Mike Warkentin (00:02):
Retention is a huge deal in gyms, but some retention tactics don’t do a thing and other ones are essential. We’re going to talk about exactly what the essential retention tactics are today and how you can get more clients to stay at your gym for longer. My name is Mike Warkentin. This is “Run a Profitable Gym.” I’m here with Two-Brain founder Chris Cooper. Welcome Chris. How are you doing?
Chris Cooper (00:20):
Awesome, Mike. Thank you.
Mike Warkentin (00:21):
I have fired up with this. Retention is a passion of mine because every client who stays is one less person I have to try and find at great expense and cost of time. So, I want to talk about things that do not matter for retention. There’s a whole list of stuff that we think matters, and it’s little pins and buttons and things like that. What does not matter? We’re going to get into the big stuff, but what’s some of the frivolous stuff we can just do away with right now?
Chris Cooper (00:45):
Bar hopping, like client social outings. Competitions don’t really make a difference for retention. Giving client milestone rewards—they might matter a little bit, but it’s really hard to track. And discounts, like discounts don’t affect client retention. So today we’re going to talk about the things that actually do move the needle, like the big important things that you have to do. And then if you want to do some of these other nice-to-haves, like, “Hey, my client is in the 100 Workout Club,” fantastic. But make sure that you’ve got these cornerstones in place first.
Mike Warkentin (01:17):
Yeah, I’ll give you an example of something that I—we renovated our gym. We had a number of contractors and people that were there. They all pitched in, and they helped us do some work very cheaply and donated labor. It was great. I put up a plaque saying these were the original builders of the gym and so forth. By about year three, all of them were gone. I thought that was a big retention deal, that plaque—it really wasn’t. It was a nice thank you. I probably could have just given them a card and a hug, and it probably would’ve done better. That stuff doesn’t matter. So, what really matters? Let’s get into the nuts and bolts, and we have data to back this up. What keeps clients longer?
Chris Cooper (01:48):
Well, the number one thing that you have to have and the foundation of everything is every client needs to have a clear goal, a plan and accountability. So, you need to know what their goal is. Their goal is not to do CrossFit. Their goal is not to do a bootcamp. Their goal is to use CrossFit or use bootcamp or use exercise or use your nutrition plan to achieve the goal that they care about: to fit back into their swimming suit, to get faster on the bike, to look like a bodybuilder, to touch their toes. They have a goal, and if you don’t know what that goal is, you’re already starting off on the wrong foot. The next thing is that they have to have a plan to get there. Now maybe their plan is to come in every day or three times a week and do our group workouts, and eventually you’re going to get there.
Chris Cooper (02:33):
But it’s even better if you say, “OK, for the next three months, our plan to get you to this goal is X, Y, Z. Your goal is to lose 10 pounds of body fat. You’ve already lost five. What we’re doing is working. Let’s keep that going.” Like that’s the plan, but you’ve had the conversation. The client needs to know that there is actually a plan in place and that somebody is overseeing their progress and making adjustments as necessary. And then the third is somebody has to hold them accountable to it. As coaches, a lot of the times we think that the most important thing we do is the programming or “What schedule should I do?” The most important thing that you do is get the client to the gym. And that’s the skill you have to develop. It’s not “How well can I correct interior rotation of the knee on the squat?” No. It’s like, “Am I quick to call this person if I haven’t seen them in three days?” That’s the skill of coaching that really makes a difference and gets client results and keeps them around for a long time. And we’re going to talk about client results and what’s important there in a moment. But the reality is if you don’t know a client’s goal and they don’t know the plan to get to that goal and nobody is holding them to that plan, they’re gone. Why would they pay a coach?
Mike Warkentin (03:47):
And the irony of that is that stuff is all completely outside the work that happens in the gym. And I thought for so long that my credentials and my skills at coaching and all this other stuff that I did was going to hold the clients. I forgot to ask them what their goals were, right? I didn’t have that structure built outside it to help them understand, “We have a goal, we have a plan, and I’m going to hold you to it and get you to it.” I didn’t do any of that. I just thought they wanted to come and do Fran with me. And that was a real struggle because I was focused on the wrong stuff, and that’s why we’re doing this show to help you guys understand what’s really, really important in retention. So, I’m going to drop a link for you guys.
