offer this year to avoid the holiday lull. By following these 3 simple steps, you will be able to create the most compelling offer for your clientele this holiday season.

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