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15+ Gym Marketing Ideas to Grow Membership in 2024

Gym marketing attracts new clients and engages current members, empowering you to maximize revenue for your business.

Gym Owners & Fitness Professionals
10 min readDecember 11th, 2023
MKWritten By Michelle King

The fitness industry is expected to grow 171.75% by 2028. While this exponential growth provides ample opportunities to expand your business, it also presents plenty of competition. Building brand awareness and highlighting your business's differentiators is essential to stand out from other gyms. An effective marketing strategy helps improve your gym's visibility and creatively communicates what makes your business unique.

Ready to level up your marketing efforts? Check out our top gym marketing ideas below.

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Gym Marketing Ideas to Attract New Members

According to Lisa Donohue, CMO of BODY20, gyms should constantly strive to attract new clients.

"While any studio will always have members that joined from day one, there’s always an ebb and flow of members, and it’s critical for long-term success to introduce and sign up new members. New members also bring energy into the studio and often will fill class times that have been less popular in the past," said Donohue.

Implement the following marketing strategies to keep a steady stream of fresh clientele visiting your gym.

Offer Free Trial Sessions

Offering new members a free trial period helps alleviate hesitancy they may have about purchasing a membership. Allowing potential customers to check out your facilities and squeeze in a few workouts gives them a chance to experience your gym's culture for themselves. This risk-free introduction addresses concerns, creates a positive impression, and helps remove barriers that may prevent them from committing to a paid membership.

Implement a Referral Program

Your current members are your most powerful marketing resource. Research shows that 92% of people trust referrals from family and friends over other forms of advertising. By implementing a referral program, you can tap into your current members' network of new potential clients and harness the power of personal recommendations.

Rebecca Hass, Owner of BODY20 Hinsdale, uses a referral strategy to help her studio increase membership sales.

"Throughout the month of November, we are running a promotion that if you refer a friend and they do a demo between 1 pm and 3:30 pm Monday through Thursday (our slowest times), we will give the member a free session. So far this month, we have seen an increase of 33% in membership sales, and six of our eight sales in the first ten days were from this referral program."

Offer Flexible Membership Plans

To attract more members, you need to create membership options that accommodate your clients’ preferences, needs, and budgets. Offering a tiered system with different access levels, pricing plans, and additional amenities allows potential clients to choose a membership that aligns with their goals and financial constraints. This customer-centric pricing approach accommodates a larger variety of clients, which may help increase gym membership sales.

Utilizing Social Media for Gym Marketing

With an estimated 4.9 billion global social media users, establishing a presence on key platforms like Instagram and Facebook is essential for a successful marketing strategy. Staying active on social media can boost brand awareness, expand your reach, and help promote your facilities and services.

Establish a Presence on Multiple Social Media Platforms

Your target audience isn’t solely on one social media channel, so your gym shouldn’t be either. Today, the average millennial or Gen Z user engages with over eight platforms. Creating a marketing strategy with multiple social media channels aligns with user behavior and gives your target audience more opportunities to interact with your brand.

Utilize Short-Form Videos

Who hasn’t been sucked into the mesmerizing world of Instagram reels and TikTok? As our attention spans shorten, users find bite-sized videos 2.5x more engaging than long-form content. Gym owners can tap into the power of short-form videos by creating content that lasts less than 60 seconds. Consider creating short videos that explain a fitness term, share fitness tips, show off your gym’s amenities, or show people how to do an exercise.

Incorporate User-Generated Content

User-generated content (UGC) is content about a brand created by customers. Examples of UGC for gyms include member testimonials, workout videos at your facility, and gym selfies. Including this content in your social media strategy builds trust and credibility by highlighting authentic member experiences. You might consider having a “selfie” area in your gym, prominently displaying your gym’s hashtags and social media handles, and holding contests.

Collaborate With Fitness Influencers and Micro-Influencers

Influencer marketing involves teaming up with online personalities to promote a brand and boost awareness. With 69% of consumers trusting influencers’ recommendations, this marketing strategy can help your gym connect with a broader audience and build credibility.

You don’t have to work with mega influencers with millions of followers to resonate with your target audience. In fact, micro-influencers with 10,000-50,000 followers see the highest engagement rates on their posts. While micro-influencers have less followers than social media celebrities, their audience tends to find their content more relatable and authentic.

Search for social media influencers near you and ask them about pricing to visit your gym and share photos, reviews, and videos.

Gym Marketing Strategies for Increasing Local Visibility

Having a strong community presence is equally as important as your digital marketing efforts. Engaging with the community through local events, sponsorships, and partnerships enhances brand recognition and allows you to interact directly with your target audience.

Sponsoring Local Events

Event sponsorship is when a gym offers financial support for an event like a 5k or powerlifting competition in exchange for brand visibility. With 71% of local businesses expressing satisfaction with the results they see from the community sponsorship, we recommend getting involved with at least a few events a year.

A few ways sponsors can promote their gym at an event include:

  • Branded Merchandise
  • Signboards
  • Demos

Partnering With Local Businesses for Cross-Promotion

Partnership marketing involves collaborating with local businesses that share a similar target audience to create mutually beneficial promotions. This helps your gym tap into a new customer base while providing current members access to new health resources.