Mike Warkentin (04:20):
It’s the prescriptive model. I’m going to put it in the show notes. And the thing that you’re going to take from there is that everything is listed right out, this entire model and how you can put in place at your gym. So, if you have questions about it, check that link out; it’ll be in the show notes. So, Chris, you mentioned something super interesting here. We’re talking about goals, but it’s not my goals for the client, which is like, “Oh, I want them to have a 400-pound deadlift and a one mile run or a four-minute mile run,” or whatever it is. What are we actually doing here to motivate clients? How does the goal review—how does that set up for client success?
Chris Cooper (04:51):
Well, number one, it’s a measuring stick. So, you know, it is interesting when you start a program like CrossFit—or you start any fitness program—you start to see results; you start to feel a little bit better. You start to look in the mirror when you walk by, right? And you just casually check out your arms in the donut shop window. But like the key is that at some point you’re going to say, “But am I going where I wanted to go?” So, what can happen, and this happened to me a lot before I figured it out, was especially with women—like women would come into the gym, and I would look at them, and I would immediately see so much potential for them. Like, “You’re going to be awesome,” and we’d start working out. They would get really good at something in my gym. It was usually the deadlift because we had a lot of powerlifters, and so suddenly we had like 15 women who could all deadlift 300 pounds or more.
Chris Cooper (05:39):
Incredible. I’m so proud of them. And they all kept quitting. And I’m, “But how can you quit? You’re so amazing now. You’re so awesome. You just ran your first 5K; you just deadlifted 300 pounds. We put you on Instagram.” “My bathing suit still doesn’t fit. In fact, it fits worse than it did six months ago when I started your gym.” And that’s—yeah, and I can remember actually the woman who was the most transparent about this, Tori. She’s like, “My husband says I don’t look any better.” Oh, immediately, I was like, “I’ve failed here,” because I didn’t know her goal, or I was putting my own goal for her ahead of the goal that she had for herself.
Mike Warkentin (06:18):
So, how do you motivate clients? Like how do you hold them? Like walk us through this process so that we don’t make the same mistake because I’ve done stuff like that.
Chris Cooper (06:25):
Yeah, well so, motivation is really a balance of success with desire to achieve the next outcome, right? Like everybody can say, “I want to lose 30 pounds,” but the reality is you motivate people to lose one pound at a time. So, the most motivated person is the person who has just lost one pound and has one pound left to go. So, what you want to do is start with, like, “Here is your big goal: 30 pounds lost.” You want to break that down into small achievable steps: “We’re going to take this three pounds at a time. OK? So, every time we lose three pounds, we’re going to celebrate.” Then you’re going to set up like the measurement points: “So, we’re going to measure you once a month. I would expect you to lose on average about three pounds a month, give or take a little bit. We’re going to do an InBody test to make sure that you’re losing fat.”
Chris Cooper (07:11):
“You’re going to feel a lot better, but the first thing that’s actually going to happen is that tomorrow you’re going to wake up, you’re going to be a little bit stiff, a little bit sore, you’re going to be hungry, and that one is the signal to you that your metabolism is working better than it was today.” So, what you’re doing is you’re telling people not just, “Here are the steps. I’m an expert who can get you there.” Not just, “I’ve done this a hundred times before,” but also, “Here are the signs when you’ll know it’s working,” because people do not recognize change in their own bodies. You know, I’m sure if you thought about it, and I said, “How much do you weigh today?” you’d be able to give me a guess within five pounds, but you couldn’t tell me if you were a pound heavier or lighter than yesterday. And that’s because we’re too close to the problem. We don’t know. We don’t see the progress ourselves. So, the key is that you have to know the client’s goal. You have to show them their results because they won’t automatically see results or recognize them as they’re happening. And you have to even forecast, “Here’s what’s going to happen. Here’s what you’re going to feel like.” And then they’ll say, “He was right. I do feel like that.”
Mike Warkentin (08:13):
It sounds like you’re doing a lot of client education.
