An email fitness newsletter is a great tool to engage and retain gym members if you do it right. Heres how in five steps.

5 Steps to Create a Fitness Newsletter that Boosts Gym Membership

Email marketing remains the best way to build an audience for your fitness business, even in the age of Facebook, TikTok, and countless other communications channels. You need to constantly nurture your email list — and use it. All the time.

It’s how prospects get to know you, like you and trust you — so that they’ll want to become clients. It’s how current clients are steadily reminded that you care about them still, even after they’ve signed on the dotted line. And it’s one of a handful of communications channels you need to show the world who you are and what you value.

Too many of us are shy about sending emails because we don’t want to become annoying spammers. But we’re here to show you how to create a powerful email newsletter and how to use it for two main goals:

• Grow your fitness business
• Establish yourself as the local authority on over-50 fitness

Remember that one of the greatest strengths of the over-50 market is that they still love to read useful, engaging material, and they appreciate you sending them good stuff on a consistent basis.

5 Steps to create a fitness newsletter

Creating a successful email newsletter is a little like cooking from a recipe. You follow the instructions, but you add your own creativity that makes it unique. An extra pinch of paprika, or a half glass of red wine that wasn’t there before.

Step #1: Make a plan

OK, so the goal of your email newsletter is always to convert prospects and retain existing clients, and promote yourself as an expert on over-50 fitness.

We recommend that you send at least two emails each week to your prospects and clients. Some research shows that the sweet spot is 6.21 emails per week. It’s up to you. The key is to be consistent, so your email list gets used to receiving your emails on the same days each week.

With the material you receive from Prime Fit Content, this is easy. All you need to add is one or more short items each week about your business — like a new class coming up, or your holiday hours. Don’t sell all the time. You want it to be useful, not promotional.

Step #2: Create your fitness newsletter template

A small email list can be managed easily in your general email platform (like Gmail, Outlook, etc.). It’s easy enough to drop in a photo, too. Include your contact information at the bottom, and don’t forget an unsubscribe option.

At some point, though, as your email list grows, you’ll need an email business service like MailChimp or Constant Contact. These are easy to use and affordable. You’ll find most have free subscription levels up to a certain number of subscribers.

Set up a template from their list of options, and add your logo and boilerplate information. Then just copy and paste the material from Prime Fit Content into the template. Add something specific to your location at least once a week, and send your newsletter. It really couldn’t be easier to do.

Step #3: Segment your email list, if you wish

Now, you might want to segment your email list, by dividing it into two lists – one for prospects and one for clients. Some of our clients do; others don’t. It just means you can send different content to different people if you want. It’s your choice.

Step #4: Send content that engages

You want to send content that engages your audience. It’s got to be interesting, entertaining, and informative. Active agers want to read about how they can improve their lifestyle by staying fit and healthy. That’s where Prime Fit Content excels.

Our content focuses on what’s important to people over 50, the lifestyle benefits of regular exercise: better health, freedom to travel, longer autonomy, spending quality time with the grandkids, and so on. And it’s all created from their perspective.

The spice you add? Something about your business once a week. But don’t make it too salesy. That turns people off. A special promotion once a month is fine, but more than this and you’ll lose your audience. Nobody wants to receive emails that ask for credit card details all the time.

Step #5: Personalize your email newsletter

Finally, you get the best response by personalizing your email. You’re delivering content that is highly relevant to your audience. Now individualize it. Put their name on it. 

How much more inviting is an email subject line like ‘Hey, Jay, we thought we’d share these tips to improve your lifestyle’ than ‘Here are some tips to improve your lifestyle’?

If you are sending your newsletter via an email business service like MailChimp, this is done automatically for you.

Send email newsletters that help grow your gym business

An email newsletter is a basic, essential element of your fitness business marketing strategy. It helps retain clients and grow your business, without the need to pay for expensive advertising or spend endless hours on social media.

You need to be emailing your list consistently. And you must provide content that is useful, informative, entertaining, and engaging. Difficult? Not at all. That’s what we’re here for, to create the content that makes your email newsletters stand out. It’s effortless for you, and you can get started right now: