How to successfully transition your clients from free fans to paying customers
Ready to take the leap from free classes to paid? Ready to transform your passion into a career as a fitness creator?
Might sound a little intimidating right? Asking folks who have long enjoyed your services for free to now start paying. Well, if you’re a little anxious about the transition, know this: you are not alone.
So to help, here are a few tips on how best to manage the transition and convert a good percentage of your free fans into paying customers.
First, use social media for what it’s best designed for — creating content
If you’ve been using social media to post free fitness content, start planning a transition towards using social media as your marketing tool vs your business tool. Don’t go cold-turkey overnight by flicking the proverbial switch on social or deleting any existing content, but begin building your “freemium” model.
Use occasional free content to build trust and equity with soon-to-be clients and leverage the power of social media to promote your paid offering through posts and “sneak-peak” videos.
Share the “why” behind your transition to paid
This is your passion, and your free fans are loving what you’re doing! So to make it sustainable to continue investing time and energy, and deliver more classes you need to start charging for your classes! Might sound obvious but that’s almost the point. Bring your fans in on your journey as you build something special with them as the early adopters. Many will just need the reminder of why it is you do what you do, and why it is they love what you do.
Make it easy for your clients to book & pay and build your business and brand — not someone else’s
Once you know you have enough interest to transition to your paid program, make sure you have the technology to make it seamless for your now clients! We live in the generation of Uber where a car can take pick you up and take you where you need at the click of the button. So make sure the booking and payment of your classes is convenient and easy to do. And most importantly make sure the solution you use is build YOUR business and brand that lets you capture all the value you create!
Create a menu of options for your clients to choose from
Take a leaf out of the books of studios and gyms and create a menu of pricing options to satisfy different appetites. Maybe you can have introductory class prices, classes of different lengths at different price points or a membership that encompasses an “all you can fit” program. Having a variety of options gives a broader group of people an opportunity to dive in.
Final thoughts
The most important thing to remember is to leverage the learnings to create and add value. Keep an open feedback loop with the early adopters of your online model to continue improving and optimizing your offerings as a fitness creator and to entice more free fans into paying customers.
If you are looking for a all-in-one platform to help you start, run and grow your business as a fitness creator check us out at onPodio.com.
We simplify your business by automating class creation, bookings, scheduling, payments, email reminders, and much more to give you that professional edge.
