10 Member Engagement Ideas To Keep Your Gym Members Happy

You've promoted your gym services, attracted potential members, and convinced them to sign up. Great! While attracting customers to join your gym is an excellent first step, it's just one piece of the puzzle. If you want to run a successful gym and improve member retention rates, it’s critical to keep those members engaged.

In this guide, we highlight why gym member engagement is essential for business growth. We also provide ten engaging, unique, and effective gym member engagement ideas that will keep people excited about their next gym sessions. Let's get started!

Why Is Gym Member Engagement Crucial for Business Growth?

Gym member engagement can fuel your gym's growth. Here's how:

It’s more cost-effective to retain members than attract new ones 

Acquiring a new gym member can cost up to seven times more than retaining an existing one. Engaged gym members are more likely to stick with your gym, reducing member churn and the need for constant recruitment, ensuring a consistent income stream.

Organic referrals

Happy members tend to become excellent brand advocates. They're more likely to recommend your business to friends, family, and colleagues, leading to an effective and trusted form of word-of-mouth marketing. This can be a massive boon for your business, as referred customers are twice as likely to convert than others.

These are just a few reasons why it's crucial to create a strong member engagement strategy to make your fitness facility a hub of activity.

10 Member Engagement Ideas That Your Gym Members Will Love

When it comes to member engagement, there's no one-size-fits-all solution. If you want to improve retention and enhance the customer experience, you must employ a variety of membership activities. Bearing that in mind, here are ten gym member retention ideas that your gym members will love.

1. Design a Memorable and Personalized Onboarding Experience

About seven out of ten customers expect businesses to provide personalized interactions. To make your first interactions with new members unforgettable, here are some great onboarding ideas worth considering:

Use Targeted Communication 

Don't send generic emails or texts to new members. Welcome each member by name and use the information collected during signup to send personalized messages. For instance, you could provide new members with customized workout plans based on the fitness goals they listed during signup.

Offer a Welcome Package 

Welcoming new members with a personalized email or text is an excellent initial way to forge personal connections. But if you want to make new members feel extra special, consider giving them a welcome package. Some thoughtful items you could put in the welcome package include a personalized welcome letter, a workout journal or worksheet, and membership benefits like discounts on gym services or nutrition consultations. To enhance the onboarding membership experience even further while promoting your brand, you could include branded merch like water bottles, t-shirts, or keychains.

Enroll Members in Your Online Community 

Nearly seven out of ten customers purchase more from brands with online communities they're part of. Why? Online communities bring together people with common goals, helping them to forge meaningful connections. So, whether you have a members-only Facebook group or a dedicated online forum, prioritize integrating new members into the community during onboarding to promote ongoing engagement.

2. Organize Fitness Challenges Online or On-site

Fitness challenges are an excellent way to encourage friendly competition while improving member engagement. And best of all? You can organize them on-site or online and invite members to participate using a branded hashtag to enhance your brand's online visibility.

Some fitness challenges you can organize to cater to different challenges include weight loss, cardio, and strength gain challenges. For instance, you can create a ''steps challenge'' and award a prize to the member who completes the most steps within a week.

Looking for ways to simplify these challenges? Fitness On Demand provides a comprehensive member app with many challenges built in, plus you’ll have the flexibility to create your own!

3. Provide Online Classes and Events

Some gym members might be hesitant to join a traditional gym. Additionally, others may be unable to access the gym or attend sessions frequently due to busy schedules, long commutes, or childcare duties.

An easy way to cater to these members' needs is by offering online or virtual classes and events. Some beneficial online classes and events you could offer include live-streaming workout sessions, workout tutorials, and Q&A sessions with experts like nutritionists, fitness instructors, or physical therapists.

4. Create a Member-of-the-Month Campaign

Everyone wants to feel seen and valued for their efforts. That's why starting a member-of-the-month program is undoubtedly one of the best gym member appreciation ideas.

Consider starting a ''Member-of-the-Month'' campaign where you highlight member success stories and share them on your gym's social media pages, email newsletter, or print marketing materials. This is a great way to motivate other gym members to put in more effort and promote your brand.

You can also offer winners discounts on premium gym services or free branded swag like yoga mats, gym bags, or workout towels to amplify your brand and create awareness about products and services your members might not have heard of.

You can select the member based on criteria like attendance, goals accomplished, referrals brought, or a combination of factors.

