By Brian Alexander, Two-Brain Mentor Retention strategies centered around automation and innovation. When it comes to “retention”, there is no silver bullet. Every gym is different, every market is different and sometimes it seems like we as affiliate owners are just unlucky because people cancel, move, quit etc. It happens to all of us. Control what you can control and don’t worry too much about the rest. When I say, “Control what you can control” I am talking about systems, and more specifically retention systems. A brief history of Illumine: We opened our 1,700 sq.-ft. gym in May of 2013 with zero members, just like the rest of you. From the beginning we implemented a group on-ramp program that caught like wildfire and we began to grow rapidly. I had a full time career in B2B IT Solutions (Sales) and decided to turn my passion into a business. Like many of you, we opened our doors and just let things happen. Essentially we “Winged it,” and it worked. But then this thing kept growing, and within 7 months of opening I moved to a 17,000 sq.-ft. location. We grew so fast that we didn’t have time to create systems, implement systems, etc. We were just rolling with the punches.It wasn’t until December of 2014 that I tried implementing “Goal Setting” for my members as part of my retention strategy. I used the standard “Google Docs Spreadsheet,” ran a report in Wodify, created enormous hype around our new “Goal Setting” process and sent forms out for our athletes to fill out. Some bought in right away and filled the forms out, most didn’t take the time to and others never knew an email was sent. Right from the start the system was flawed. For those who took advantage of the new “Goal Setting” process, they happily filled out the forms and I entered it into the spreadsheet, wrote it on a “Goals Board” ...
Read More →
