Friday, January 2, 2009

Gym Advertising Ideas For January

Considering that the economy is in the toilet, many health club owners are absolutely strapped for cash right now. At the same time, we're all aware that January is the best month of the year for new gym memberships.

So how do you sell gym memberships in January when you have zero dollars in the marketing budget?

One of the best gym marketing ideas is to GIVE AWAY FREE MEMBERSHIPS ON THE RADIO.

What?!?!?! Give away free health club memberships? Are we crazy?

Absolutely not! When you have zero dollars for gym marketing, yet you need to get some name recognition, you can still find success by giving away free memberships.

Here's the plan: Go through the phone book and create a mailing list of every single radio station in your area. Be sure to include both AM and FM stations for maximum coverage. Then print up five (5) FREE 1-MONTH GIFT CERTIFICATES for each of those stations. So if you have twenty local radio stations, then you'll print off one hundred gift certificates.

Mail each station their five gift certificates, along with a letter that says something like this:
Dear _____ Radio Station,
January is the month of New Years Resolutions, and many (if not most) of your listeners are making a resolution to lose weight this year.

Enclosed you'll find several gift certificates for a FREE short-term membership at our health club. Please accept these as our gift to you, for you to use to help create on-air excitement this month! You may consider using these gift certificates as prizes or rewards. Many radio stations like yours award prizes like this at random, either for the _th caller or for answering a trivia question.

These gift certificates will be valued by your listeners, and each winner will appreciate the prize!

Please don't hesitate to contact me directly if you need any additional gift certificates. We would love the opportunity to partner with you in the future!

Sincerely,
__________, owner of ABC Health Club


Do you see the beauty of this concept? For the price of a stamp, an envelope and a few sheets of paper, you've 'bought' some radio advertising! When the radio DJ announces the contest and the prize on the air, you get the name of your gym on the radio! Not only that, but you've also (possibly) created a partnership with at least one local radio station that could lead to future promotional opportunities!

Who said good gym advertising ideas were hard to come by?

For even more gym advertising ideas click here.

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