Your gym appearance, staff culture, and first impressions will raise or lower your client's perceived value of the services you offer. Within 30 seconds of landing on your gym's Home Page or walking into your facility the first time, new potential clients will be subconsciously determining the monetary worth of your facility and the services you offer. Here are some simple, along with some deep and long term, ways you can increase the value you can offer to your clients.
1. FIND OUT WHAT YOUR CLIENTS VALUE!
In most Parkour gyms the majority of students in classes are kids. The people paying for these kids classes are their parents. This means we have to take two different sets of values into consideration. What do the parents value:
A SAFE place that their kids can grow as a young person (learning new skills, setting goals, and growing their confidence in themselves)
Role Models for their children to learn good values from and be inspired by.
What do kids value:
Having fun and playing.
A social circle of friends and peers.
Having someone to look up to (Role Model) and to work towards becoming like.
Knowing these values, or additional specific values you find in your local community, you can now find ways to work these values into your Culture, Programs, and Gym.
2. BOOST YOUR GYMS APPEARANCE AND CURB APPEAL.
Parents want a gym that they feel is a safe place for their kids. If parents don't feel comfortable dropping off their kids at your gym, they will not sign up for a Membership. Get rid of any street or graffiti look you may have and replace with clean lines and colors. Brighter colors make your gym look larger, cleaner, and more inviting; ie: SAFER.
Increase the curb appeal of your gym by cleaning up the outside walls and parking lot. If possible, fill up your area with plants and trees. Paint the outside your gym colors to make it look more professional and attract additional attention. Kids are generally more attracted to bright colors than dark ones.
3. FIRST IMPRESSIONS MATTER
Having a clean looking staff, that is easy to locate without effort, will make parents feel safer leaving their kids at your gym. Make your staff easy to find with nice looking shirts that stand out.
Does your staff know what to do or say when a new potential client walks in the door? Make sure anyone near the front of your gym or in your office smiles and greets anyone who walks in. People enjoy feeling welcomed in when arriving in a new space. Make them feel like a member of their family!
4. MAKE YOUR WEBSITE SHOWCASE THE CLIENTS VALUES
When people first land on your page, what do they see? So many gyms showcase their high level athletes performing a huge skill outdoors! Why!?!? This can scare parents and immediately gives them the impression that Parkour is dangerous. Your website should show your gym, looking bright, inviting, and clean. (A safe place)
It should show that you have Coaches, easily identifiable, who are spotting and working with kids to keep them safe while training their skills. (Role Models) Your site should show pictures or videos of kids getting along, smiling and having fun, and overcoming obstacles (Friends, Community, and Self Improvement)
If you can showcase these values on your Home Page, usually via pictures or a banner video, you will have parents who are much more willing to come to your facility and try out a class. REMEMBER, no one is bringing their child to your facility to become the greatest Traceur known to mankind.
5. CULTURE
Work towards building your clients values into the Culture of your gym. You must set an example through your hard work, personality, and customer interactions to make a lasting Culture in your gym. If your Culture exudes the values of your clients, they will notice and you will have a much better chance of signing up a new Member as well as keeping them long term.
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Use these client values to determine what changes you can make to your business. Which ones are the easiest to start with and will have the larger immediate impact? Start there as you work towards making long term change to your gyms culture and mirror it towards your version of fulfilling your clients values. Fulfill these values and you will not need to worry about the cost of your Membership as you are offer not a service (teaching Parkour or acrobatics) but are instead offering your clients the true real thing they are looking for, someone who mirrors their values.
Research. Design. Implement. Improve.
Parkour Professor - Justin Taylor
Justin@ParkourProfessor.com