Chris Cooper (08:16):
Oh my god, yeah. I mean our first motto at Catalyst was, “Teach our clients to know more than any other trainer in town.” So quite often we would say something like this—we’d have a group class, and we’re going to do deadlift to max, right? And they would be like, “Oh, why are we deadlifting?” And this was 2005, 2006. There wasn’t a lot of knowledge out there. Most women coming into our gym were still scared of getting bulky, and they didn’t want to lift weights. “Why are we lifting heavy weights? Oh my god.” “Here’s what’s going to happen. We’re going to deadlift. Everybody’s going to feel good. We’re going to high five. We’re going to write your name on that board. But I want to prepare you for what’s going to happen the rest of your day. You’re going to leave this gym feeling pretty good. An hour from now you’re going to be starving, and 90 minutes from now you’ll be willing to run through a wall to get food. This afternoon, one or two o’clock, you are going to want to nap. And what’s happening there is your nervous system is just resetting because it’s going to keep burning calories all day. Come back tomorrow and tell me if I lied.” The next day, they all come in, “Oh my god, Chris. Sixty minutes later I would’ve eaten a binder.” And now it’s like, “OK, yes, I’ve predicted what’s going to happen. They’re seeing that happen even though they didn’t know before how the max deadlift was helping them. Now they see it’s all part of the plan.”
Mike Warkentin (09:35):
And that’s really what it is when you’re talking about motivating clients, retaining clients—if they see the plan, they know the plan, they understand the plan and they see progress along the plan toward the goal, that’s going to keep a client a lot longer than a T-shirt for a hundred workouts. Right?
Chris Cooper (09:50):
Yeah. And there’s a lot of really great research on this that we’ve shared on the blog before, like Loewenstein’s gap theory where the closer a client is to a goal, the more irresistible that goal becomes. So, the best thing that you can do is give them the teeniest tiniest goals: “Let’s lose one pound,” you know. And, “Oh I lost a pound.” “Great, you’ve got momentum. Let’s lose one more pound.” “OK, well I can stick with this to lose one more pound,” or something that my coaches repeat often is, “You can do anything for 10 seconds.” And what that shows them is how close they actually are to achieving their goal, doing their plank holds or whatever that is.
Mike Warkentin (10:24):
Yeah. And if you’re a fitness coach, you might not have this perspective because fitness for you is very easy, like you see it right away. But put yourself in a different situation. For me it’s home repair stuff. I feel completely overwhelmed by large projects. I don’t know where to start. I don’t know what to do; I’m incompetent, but if an expert says to me, “Just pick up this hammer at the store. That’s your win for the day,” I’m like, “Got it. Yes, I’ve got a hammer.” “Next, I want you to cut 25 boards that are exactly six feet.” And you’re like, “OK, I can do that.” All of a sudden, these wins start adding up, and I’ve got a fence or whatever it is. But at the beginning I look at my backyard, I’m like, “I am screwed.” And that’s how your clients have to look at it. In the fitness world, you maybe can’t see that. I couldn’t see that as a coach. I couldn’t see how a client viewed losing 40 pounds or adding a hundred pounds to a deadlift. I couldn’t see the gap. You need to show them progress toward those goals. And if you do that, they’re going to stay motivated. That’s the principle, at least for me. But I couldn’t see that. Chris, have you had that experience with stuff in your life?
Chris Cooper (11:18):
Yeah, I mean we all fear what we don’t understand. If I have to change the battery in my four-wheeler, I’m like, “Oh, this is going to be a big thing.” And then if I put a YouTube video on, it’s like, “Step one, remove the bumper.” “Oh, I can do that. Yeah.” “Step two, look under here. Remove the negative or the positive terminal first.” “Oh, I could do that.” It’s like the more you break it down, the less scary the path becomes, and the clearer it is, the more you’re motivated to get it done.
Mike Warkentin (11:48):
And then you’ve got the person saying, “Chris, watch the rest of that video, and do the next step.” Right? Because it’s like you stop. That’s where the coaching comes in, and that’s where the accountability comes in. So again, guys: goal plan, accountability—those things can’t be separated. They are the three legs of the stool here when we’re talking about retention. So how about this? When you get to a certain level as a gym owner, you may be like, “I could do it to about 120 to 150 clients maybe.” But I could handle retention because I knew everyone’s name, I knew what they did, I knew what their dog’s names were, their partners. But once it started to get into that 120, 150 range, I started to lose track of stuff, and I didn’t know who people were. I didn’t know what was going on. Is it possible to delegate or outsource retention? And if so, how?
Chris Cooper (12:29):
Yeah, so, a lot of gyms in Two-Brain will start doing lead gen and eventually they’re getting more NSIs, intros, than the owner can handle. And so, they’ll have to hire and train a salesperson. Same is true with retention. You can’t just stop doing retention because you’re being successful, and your gym is growing. So, you have to hire what we would call a client success manager. And this is basically the person that’s in charge of retaining people. So, what this person is going to do is take all the systems that you’re using for retention, they’re going to look at the client journey—like a roadmap of what every client goes through—and they’re going to say, “OK, where is Amber on this client journey? Oh, she’s at the 15-day mark.” On the 15-day mark. I call her up and say, “How are you feeling?”
Chris Cooper (13:14):
“Are you still feeling stiff after every workout? How’s your energy level? Are you getting more sleep at night?” Like check in with them. That’s part of it. But you have to be very conscientious. Just like when you’re selling, it can’t be like, “Do you like gyms?” It has to be, “Hey, I’m looking at your client journey here.” So let me give you exactly what I say. Right now, my role in the gym is not retention, but quite often if somebody comes in through a referral, that referrer will have mentioned me: “I go to Chris’s gym,” so I want to be the one to check in. Now I don’t have time to call everybody. So, what I’ll do is I’ll just either call them or I’ll leave them a voice message, and I’ll say something like, “Hey Mike, I know you’ve been at the gym for three weeks now.”
Chris Cooper (14:02):
“That’s amazing. Thank you so much for joining the Catalyst family. We’re really proud to have you here. I know you’ve probably just finished your first on-ramp, and so I checked in with your coach Jessica, and Jessica says that you did a good job in on-ramp. You’ve got the basics down, and you’re comfortable joining a group, and that’s the direction you’re headed, which is awesome because I know I’m going to see you in the group. I can’t wait to meet you. I’m going to introduce myself. I’m going to look over Jessica’s shoulder for the first three months, make sure that you’re making progress and tracking toward the goal that you gave us at your intake, which is lose 10 pounds or whatever it is. And in the meantime, yeah, I’ll see you at the new group. If you ever need me, I’m right here, but I know you’re in great hands with Coach Felipe.” You know, and that’s my quick check-in. There’s a million little tactics like that you can do. But the bottom line is that as we get busy, we deprioritize those things, and this is why we start to have bad retention because we don’t scale our retention practices. We scale our marketing, we scale our sales, we get our coaches leveled up or whatever. We need to scale our retention too, and so when you reach a point where you can’t do that anymore, you need to hire somebody to do that for you. That’s the client success manager.
Mike Warkentin (15:13):
Yeah. So, the client success manager, CSM—what are some essential things that your CSM does? Like what are some of the things that really matter that have to be on that checklist?
Chris Cooper (15:22):
Well number one is if somebody’s missing, they are a blinking red dot. Like we haven’t seen this person in a week, somebody better be on the phone with them. And me, that’s the kind of thing that I forget. Like I’m not a high EQ person. If somebody’s missing, “Well they got some stuff to sort out. They’ll be back.” But you know, the CSM team at Two-Brain would be calling you. The CSM at the gym would be calling you. Jessica would wonder why you haven’t been there. So, she’s going to call you, “Oh your grandmother passed away? I’m so sorry to hear that,” and then she’d probably send you a card. You know, it’s like—so first is noticing when people aren’t there. That’s so massive. Next is being proactive and booking goal reviews. We want to make sure that everybody’s on a good goal review.
Chris Cooper (16:07):
So one thing that we’ll do is we would call it “retain by chat.” We’d send them a quick DM: “Hey Sally, how’s it going?” “Great.” “Yeah. Hey, how’s your fitness progress going?” You know, and then if it’s going great, “That’s so wonderful. I’m so proud of you,” and we move into, “Let’s tell your story.” If she’s like, “It’s going OK,” “Hey totally get it. It’s the summertime. Why don’t I book you in on a 10-minute meeting with Jessica just to review your progress and see if there’s anywhere we can speed it up?” And then if they’re like, “It’s not going well. I’m not making it into the gym,” great—red alert. “Hey, why don’t I book you in for a 15-minute meeting with Jessica, and we’ll take a look at your progress and see if there’s another way that we can turn the ship around and get you back on track.” You know, that’s retain by chat. It’s really, really easy. But if nobody is assigned that work, it just doesn’t get done, and you start losing clients that you don’t have to lose.
Mike Warkentin (17:02):
One of our gym owners that I had on the show, he got his client success manager to address his at-risk list. And that was like, he prioritized those people, and he cleaned a ton of people off that list. Instead of canceling, they all stayed, and he doesn’t have to market as hard; he’s not bleeding people out. He just went to the people who were missing and absent and got the client success manager to say, “Where are you?” and he retained a ton of them. It was a huge percentage, and he’s running a very, very strong gym in Denmark. So that’s a really cool one. Goal review sessions, you mentioned—that’s tied to the intake process. So, if your client success manager is involved in your intake process—you’ve got No Sweat Intros, you’ve got the consultation—they should be booking, in a best practice, that goal review session 90 days hence, as they’re leaving.
Mike Warkentin (17:45):
And you can get a client success manager to do that, right? So that it’s part of the client journey. You come in for your consultation, you sign up, “Here’s your on-ramp, your onboarding process. We do an InBody scan,” whatever it is, “and your first 90-day goal review session is going to be on September 24th,” or whatever the date is.” That’s all a huge part of the client journey. Chris, I’ve had so many gym owners come on the show and talk about client success managers, and I always ask them, “Is it a cost or an investment?” And they’re like, “Investment.” No one has been like, “Oh god, I regret hiring a client success manager. This is the worst decision you’ve ever made. My clients are bleeding out. I’m losing money. They’re so stupid.” They’re all like, “It’s a no-brainer, and these are the best gym owners in the world.” Do you look at that when you see—at your gym, is your client success manager well worth their weight in gold and then some?
Chris Cooper (18:28):
Yeah, I mean it’s a very leverageable role. So, you’re talking about somebody who doesn’t have a super technical skillset; they just have a lot of care, and you’re paying them less than you would pay them for personal training or whatever. It’s a different role. You could even hire a college kid who’s good at instant messaging to start. And so, in my case, it’s usually like $25 an hour. And if you look at, like, “What is the value of saving one client?”—well, if my ARM is 200 bucks, then I’m getting eight times return on that investment if she just saves one client, you know? And usually it’s not like, “What is the technical conversation I need to have to convince this client to come back?” No, it’s just like, “Oh, somebody cared enough to email me.” You know, I had this with this woman, she was an optometrist, she just retired, she’s like, “Now’s the time to take care of myself. I’m joining the gym. I’m signing up for the $400-a-month semi-private package.” I was like, “Hey, I haven’t seen you at this gym in like eight years. How long has it been?” Sent her a message. Boom. “Oh Chris, I was going to quit, but I really appreciate that check in. Somebody here is watching over me. I’m being taken care of. I’m good.” Like that’s the kind return on investment you get from a CSM.
Mike Warkentin (19:41):
Let’s bring this back, and we’re going to stay on the topic of delegating retention. Let’s bring it back to inside the gym. So, you talked about the goal, the plan, and the accountability and all that stuff. And the CSM is kind of your retention safety net when people have gone astray and you need to get them back and contact them and you get your absentee list and so on. Talk about the coach’s job to motivate and get results inside the gym. How does that relate to retention? How important is that stuff?
Chris Cooper (20:04):
Well, it’s super important. I mean, you have to have a good product. People will leave if your coaching sucks, right? But the reality is that most people that we talk to, their coaching is like a seven out 10 across the board—like their worst coach on staff is a B+. And their business is like a two out of 10. And so, we work on their business first because that is their top priority. But eventually there are things that your coaches can do. So, number one, your coaches should be doing goal reviews. They should know the client’s goals so that they can say, “Here’s how this workout is going to help you.” Even if they’re in a group class, they should be able to say, “Hey, if your goal is to lose weight, this workout will help because,” or hey, “If your goal is to get stronger, this workout will help because.” OK? We do this every single day at my gym.