Cynthia Cline, Fitness Center Project Manager at EquipmentShare, found partnership marketing valuable for attracting new gym members and engaging current ones.

“We partner with a local chiropractor and have them visit our fitness center once a month to perform hands-on chiropractic sessions for our members and give educational lectures on various topics,” Cline said. “It has been so beneficial for both of us. We get people who would not usually step into the fitness center to take advantage of this service, and the chiropractor has increased business since the partnership started.”

Cline encourages gym owners to reach out to local businesses, saying, “Be creative and don’t be afraid to talk to local businesses to see how you can work together to offer your members more to reach their health and wellness goals!”

To get the most out of this marketing strategy, we recommend partnering with businesses in adjacent fields like nutrition, chiropractic care, or physical therapy.

Effective Strategies for Member Retention in the Fitness Industry

It's tempting to constantly test strategies for attracting new customers. However, retaining your existing clientele is equally important. Research shows that boosting customer retention by just 5% can increase a company's profits by 25-95%!

Include the following elements in your marketing strategy to keep members around for the long haul.

Rewards Programs for Active Members

Gym rewards programs help keep members motivated to maintain their fitness routine and reward them for choosing your gym as their fitness hub.

Fitness facilities can reward members for one or more of the following variables:

  • Class Attendance
  • Gym Attendance
  • Event Participation
  • Habit/ Goal Attainment
  • Referrals

Curious what this looks like in action? Cynthia Cline, Fitness Center Project Manager, says EquipmentShare rewards gym-goers for class check-ins.

"We utilize check-ins through our Fitness Center app as people check in to classes, open gym, or even events we host,” Cline said. “The more check-ins, the more milestones your members reach, and the more prizes they earn. For example, we started the rewards at Milestone 25, and members would win a custom Milestone 25 shirt. If our members reach 100 check-ins, they receive a gift card to NoBull. All the prizes are related to health and wellness, motivating them even more to utilize our fitness center and get more check-ins!"

Personalized Training Plans

Seventy-one percent of customers seek personalized experiences, and 76% get frustrated when businesses fall short. This desire for personalization is especially high in the fitness industry, where tailored approaches can make the difference in whether members achieve their fitness goals.

Customized training plans meet members' preferences, increasing the likelihood of achieving desired results and improving member retention. By providing personalized fitness experiences, gyms can cater to each member's unique needs, enhancing their commitment to their fitness journey.

Update Offerings and Facilities to Meet Member Needs

The fitness industry is constantly evolving, and so are consumer needs. If your facility doesn't provide resources to meet member expectations, they'll ditch your business for a gym that will.

The demand for niche fitness offerings has grown 35% YoY. To stay competitive and meet the increasing demand for diverse fitness options, gym owners should consider expanding their amenities.

Unique wellness amenities you may want to consider include:

  • Infrared saunas
  • Cryotherapy
  • Virtual classes
  • Healthy snack options
  • Massages

Celebrate Member Wins

Cynthia Cline, Fitness Center Project Manager, believes celebrating member accomplishments can help clients maintain their momentum in the gym, saying, “Celebrate your members’ wins! When people feel recognition for their accomplishments and all the hard work it took to achieve them, it motivates them to keep going!”

Cline suggests posting props on your gym’s app or sharing client wins on social media.

Personalizing Marketing Efforts for Individual Members' Needs

Personalized marketing is more than just inserting your customers' names into generic emails. Instead, this strategy ensures each member receives content relevant to their interest and goals. This can help increase customer interactions and improve conversation rates.

Collecting and Utilizing Member Data for Targeted Marketing Campaigns

To personalize your marketing, you need to collect member data. But, what sort of data should you be gathering? There are two main types of data: quantitative and qualitative.

Quantitative data focuses on facts and numbers like your members' ages and how many classes they attended each week. Your gym management software should track this information. Qualitative data refers to non-numerical information that provides insights into qualities, characteristics, and subjective attributes. Examples of qualitative data in a gym setting include members' preferred classes and member fitness goals. You can gather this information through staff observations, questionnaires, and surveys.

Gyms should use both types of data to help inform personalized marketing campaigns.

Sending Personalized Emails

Email personalization ensures you send members and prospects content relevant to their needs. Taking this approach with your email campaigns can help increase revenue by up to 760%.

Not sure how to personalize your emails? Check out a few examples below.

  • Personalize your subject lines
  • Provide personalized product recommendations
  • Celebrate fitness milestones
  • Celebrate fitness anniversaries

Offering Customized Promotions or Rewards Based on Individual Goals

Use your customer data to create targeted promotions that align with each member’s specific fitness goals. For example, if a member aims to attend a certain number of classes per week, providing a discount or exclusive reward tied to that goal can be a powerful motivator. Aligning promotions with members’ aspirations can help boost engagement and customer satisfaction.

Bottom Line

Testing new marketing techniques can help your gym maintain a steady stream of clients. When trying new marketing strategies, document your approach and track your results. Doing so will help you determine how successful your marketing campaign is and let you know if you need to make adjustments.

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