5. Celebrate Your Gym Member's Milestones

Few things discourage gym members more than failing to achieve their fitness goals. In fact, two out of five gym goers discontinue their workouts within the first six months of joining the gym. Often, this happens because they're not receiving the encouragement or support they need to achieve them.

Keep your gym members motivated and engaged by celebrating their fitness milestones. These milestones could include reaching a weight loss goal, attending a particular number of consecutive gym sessions, or lifting a specific weight.

Besides fitness milestones, consider celebrating important personal milestones like birthdays, graduations, or retirements to make members feel valued.

You could celebrate these milestones by highlighting them in your email newsletter, posting them on bulletin boards in your facility, or sending members push notifications when they hit milestones. A member engagement solution like Flex App can automatically track progress, gym visits, and more to ensure you're celebrating wins with everyone.

6. Send Gifts or Discounts on Their Birthdays

Sure, wishing gym members happy birthday may feel cliché, but it's a big deal for most people. In fact, birthday emails receive a staggering 179% higher click rate than promotional emails. So, when onboarding members, capture their birth dates and email addresses to wish them a happy birthday when the day arrives.

But don't just stop there. Throw in gifts like free merchandise or discount codes for one-on-one training sessions or other gym services. Not only will this make members feel extra special on their big day, but it’s also a great opportunity to get them interested in premium offerings they may not have considered otherwise!

7. Create Content Around Fitness Topics of Interest

While inviting people to join your online community is an excellent way to engage members, creating relevant content around fitness topics can enhance engagement levels further. An easy way to identify what content resonates with your members is by running polls and surveys. For instance, if your poll or survey reveals that many members want to lose weight, you could create content about healthy recipe ideas, simple cardio workouts, or tips on staying motivated during the weight loss journey.

Some examples of valuable content you could create include blog posts, downloadable guides, social media posts, webinars, and videos. Also, consider providing your most active members exclusive content like early access to new workouts, personalized workout plans, or behind-the-scenes training tips to make them feel like they're part of an inner circle.

8. Share Playlists To Motivate Gym-goers

Most gyms play music during workout sessions — particularly cardio. And for good reason. Listening to music during workouts can boost endurance by up to 15%.

So, share playlists to make gym sessions more enjoyable and motivating for members. But don't compel gym-goers to listen to your playlist of favorite songs daily — no matter how many likes it has on your favorite streaming platform. Let them contribute to your playlist to ensure it caters to eclectic music tastes.

Sharing playlists can stimulate conversations about music preferences among members and promote a sense of community.

9. Offer a Fitness Bingo With Prizes

Fitness bingo is an engaging activity that adds a playful twist to traditional bingo. Here's how to play the game:

• Create multiple bingo cards with a 5x5 layout.
• Include various engagement activities on the cards, such as jumping jacks, squats, or push-ups with a certain number of reps.
• Distribute the bingo cards to members during one of their workout sessions.
• Call out an activity on the card for the members to perform. For example ''ten squats.''
• Allow members who complete an activity on their bingo card to strike it off.
• Continue calling out activities until a member yells ''Bingo!'

When the game ends, award the winners prizes aligned with their interests, such as free gym merchandise, discounts on services, or healthy meal gift cards. Also, encourage winners to post their completed bingo cards on social media with your branded hashtag to increase your brand visibility online.

10. Organize Themed Days at the Gym

Themed days can be an excellent way to create a more animated and relaxed gym atmosphere. So, don't hesitate to switch it up! For instance, you could organize a "Retro Fitness" day where members wear workout clothes from the 70s and 80s or a "90s music" day where you exclusively play 90s tunes.

Consider pairing themed days with free buddy passes or referral programs to encourage current members to tag along with friends to join the fun. Not only is this a great way to provide existing members with a fun experience, but it allows you to give potential members a taste of your gym atmosphere, encouraging them to sign up.

Just bear in mind that this engagement tactic might not work with everyone, especially if it involves dressing up. So, make dressing up voluntary to ensure there's no pressure on members who might not want to participate.

Improve Gym Engagement and Retention With Fitness On Demand

These ten member engagement ideas can help improve retention rates and keep gym members eager to attend upcoming sessions. However, to take it up a notch, you may want to leverage analytics to monitor member engagement.

At Fitness On Demand, we offer innovative digital solutions to help you keep tabs on member engagement and obtain invaluable insights. Request a demo today to see how our solutions can enhance member engagement.