Are You Getting the Right Advice?
Is it optimism, bias, a lack of information, or just business as usual?
We don’t want to be the only voice on here. If you are a fitness pro who can provide experiences and perspectives that can help others in the industry succeed then, share them through Breaking Muscle’s Submission Portal. We’ll vet and publish legitimate articles if it can help others. People on the frontlines of the industry, the ones facing the reality of the issues, the ones who suffer the consequences, they are the ones who can provide the best information for their fellow pros.
In about a paragraph, we’re going to dig into why we may not be giving you the best advice. However, before we start, we’d like to recommend two books, Naseem Taleb’s The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbably and, Daniel Kahneman’s Thinking, Fast and Slow. Both are heavily reviewed and are easily researched online, as are their authors. Suffice to say that they may provide invaluable insight into understanding our proclivities in behavior during extraordinary circumstances. You’ll understand why we are recommending them if you make it to the end of this article. On with the show.
Joel Jamieson opened a gym at the age of 23 years old. Over the next few years, he built a niche around training youth athletes, largely volleyball, and combat sports at the pro level. He grew the business very successfully, made a lot of money, employed lots of people, and over the last decade has moved into becoming an online fitness entrepreneur with three separate products and revenue streams. He is also a consultant to big box gyms like Equinox and Life Time Fitness, as well as working with many coaches helping them in their practice and business. So, this is what Joel had to say about our last piece, Waiting to Exhale and it’s worth giving the space:
I actually don’t think it’s possible to build a very successful brick and
mortar business these days without at least a reasonable level of competence
in online marketing. Almost every single potential customer is going to
judge you by your online presence whether you sell services/products in the
real world or online. It makes no difference.
So when I read your email that said, “We could tell you how to do online
marketing but, frankly, it’s not something to be learning right now. No one
knows how online marketing will change over the next six months,” as well
as, ”The level of noise online and the sheer size and mechanics of online
marketing make it almost impossible for a small business to create
meaningful impact without speculating. That requires throwing money that
isn’t there at the problem. Not just now, but probably for a long time to
come.”
Those are both things I completely disagree with, to be honest . Marketing
is marketing because human behavior is human behavior. The only thing that’s
changed about marketing over the last 50+ years is the mediums we use and
the way we consume it now.
As I’m sure you’d agree, marketing is nothing more than being able to
attract the right people towards your business and then telling them how you
can help them solve their problems. The fundamental principles of that
aren’t going to change and the online marketing space isn’t going away, it’s
only going to continue growing.
So while I was suggesting that right now an important strategy is for gym
owners and coaches is to learn how to work with their existing
clients/members virtually, I’m not suggesting they should be building an
online business. But I am suggesting that an extremely important skill they
need to be learning is marketing, and online is always going to be a huge
part of that.
I think scaring them away from it and telling them it’s all up in the air
and nobody knows what’s going to happen and that it’s impossible for them to
make an impact so there’s no point in learning it is simply a message I
don’t agree with. This is what I was trying to point out in my initial reply
in the first place. Marketing and online marketing aren’t dead or completely
unknown.
Right now, ads are actually cheaper than ever because ad supply is higher
than ever while advertising dollars have diminished. I’m not saying everyone
should just start throwing all their money into ads, but we also shouldn’t
be painting an inaccurate picture of the current situation either.
All of the above are good points and many thanks to Joel for taking the time to provide the feedback. He didn’t have to go to all that trouble but he showed that he cared about his fellow coaches and trainers enough to say his piece. We wish there were more people doing that. So, as you can guess, there’s no argument here on our part with the substance of the exchange.
What may be helpful is to look at our rationale and biases in the article that got Joel going. Not as an excuse, or counterpoint, just for the sake of providing some more data points.
Who is the Fitness Industry?
Without getting bogged down in the intricacies of Venn diagrams and our use of the word persona, as some of you no doubt will, this image really serves one main purpose: it shows, quite clearly, the intersection between everyone involved in the fitness industry and online component is universal. So, logically, we would be remiss in ever saying that online marketing is pointless when online is a part of everyone’s presence in the business.
But, Joel makes a very good point: you need to learn how to market and sell online. The crux of his commentary is the importance of being online marketing savvy. If we are guilty of anything in our approach it is the lack of faith in the ability of most people in the industry to make the transition to online or hybrid online models mostly because of a lack of online marketing savvy.
Yes, there are fitness pros who have succeeded through their trial and error, experience, or by using courses, books, consultancies, and the like to make their online marketing deliver. But, most don’t. The vast majority of fitness pros rely on personal referrals, and being a part of a bigger facility, or tied into some sort of franchise.
