If you want to take your pilates business to the next level, creating awareness about your new studio and bringing in new customers are going to be on top of your to-do list. Simply put, you will need to come up with a marketing strategy to promote your studio.
Our in-house experts have put together this comprehensive guide to help you with your pilates club promotions.
Pro tips for creating a plan for pilates studio promotions
- Tackle the awareness problem
- Create a client persona
- Pay attention to branding
- Host special events
- Create a referral program for existing customers
- Leverage social media
- Collect reviews and testimonials
- Create a complete experience
Let’s now dive into some of the most effective pilates marketing ideas.
Tackle the awareness problem
Pilates may get a lot of mentions in the mainstream media, thanks to the slew of celebrities who practice it, but how many people actually understand the benefits of pilates as a form of fitness?
Building awareness about pilates should form the base of your studio promotions strategy. The more people learn about pilates from you, the more they’re likely to recall your brand whenever they think about it. Here are some tips on how you could build awareness about pilates.
Local fitness events are a great place to start. Leverage these events to not just build your network, but to build awareness about pilates. Demonstrations and distributing booklets are effective ways to spread the word at events.
In fact, if budgets are not a constraint, these events are a great opportunity to distribute some free branded swag, such as custom wristbands, stickers and pins. That way, everytime someone looks at the merch, they’re reminded of pilates and your studio.
Content in various forms will go a long way in building awareness. This content could be in the form of blog posts, newsletters or even videos on Instagram, Facebook and TikTok.
Create a client persona
One of the primary factors that you will need to define before you even start building pilates marketing ideas is defining who your target audience is. Knowing this will help you streamline your marketing process and make it more efficient.
Pilates by itself has many applications. It helps with postpartum recovery. It helps athletes recover from injuries more effectively. It helps people of all age groups stay healthy. Who do you want to offer your services to?
Keep in mind that you cannot offer your services to everyone. Your success will largely depend on defining a niche for yourself. Tools like Hubspot’s makemypersona.com could help you clearly define your ideal customer.
Pay attention to branding
Branding is an integral part of marketing your pilates studio and creating a recall value. Here are some of the most important aspects of brand creation that you will need to pay attention to.
- Logo creation
Your brand’s logo is symbolic of what your pilates studio stands for. Think about all your favorite brands, and you’ll see how easily you can associate their logos with their brands.
Creating a logo uses tools like Wix Logo Maker, Adobe Illustrator and Canva. Ideally, you’d need to hire a professional graphic designer who can understand your vision and translate that into a logo.
- Typography
The fonts you choose to use ought to be consistent over everything that carries your brand, from your business website and letterheads to all other marketing collaterals.
It’s advisable to choose two fonts that complement each other. Use one font for all headings and the other for body text.
- Colors
A lot of people do not understand the importance of choosing colors that resonate with brand values. Each color signifies a different emotion.
For example, red could signify love and courage, but also rage and war. Yellow is a happy color, usually related to joy, hope and positivity.
Delve a little into the psychology of colors before choosing two primary colors to represent your brand. What do you want your pilates studio to represent? Do you want it to be a high energy brand? Do you want it to be a brand associated with calmness and peace?
These colors are not just going to be on your branding, but they ought to be a part of your interior design and decor as well. A common industry practice is to also choose a third complementary color that can be used for backsplashes and accents.
Host special events
Utilize your studio as a marketing tool for your pilates studio. Your studio is the perfect venue for you to host fitness events. Your guest list should include other local fitness businesses and the local community at large.
Events like these are the perfect opportunity for you to include 15-20 minute trial sessions, where people who are new to pilates get an opportunity to try it for the first time.
If you want to increase the reach of these events, you could host them in partnership with another local fitness business, like a yoga studio. This creates great cross-marketing opportunities for both businesses.
Another great way to leverage events is to participate in charity drives. Host special pilates courses with the proceeds going towards your favorite local charity. Not only will you be giving back to the community, your studio is also sure to get noticed in the process.
Create referral programs for existing customers
Your existing customers can be your best brand ambassadors, just as long as you make it worth their while. In addition to ensuring they have consistently great experiences with your pilates studio, create a referral program to reward them for bringing in new customers.
Here’s a great in-house example of a successful referral program. One of our customers, Booster Transform, ran a referral rewards program in which they offered their customers a free month’s subscription for every new customer they brought in.
As a result, they saw an increase in revenue by around $51,000. Of course, Bookee’s easy booking process and back end automations made it even easier for them to run this program.
Leverage social media
Considering the vast amount of time people spend on social media, a strong social media presence is necessary for all businesses. Instagram, Facebook, Youtube and Tiktok are the top 4 social media platforms to promote any fitness activity.
Here are some pro tips on how you can leverage social media to help with pilates promotions.
- Make it a point to post consistently. It is only by posting high quality content consistently that you can build a following on social media.
- Do not limit your posts to only your pilates studio’s social media handles. Post regularly on local fitness groups as well.
When you post and actively participate in discussions on these local fitness groups and pages, people will begin to recognize you as a pilates expert and your studio as the go-to place for all things pilates.
- Remember that your pilates studio is an extension of yourself. Create a brand around yourself as a pilates professional, and cross promote your studio from your personal accounts as well.
- Video content is 12 times more engaging than pictures and words put together. Considering the physical nature of pilates, you should have no problem creating relevant content to post on Instagram, Facebook and TikTok.
Longer videos are best suited for YouTube. The ideal strategy would be to create shorter clips for Instagram stories, Facebook reels and TikTok, making sure to link these to longer videos on your YouTube channel.
- Video content topics could vary from demonstrations and routines to dietary tips. Be sure to add a soundtrack that matches the vibe of whatever you’re showcasing.
- Promoting content on these social media channels ought to be a healthy mix of paid and organic promotions.
Collect testimonials and reviews
A 2021 study showed that 99.9% of all online shoppers read reviews before buying anything. This makes it imperative that you get your existing pilates studio members to write testimonials and reviews about their experiences with your studio as well.
Remember that a few of these reviews may express less than flattering points of view. Look at these as an opportunity to address the issues and improve your service standards, rather than hushing up or hiding those reviews.
Create a complete experience
Pay attention to details to ensure your existing pilates studio members as well as prospective customers have a complete and consistent experience, whether it is online or offline.
This means making sure there is consistency when it comes to the branding they see, the language and tone used while communicating with them and the level of customer service they receive, irrespective of the type of transaction or the platform.
Start your pilates studio’s growth journey with Bookee
When you sign up with Bookee, your pilates studio is assured the perfect growth partner. Here are some of the reasons why Bookee ought to be your only choice for a studio management software.
- Our team will build you an easy to navigate and intuitive yet highly professional branded website. We’ll also build you a branded smartphone app. The underlying theme will remain the same across both platforms, giving your members easy access to their relationships with your brand and consistent experiences on multiple platforms.
- Your social media campaigns will be easy to handle from a single dashboard with Bookee.
- Trial classes, discounts and referral programs are easily manageable using Bookee,
- You get access to our world class customer service, ensuring that even though our software is easy to set up and use, you are never left without assistance when you need it.
Book a free demo with our experts today, and experience first hand why Bookee is at the forefront of technologies used to manage fitness businesses.
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