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The Art of Automated Follow Up: Capture 10-15% More Fitness Studio Leads

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Let me start by painting a picture… you run a beautiful Facebook ad campaign with a great offer. Your social engagement is through the roof! The special offer really resonates with your prospective members and you’re getting all kinds of leads. So many people have expressed interest in your fitness studio—whether it be functional fitness, cycling, kickboxing, yoga, etc. What’s missing? That’s where automated follow up comes in…

So, this is a pretty great scenario, right?

Automated Email Follow Up Capitalizes On Great Social Metrics

If you and your staff are really on the ball and getting these new leads scheduled for their free sessions (I’m talking 86% booking rate), then you’ve got a great opportunity to grow your business here. But…

The big question is: How many of those people convert into long-term members at your fitness studio?

See, social engagement is great! Clicks to landing pages are awesome! People filling out your form to become leads is incredible! The only reason these things are so amazing is because they all should lead to sales.

If they don’t, there’s another issue. The obvious one is your Sales Process. The other is your automated follow up process…

Manual Lead Management Hurts Fitness Studios

I’ve been around the fitness industry for a while now and I’ve seen studio owners collect hundreds of leads each month thanks to proven special offers and free class trials.

They’ll convert a few of them into dedicated members, and then let everyone else fall through the cracks. Not out of laziness or “Ooo I signed a few members, I don’t need these other leads anymore.”

It’s obvious no one is doing that. But, it’s pretty crazy that so many leads get essentially ghosted by fitness studios considering the vast majority of these leads have done 3 things:

  1. Expressed interest in what YOU, your fitness studio, and your offer
  2. Committed by taking time out of their busy lives to do a few free workouts at your studio
  3. Then, they actually showed up to experience exactly what you had to offer

It’s at this point that they somehow disappear into the ether…

Why?

Because you simply can’t manually manage every lead that walks into your door. Not everyone buys or signs up after their free workouts… but that doesn’t mean they won’t sign up.

That’s why automation is an amazing strategy that allows fitness studios to maintain relationships and nurture those leads in their sleep! This is really great considering how long it can take until someone decides to buy.

Automated Follow Up Makes You Seem Everywhere At Once

Without an automated follow up process, you don’t have time to track down every single person who came in during that free “bring your friends & family” weekend class! I’d be nearly impossible to get on the phone with every single one of them and sell them on the incredible value you provide.

Think about that… if I had a great experience with you but don’t hear from you for another month, I’ve probably already found another place to give my money to.

But thankfully we live in the future! Like literally, I’m pretty sure Marty McFly has never been here, so we’re pretty advanced.

This means there are a ton of great tools out there to help you perform automated follow-up. That way you can nurture all of these very warm leads and convince them to sign up.

It’s so important to capitalize on the momentum you created with their free workouts. Luckily, I’m about to show you how I did this with a super simple automated email that increased my engagement with leads 10-15%.

The Automated Follow Up Email That Increased My Lead Engagement 10-15%

When someone signs up for your special offer or even walks in and fills out your waiver, you should always collect this person’s name and email address.

That way you’ve got everything you need to send them an engaging sequence of emails designed to help them understand your studio and what you offer while also establishing your credibility and expertise!

And that is super important because we, as modern humans, really don’t like buying stuff we don’t understand from people we don’t like or trust, right?

The cool thing is you can build a pretty rock solid relationship with people via email using simple email automation tools (if you do it right).

My Exact Automated Follow Up Email

Let’s take a look at a personal example I use in my online strength & conditioning business

When someone signs up for my email list via my Ad to Landing Page combo or any handful of forms on my website, they immediately receive an email from me (automated).

The sole purpose of this email is to increase their engagement and begin the relationship. Here’s what they receive:

As you can see, there’s nothing fancy going on here. I’m simply letting them know what they can expect from me and ask a simple, but powerful question: “What are you currently struggling with?”

Those 6 simple words have done wonders for my relationship with my subscribers (and my business is 100% online).

I’ve gotten so many great responses (10-15% of my subscribers reply to that automated email) that it’s not only shaped my business model and the programs I offer, but how I “talk” to my list, leading to even better engagement.

On top of that, I have a 40% average open rate (which is quite a bit higher than average), leading to even more sales! Which is the ultimate goal, right?

Incredible Responses Leading To More Sales

So, just by asking that simple question and promising to provide them with real value (which you should always do), it led to some pretty awesome responses. As well as additional sales opportunities that otherwise might have fallen through the cracks:

So How Could Automated Follow Up Work for You?

Let’s break it down…

  1. Someone gives you their contact info when they opt in to your offer
  2. Their info is automatically entered into your email marketing system (MailChimp & ConvertKit are two of my favorites to get started with). If you don’t know how to do this, the team at Loud Rumor can build it all for you.
  3. You trigger an automated email sequence (super easy to do with those service listed above) that sends them email(s) to build trust and credibility while providing them with as much value as possible.

Pretty simple, eh?

In fact, I bet you could take that same script I have above, swap out your business for mine (and maybe tweak some other details), and be up and running in 15 minutes from start to finish.

Which means, you have a great tool automatically following up with your prospects and creating the trust that will net you a bunch of long term members.

With Emails, Practice First, Then Sequence…

Then, when you get really good at your email drip, your sequence might even look a little something like this with timers, notes, tags, and more:

This small investment in time could lead to HUGE returns down the road in gained revenue from people who would have otherwise fallen through the cracks.

Remember, it only takes those 6 – 8 touches of contact before someone usually invests. So just because someone decides they want your free week offer and they book their first session, doesn’t mean they’ll become a members.

You have to help them want them to become a member. And that’s what’s awesome about my friends at Loud Rumor!

They build your email list for you and capture all of those leads so you can continuously reach out to them. You to create an automated follow up process to make those addition 3 – 4 touches (they make the first 3 for you, which is pretty sweet).

This simple 1-step follow up email could seriously propel you past your competition, build trust and credibility in your community, and help grow your fitness studio!

If you’ve had success with this automated process, fill me in by commenting below—I’d love to hear about it.

Loud Rumor
Loud Rumor

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