Therefore, we kind of shoved the whole online marketing discussion out of the way and said, you better figure out what you want to do because it is going to be really hard, and if you are not prepared to do what it takes to get out of this, you might as well as find a plan B right now. That was probably frustrating to people who have managed to transition online during the Great Pandemic of 2020. Most fitness pros are not going to get there. The actual impact of the lockdowns may not be truly apparent until the end of summer, and for some time thereafter so, some fitness pros are going to ride the initial wave of closures out because they have so much invested in offline work.
Not only is it hard to make a decision about your future in the fitness industry right now, but it will require you to focus on learning new skills, rapidly, and being able to apply them successfully, meaning, selling yourself online, sure, but also knowing how you’ll get through the cash crunches that are bound to come, and making sense of how members and clients adapt because of their own circumstances. You don’t need anyone’s advice to figure out what’s going to happen. Because, frankly, we have no experience of the present situation.
Which takes us back, nicely, to the book recommendations at the beginning of this post. Taleb and Kahneman bolster the simple notion that in extraordinary circumstances you cannot just think your way out of it and that you have to be able to feel your way out of a situation. To transition from having a feel for a brick and mortar business to one that is hybrid online, or only online, one has to develop a feel, an instinct for making decisions that are, mostly emotional. That means getting in the right headspace for what is to come.
Our natural bias was to dismiss the notion of marketing and advertising opportunities because we are inherently biased towards their efficacy when the goals are uncertain and the ability to execute is inadequate, but in reality, instinct should have also told us what Joel Jamieson made clear, it may be the best time for online marketing right now because the ad market is at a low point, inventory is available, and costs should have gone down.
People who have been successful online previously will have a head start. People like Joel are well placed to take advantage of online marketing opportunities because they have the perspective that comes with experience. People who are newly making the transition will have to make some bold investments in time, effort, and dedication.
If you look at the Venn diagram above again, one thing is clear, eventually, as online gains more relevance, the fitness industry, and all its component parts, kind of meld into one glob. That’s going to mean a new existence.
What is This New Existence BS?
Unfortunately, we can’t end the post there (we’re as exhausted by this post as you are but we’re trying to help so bear with us).
We have to explain this “new existence” thing.
Life will go back to some semblance of normal, whatever that means for you, but you cannot discount a number of things: unemployment will be high, very high by normal standards. Jobs are not going to suddenly appear because they don’t. We have yet to see corporations, back to work, making adjustments to mitigate the impact of the lockdowns so that they can bulk up again. That means, unfortunately, that businesses will not be hiring as if there is an upturn. It may be a year or two before we really see some stability. You can be optimistic, but you can’t plan for the best-case scenario.
So, there’s an impact on the ability of people to pay for stuff, and a change in priorities, that will have to happen. It will be highly subjective in terms of the impact on every fitness pro.
Small gyms and private training facilities may have the upper hand because they are better able to manage small groups and social distancing, which will be a fact of life for many months. Sounds great. But, is there any doubt that big box gyms have both the resources and size to suck up members with more tools and sales options? What if they decide to take on the small gyms and private training facilities by adapting, creating their own hybrid models that are more about their own survival and competitiveness against these smaller competitors?
What if they become big boxes with small gym and private training mindsets?
We believe that many small gyms are underestimating the threat to their core business of the big box gyms, who have more clout and better access to capital and resources to weather a long-term recovery. Sure, over time, small gyms and private training facilities offer a lot of advantages but, short-term it’s going to be a war. What were two different gym business models may end up being very similar at some point.
What about the Orange Theory type gyms? What about other boutique gym offerings? The fitness industry will have a new existence dictated by a desperate need to survive a major downturn. End of story.
As for online, if everyone is there then everyone is a competitor. It’s not about local memberships or clients. It’s everyone, from everywhere, competing for attention. There are ways to isolate and personalize your work online. But that’s not what works for every fitness pro. People don’t get into the fitness industry because they think they’re going to get rich. They like the physicality of it all.
Online training is already changing. There are bricks and mortar coaches doing online training classes and programs now, even when they’ve hastily ducktaped together their offerings, that are unique and interesting and different. People who may never have gone online are now online. Will the stick it out or be glad to go back to the way things were before? Many people who shunned online training in the past have no choice but to embrace it now. How will that work in a recovery?
There is a new existence. There has to be. Doesn’t change the fact that a big box gym will survive, a CrossFit will keep going, and someone will sell 30-day challenges off their Instagram profile. There are way too many moving parts, even in the glob that is the fitness industry.