Creating a professional gym marketing plan is essential for generating revenue. Every health club, fitness centre, and boutique studio needs a strategy for attracting gym members (and keeping them loyal). So, we’ve put together this guide on preparing a marketing plan for your fitness business.
In this article – learn how to write your own gym marketing plan from scratch, with examples and templates to follow (including a PDF download).
We’re a specialist fitness marketing agency with 15+ years of industry experience, so we know first-hand what works (and what doesn’t!). We’ve helped gyms, fitness studios, and personal trainers to successfully promote their businesses, so our digital marketing strategies are tried and tested.
Writing a marketing plan is one of the first things we do with our gym clients, so we’ve created loads over the years. Having tested different structures and formats, we’ve found that a simple 5-part plan is the most effective approach. This is because it allows you to capture the most important elements of your gym marketing strategy on a single page.
A gym marketing plan should include your objectives, strategies, tactics, and how you’ll measure the results. We also recommend including your overarching business goal at the top of it to ensure that all your marketing efforts align with it. So your 5-part marketing plan should cover…
Here’s an example gym marketing plan template that shows you how to structure these elements…
While a one-page marketing plan might sound overly simplistic, it’s actually one of the things that makes it so effective. You can print it on a single piece of paper and stick it next to your computer or pin it to your noticeboard. Being able to refer to it at a glance will help you stay focused on the core marketing activities in your strategy.
Whether you’re writing a marketing plan for a fitness center, health club, or boutique studio, it should contain the same five sections. The content and details will differ depending on the type of business, but the structure remains the same.
Let’s look at what each of the five sections of your marketing plan needs to include…
Most gym businesses will have an overall goal related to revenue and/or profit. But if you’re a social enterprise or non-profit, then your over-arching goal may be around the number of people who benefit from your services. The goal is usually defined by senior management, so plug it into the top section.
Example: Increase revenue 10% by the end of the financial year.
In our experience, including the business goal at the top of your plan ensures that your marketing efforts support it. It’s easy to get excited by a creative marketing idea and lose sight of whether it’ll directly contribute to your results. But having the business goal front and center helps keep your marketing activities aligned with it.
A step-by-step guide to creating your strategic marketing plan with template & done-for-you examples.
The key to any successful fitness marketing strategy is having clear objectives. So identify 1-3 marketing objectives that will help achieve the overall business goal.
For example, if you want to increase gym revenue then you could look at…
Examples of marketing objectives for a gym could include attracting 20 new members per month or increasing retention to 80%.
Learn which fitness marketing strategies produce the best results (so you can focus on what actually works).
Strategies outline what you’ll do to achieve these objectives. If you want to increase the number of clients you have, then you could…
Think high-level here, so things like audience targeting, brand positioning, or increasing leads and conversions.
Marketing strategies for gyms often involve increasing the number of membership leads or boosting tour conversions so that more people sign up. Health and wellness marketing strategies also need to address credibility, since many people are distrustful of fitness fads and diets.
Fitness Marketing & Lead Generation Roadmap
Your All-in-One Toolkit to Attract, Engage & Convert More Clients
The tactics section is about how you’ll execute your strategies. This is the most detailed part, where you cover the entire marketing mix for gym studios (product, place, promotion, and price).
What channels will you use to communicate with your target audience? Will you produce promotional materials, digital assets, or create experiences through hosting events? Here are some of the most effective marketing tactics for gyms and fitness centers…
Define deliverables (such as ebooks, brochures, adverts, etc) and communication methods (social media, email, advertising platforms, etc) in your plan. If there are marketing channels that are trending, like specific types of videos or social content, then include them here.
For more marketing ideas and promotional tactics, download our free ebook…
Learn which fitness marketing strategies produce the best results (so you can focus on what actually works).
Lastly, you’ll need to define how each marketing activity will be measured. This is all about tracking results and identifying areas for improvement.
How will you know whether your gym or fitness club’s marketing efforts have been successful? Where can you improve? How will you decide if it’s worth repeating?
Make sure your measurements link back to your objectives. Although clicks, reach, and attendee numbers are interesting, they may not always be the best indicators to measure.
For example, if your goal is to generate new leads, then the measure of success should be around how many people’s contact info you captured, and ultimately, the number of leads produced!
So, now you know exactly how to create an effective gym marketing plan. Including the five elements above will ensure your marketing contributes to your business goals and actually gets you results.
To help you get started, we’ve put together a gym marketing plan PDF template that you can download to save time. It includes sample plans for gym studios, fitness centres, and health clubs. Plus examples for personal trainers, health bloggers, and fitness equipment manufacturers too.
A step-by-step guide to creating your strategic marketing plan with template & done-for-you examples.
You can access it as part of our Fitness Marketing Kit which includes a step-by-step and the same templates we use with our agency clients.
Writing a marketing plan for a gym doesn’t need to be complicated or daunting. By following the approach we’ve laid out here, you can create an effective strategy in no time! From there, it’s about creating a fitness content plan and executing it!
Your All-in-One Toolkit to Attract, Engage, and Convert More Clients – Tailored Specifically for Fitness Businesses Like Yours!
The Fitness Marketing & Lead Generation Roadmap is a comprehensive resource designed for gyms, personal trainers, and online fitness businesses. It’s packed with video workshops, marketing templates, step-by-step guides, cheat sheets, and more. We cover:
Fitness Marketing & Lead Generation Roadmap
Your All-in-One Toolkit to Attract, Engage & Convert More Clients
[P.S. Want to outsource your gym marketing planning? We also offer strategic planning services – use our contact form to request more details.]
