The biggest challenges with growing a business is keeping your client numbers up! This mean not only bringing in new clientele on a regular basis, but also maintaining great relationships with current clients.

Client acquisition and retention can be quite the task; however, with the right systems set up, it gets a lot easier! I have been running my business for 13 years now and have been in my current studio location for six of those years. In all these years of doing business I can tell you that I have never had to be sales-y to sell services.

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The main strategies I have used are nurturing relationships, providing exceptional service, and encouraging word of mouth.

Here are three relationship-focused ways I’ve retained existing clients:

1. Provide Exceptional Service

This is something I have always stood by, even when I was a young’n in the game. I am very passionate about what I do and love helping people! Giving clients the best workouts, feedback, nutrition advice, and experience in the gym has come fairly easy to me.

As my business began to grow and I began to build a team of trainers working under me, I had to ensure that those employed in my business were doing the same. This required me to build systems to ensure no one is forgotten. Currently, there are clients who are training in my business who I haven’t met yet because they are training with one of my trainers. Whether it is a group fitness client, personal training, nutrition coaching, online training, or youth athlete, i ensure systems and technology take care of everyone.

Automated emails, text reminders, personalized check-in emails, and phone calls are all ways to ensure we are providing exceptional service to our studio members. As the owner, I ensure all clients know who I am and how to contact me if they ever have a concern about the service they are receiving at my studio. Our main goal is to get people results, help motivate them to become the best versions of themselves, and overall feel ten times better when they leave our studio then when they walked in. These are the main determinants that will keep clients coming back for a long time!

2. Implement a Customer Loyalty Program

At Core Conditioning, we have many systems in place to reward those who have been coming to our studio for a long time. We have clients who have been coming to our studio weekly since 2014 when we opened at our current location.

Week after week, they’ve kept coming back, for six years. Why? Because we have provided them exceptional service and honour their loyalty through our client loyalty program. Reward clients who come to your studio multiple times per week or for many years! If they know how much you appreciate each and every one of them they are more likely to continue purchasing your services.

3. Create an Atmosphere They Love

This is so very important, especially in today’s hyper-competitive fitness industry. Despite there being five or six other training studios within a few blocks of my training studio, I never feel threatened by them. I feel that we have created an amazing, upbeat, and motivating atmosphere at our studio that keeps people coming back.

Our clients know exactly what they are going to get each time and they enjoy it. We have created a “fit fam” at our studio with special events and contests to bring all the clients together to get to know each other and really feel like they are “home” when they are in our studio. This is another factor that keeps people coming back! They miss it when they are away, and they crave the feeling they have post-workout when they walk out of your studio.

These are just a few ways you can increase client retention in your fitness business—and I promise, you can do it without having to be sales-y!