Get New Customers Without Spending

This week’s blog post comes from a guest blogger and Personal Trainer Tyler Spraul! I love it because I am a big fan of not spending your hard earned dollars on marketing. And, below he not only gives you 4 tips on what to do he also gives you actions to take to make it work! Cannot wait to hear how these work for you. Take it away Tyler!

In this article, I’m going to show you some simple ways to get new customers without having to pay for advertising.

It’s all too common for a fitness business owner to take one chance at getting someone to sign up, and then never try again. It’s like we don’t want to offend people or come off as “salesy,” but the truth is that we are doing potential clients a disservice if what we have to offer will truly make their lives better!

It’s easy to dig into the things you enjoy the most about your business, like learning how to be a better coach and connect with clients, or continuing education to expand your toolset, or spending that quality hands-on time with your clients. But sometimes this fun stuff comes at the expense of the not-so-exciting portions of your business, like building efficient systems, implementing processes that are easy for new hires to follow, spreading the word about your business through marketing, and more.  

When it comes time to grow and scale your business, it’s the not-so-exciting things that make or break your chances of success, so you can’t afford to ignore them.

Tips to Grow Your Pilates Business

Call them habits or systems — whatever you’d like — implementing just one of the following tactics on a regular basis will help grow your business consistently over time.

1. Find something to give away before you ask for anything from potential customers.

People love free stuff! Offer something your ideal customer can’t resist before they have to give you anything. To keep this simple, you can offer a “free sample” type of session on a regular basis.

This session would provide a low barrier of entry for potential customers to meet you and see what you have to offer.

It also provides an easy way for your current clients to invite their friends. They don’t have to think about selling their friends on your service but can simply invite them to give it a test run themselves, totally obligation-free.

ACTION STEP:

Offer a FREE sample class or two every week on a day that fits your schedule. To keep it really simple, you can start with once a month.

2. Make it easy for existing clients to promote you.

What if your favorite clients went out of their way to hunt down more potential clients for you? What if they were excited to do it? This can be a huge win if you have never gone out of your way to ask for referrals.

You may even want to go as far as incentivizing those referrals.

ACTION STEP:

Part 1: Make sure clients know the best way to refer their friends to you.

Do they just need to give you the correct contact information so you can reach out?

If not, where should they send potential referrals?

• To your email or mailing list?
• To your website?
• To your once-a-week class that’s 100% free?

Wherever it is, make sure that you communicate it clearly and it’s as simple as possible for your clients!

Part 2 (optional): Figure out a sustainable way to reward your clients who refer customers.

You can position it as a fun monthly contest or challenge to see who can refer the most new customers.

You can then offer prizes and rewards to your top referrers. You can announce your winners each month or once per year.

If you just want to keep it super simple, that’s no problem. You can offer a discounted month or class voucher for each new customer a current member refers.

3. Make the most of your existing lists with a regular “ask.”

Your lists can be any social media channel, email newsletter, physical mailing list, etc.

Wherever you’re providing value through your content, you need to be consistent with your “ask.”

You must have a clear call to action (CTA) that prompts your ideal customer to get out of his or her routine and come do business with you.

Before we get too carried away, we don’t want to make the mistake of using these tools to only sell all the time.

80% of your content should be helpful material to enhance your customers’ lives. Then once you’ve provided value consistently, you can point them to your specific calls to action.

Example: If you post 5 days a week on Instagram, one of those posts should be a CTA, while the others should be adding value, sharing client successes, etc.

What makes a good call to action? I was hoping you’d ask!

A good CTA:

• Only asks for one clear action. Don’t ask for a comment, and a share, and a like, and a text message to friends and loved ones.
• Provides the exact steps needed to take action. “Enter your email below.” “Call us at xxx-xxx-xxxx to book your appointment.” “Click this link to book your spot in our FREE Saturday session: [LINK]”
• Gives a reason to take action now instead of later. “Our first 3 reservations each month receive a free water bottle.” “Book today, and we’ll include a free session voucher.” Don’t abuse this one, though. If you have a deadline, stick to it, and don’t make up pretend deadlines for the sake of having one.

ACTION STEP:

Brainstorm 5-10 CTAs you can plug into regularly scheduled programming for social media, emails, etc. Make sure each one checks all the boxes for the requirements above.

4. Follow up, follow up, follow up!

Now that you’re giving value before asking for anything, incentivizing referrals, and moving people to take action with clear CTAs, it’s time to create a regular follow-up system.

How many times have you had a hot prospect get cold feet and duck out of a commitment, only to never see them again? You know your service would increase their quality of life, but it just didn’t work out the first time.

Do you say, “Oh well!” and give up all hope of getting them signed up?

No way!

Your follow-up system will help you make the most of the people who already know about your business and have expressed an interest, but aren’t currently paying members.

ACTION STEP:

We are going to separate these follow-ups into 2 categories:

For leads who expressed interest recently

To follow up: Call them within 2 days of their most recent contact.

If you don’t hear from them within a week, try again. For the first month, follow up once per week.

Once they’re on your “1 Month+” list, give them a call once per month until they sign up or request that you stop calling.

Previous customers and any others you haven’t heard from in a long time

Determine the best way for you to make a personal follow-up with these people who already know about you but haven’t gotten on board just yet.

Keep it simple! It can be as easy as a Facebook message, but the key is to keep it personal. Check in with them, let them know you’ve been thinking about them, and ask how they’re doing.

We don’t want to just copy and paste a sales message with a link here — that’s not what I’m saying at all.

Whether it’s a phone call, handwritten note or postcard, or even just a Facebook message, following up while staying polite and persistent will keep you on the radar and let your potential clients know you care.

So, now that we’ve gotten through the list of these action ideas and examples, it’s time for a call to action of your own!

Pick one of these ideas right now (start small), and set aside 1 hour to work on it this week. Make sure to block off the time on your calendar!

Leave a comment below with the action you have planned. I’ll read everyone!

-Tyler

Big thanks to Tyler for sharing these tips and actions you can take! I second Tyler leave a comment below telling us what action you will take this week.

xx~LL