Chris Cooper (20:49):
I post the workout; I give the clients a brief: If your goal is this, here’s how this will help. I tell the coaches, “Here’s how you run this workout.” Alright, so that’s the first thing. The second is client knowledge. So, you have to know who’s in your group. “Hey, I don’t have anybody here who said that they’re really interested in weight loss. OK, I don’t have to talk about that. I do have three people here who are worried about mobility, so I’m going to address that problem.” OK? And next is our clients seeing the success that they’re having: Are they recognizing that success as it happens? So, the coach should be like, “Hey Mike, was that a PR for you?” Hey Mike, I can’t recall you ever going this fast in that 400 meters. Was that the fastest you’ve ever run?” Like they have to recognize that because the client won’t always recognize it for themselves.
Chris Cooper (21:33):
And then after class, it’s celebrating that stuff. So, if my coach has one minute that they can spare during the one-hour class time, they are not going to waste that minute saying, “What was your favorite car in high school?” They’re going to spend that minute at the end of class saying, “Was that a record for you putting you up on the board and celebrating you?” That’s what counts for retention. And then finally, the last piece, which is a surprise to a lot of people is referrals. So, when somebody signs up, we tell them, “Hey, 90 days from now, you and I are going to get together and we’re going to measure your progress, and if this is working really well for you and you’re really happy, I’m going to ask you for a referral. The reason I’m going to do that is because we want more people just like you in this gym instead of doing a lot of advertising.”
Chris Cooper (22:21):
“Fair enough?” They say, “Yes.” Now they’re expecting a referral. They’re coming to that goal review knowing that I’m going to ask for a referral, and they’re not defensive about it. So, they come in, it’s their first goal review, and you’re like, “Hey, you’re down three pounds. I’m so proud of you, congratulations.” Maybe I’m going to ask them to tell their story. And then I’m going to say, “OK, now are you comfortable referring me to a specific person who’s special in your life?” or “Is there anybody in your life who you think would really benefit from the same service that you are receiving right now?” Half the time they’ll give me a name: “Yeah, my husband Mike.” The other half the time they’re going to be like, “I can’t think of anybody.” And you’ll say, “That’s OK. Are you comfortable writing a five-star review for my gym?” So, if somebody is really thrilled, they will become an evangelist.
Chris Cooper (23:11):
They’ll give you a name, a referral. If somebody is pretty happy, but not over the moon yet, that’s OK, they will be. But they’re going to start by giving you a review. And what happens is really interesting. So, people who refer their friends or even give you a review stay at your gym longer because now they have publicly asserted that you are good, and they are getting results. And when people say things out loud, they become married to those things that they say, and they entrench even more. So, if somebody brings their spouse in, they stay longer than they would’ve on their own.
Mike Warkentin (23:45):
I wouldn’t have thought that. Honestly, referrals doesn’t seem like a retention thing to me, but when you lay it out like that, it makes sense. I have now stated publicly that I love this place; I must stay.
Chris Cooper (23:53):
I’m sure you’ve been at Christmas dinner with a drunk uncle who’s made some ridiculous claim.
Mike Warkentin (23:58):
“I invented the question mark!”
Chris Cooper (24:00):
Yeah, exactly. And then the more you press them on it, the more they entrench: “Yeah, no, I invented the question mark.” And they’re going to fight you for it, right? When you tell somebody, “This gym is amazing,” and then they come to the gym with you, and you’re like, “What did you think? Was it awesome?” and they say, “It is OK,” you’re going to talk them into thinking it’s amazing because you’re invested in that now. You’ve made that in your position, so that’s why referrals really help with retention too.
