When it comes to marketing your fitness facility, many times, studio and gym owners rely on Facebook, Instagram, or Google ad programs to try and get their name out there. While these advertising platforms can be effective when paired with a solid marketing campaign, many times, there can be some fruitful opportunities right in front of you if you are willing to roll up your sleeves, break outside of the box, and get creative.
In this blog, we will discuss what guerilla marketing is, some well-documented examples, and how gyms can easily leverage some common tactics to their advantage.
Guerilla Marketing a Fitness Studio
Marketing can be a very generic term when it comes to getting your gym’s brand built and your studio’s name out there; however, there are various types and methods categorized by their implementation tactics to target specific audiences, markets, or even geographic locations. One of these methods is called guerilla marketing, which takes its name from guerilla warfare, involving sporadic, unconventional, or even countercultural approaches to marketing to utilize the element of surprise with your fitness studio’s target audience.
While the idea of guerilla marketing can be a bit unclear in terms of how to go about implementing it into your gym, the concept is to break out of the noise of the norm in your audience’s life and make an impression (hopefully a lasting one) that not only captures their attention but also ties their attention to your brand, business, and services.
The attention-grabbing portion of guerilla marketing is critical as it is the worm that is going to lure your fish in; however, establishing a great campaign behind your guerilla tactics is the hook essential for success. Therefore, ensuring that your tactics effortlessly tie targeted leads to your sales funnel is crucial for success – and the key performance indicator (KPI) we will be interested in gauging success for these sorts of tactics will be: leads generated as well as new memberships/clients converted.
Popular Examples of Guerilla Marketing
When was the last time you saw an advertisement on TV, Instagram, or even a billboard that really caught your attention? Standing out from the noise in these common markets is difficult, and yet there are still times when people do it. Typically, to shine through on the big advertising platforms, you need quality video, content, messaging, proper targeting, and (unfortunately) a budget; however, when all the elements don’t line up right, advertising on these platforms can feel like you are throwing money into a fire. But what if there was another way?
Guerilla marketing takes many of the same elements you work with for advertising and campaign building but emphasizes the creativity of breaking through the noise in your target audience’s daily life or in a disrupting way on the usual ad-serving mediums. One commonly cited example of this type of marketing is a campaign put out by Mr. Clean where one of the white bars on a city crosswalk was extra white/clean with the Mr. Clean guy and logo at the bottom of the bar. We like this example because it shows how small-scale and simple a guerilla marketing effort can be, but due to the contrast of its surroundings or disruption of everyday life, it catches attention and interest.
As we mentioned, guerilla marketing efforts can be effective in traditional advertising spots as well. Using a medium in a way that breaks the norm or approaching an ad from a different stylistic standpoint can also grab attention and interest. While it might not always be viewed as “guerilla marketing,” depending on the interpreter, you can see cases of brands utilizing elements off of a billboard to help drive home a message. Things like the inclusion of lights to look like a car headlight, cloth coming off to give a blowing effect, or even utilization of the pole holding up the billboard to help draw the eye to another element.
How to Implement Guerilla Marketing for Your Gym
First and foremost, always make sure to consider laws, get permission from locations/vendors/etc., and ensure overall safety. So let’s start then with some of the most common and easy-to-implement options for guerilla marketing your fitness studio:
- Handbills on windshields of cars at nearby locations
- Flyers or small advertisement pieces at local shops
- Unique ad spots – we’ve seen local cafes selling ad space in their napkin holders.
- Unique sponsorships and events – running a class in a unique place with a lot of foot traffic or signing a team up for related events like a charity plane pull
- Your building – how you decorate the outside, the signage, or even the exterior color can all serve as an eye-catcher, conversation starter, or guerilla marketing opportunity
Guerilla marketing is so effective on a small scale because there is no “book” on what to do. You have to flex your creative muscle on your target audience to really stand out. However, the tactic is just the sizzle; you can’t forget to back up your efforts with a well-thought marketing campaign to help capture leads and drive them to convert to clients through your sales funnel system.
Making A Splash
When it comes to advertising your gym, guerilla marketing is a commonly referenced tactic as it tends to have a “low cost” and “highly effective” persona about it when done right, but doing it right requires an extensive understanding of your audience, creativity to break through the noise in their life, and a well-crafted marketing campaign to back it up. If you are planning on attempting a guerilla marketing campaign for your fitness studio, we highly recommend hopping over to our marketing section and making sure you have ducks in a row to promote effectivity of your efforts.