Mike Warkentin (24:27):
It’s super interesting, and that’s one you might have not have thought of guys out there, but think about if you can set people up for referrals and do this as part of your client journey—“I’m going to ask you for a referral in 90 days.” In 90 days, “You’re super happy. Let’s do that referral”—that’s going to keep that person around longer. You will probably get a plus one out of that client. That person is going to stay on longer as a result of this link to your current client, and then that person who joins gets a 90 day, “Hey, referral”—that check-in happens too. And all of a sudden, you’ve got this daisy chain of marketing that costs about $0. Like that’s the best part about this is that you are getting clients very easily through referrals. They’re high-value, like warm leads, easy closes. You’re not spending a ton of time marketing, and they’re staying a long time. Like it’s kind of a win all over the place, hey Chris?
Chris Cooper (25:12):
Yeah, man, like honestly, 2018, Mike, I stepped out of my gym, handed it over to a GM. We did no marketing until 2020—almost exactly five years, like 2023, I stepped back in. The gym kept growing because of this referral cycle and amazing retention, and that’s it. There was no other marketing. This to me is the underlying foundation of all of your other marketing because if you bring somebody in through a Facebook ad, and then they turn into two people or four people through referrals, the value of that Facebook ad has just quadrupled. If you bring in somebody from Instagram, same thing, and then you get a referral, like the value of your Instagram work has doubled, quadrupled. Like it multiplies every other marketing challenge you have.
Mike Warkentin (25:59):
Yeah. And we’ve talked about how you can make $100,000 a year as a gym owner with just 150 clients. I’ll make it even simpler. If you get 75 clients and you can get 75 friends and spouses, how much easier is that? Right? So, like this stuff and then everybody who travels in packs, they generally have the money. So, like you said earlier, if you’ve got an accountant client and he is making $120,000 a year, his accountant friend is probably making $120,000 a year. He probably lives in the same, more or less, area in the same city. He’s already heard of you. The referral thing is such a huge play. And then it creates—all of a sudden you have this web between all these different members of this pack, and they all want to stay at your gym.
Mike Warkentin (26:36):
And for us it was firefighters at one point. We had a really good group of them. You said nurses and accountants were a big one for you. Right, and so, this retention web is just—it’s incredible, and you start holding onto high-value clients for years. And then not only are you building your gym, you’re changing their lives. And there’s a little bit of both because you want to build a great business and make a living, but you also do want to improve health. You can’t do that if people are bleeding out constantly, right? Like that’s one of the things that you’ve passionately talked about, Chris, is if people are leaving all the time, you’re failing as a gym owner, or you’re not helping anyone.
Chris Cooper (27:06):
Yeah. If the average retention rate of a client coming into a group coaching gym—F45 CrossFit, Orangetheory—their length of engagement is just under eight months, that sucks for the business, but it really sucks for the client because you are not changing their life in eight months. That’s not enough for them to develop long-term habits. If somebody comes to your gym and they stay for two years and then they leave, like, OK, they’re probably not quitting fitness. Maybe they found something else, so they’re going to another gym, but you’ve changed their life, and they’re going to keep pursuing that for the rest of their life. But if you’re letting people go after seven months on average, and I’m not talking about like—I know you’ve got a dozen clients who’ve been with you for five years; that’s cool. I’m talking about the person who starts today. Are they likely to stick around for five years and be a unicorn, or are they likely to be gone by January? And yeah, you have to know that you’re keeping them long enough to change their life.
Mike Warkentin (28:05):
Check the prescriptive model link in the show notes; that’s going to be a really important thing for you guys to check out. And Chris stated earlier the thing that really matters: goal, plan and accountability to that plan. If you can get that stuff in place, you are going to change lives, and your business will be successful. Chris, where can gym owners continue this conversation if they want to chat more?
Chris Cooper (28:25):
If they want to do it for free, it’s gymownersunited.com, which is our free public Facebook group for gym owners around the world. There’s 9,400 of us in there right now. It’s always very positive, upbeat and supportive. And if you want to go there, we can continue this conversation on Facebook.
Mike Warkentin (28:41):
And if you want to go further faster, I’d encourage you to book a call. That link is in the show notes. You can talk to someone who will tell you exactly how a mentor can help you improve retention and all the other key metrics at your gym. This is “Run a Profitable Gym.” Chris Cooper was here. I’m Mike Warkentin, and please hit “subscribe” on your way out so you don’t miss an episode.
