Social Media Influences: Fitness & Positivity — @GAINSBYBRAINS
Close your eyes. Think of all the people who you follow on Instagram, Twitter, Snapchat. Now ask yourself, have any of these people influenced you in what you wear, buy, or do? I can assure you, the answer is yes. Social media is filled with people who are known as Social Media Influencers, because they have the ability to market a certain product or lifestyle. I know that I follow loads of influencers. But my personal favourite is Sophie, more commonly known by Gains by Brains across her social media platforms.
Sophie is a Personal Trainer who encourages people worldwide to live their best life. The handle Gains by Brains was created as she wants to teach others how to grow personally both inside and outside the gym. She does this by using her personal training skills as well as positivity to encourage her followers to live a healthy life that is sustainable. She achieves this through multiple social media sites. Through Instagram, YouTube, Twitter and her own website, she posts numerous amounts of pictures and videos that all relate to her personal brand. Through social media she provided her followers with fitness routines that could help them achieve their goals. From starting off just like anyone of us with a couple hundred Instagram followers, she has now grown to have 126 thousand Instagram followers in just over a year and a half. Still being fairly new to the social media influencer list, Gains by Brains is headed in the direction of taking over personal training through social media. Sophie has clearly proven that being on social media consistently throughout the day has the power to build her own personal brand and influence others to live a healthier lifestyle.
Okay, but how do we know Gains by Brains is in fact a social media influencer? Easy. Go look at her Instagram page. Clearly, she has the 7 characteristics of an influencers. She tends to post two to three pictures a day, each with thousands of likes and hundreds of comments. These pictures are then also seen on website. Sophie also user her Instagram to post multiple stories a day, which gets thousands of views. On her stories, she also posts links to her YouTube videos, thus connecting all of her social medias. This essentially forces users to always somehow see what she is doing. Her connectivity levels are consistently high, and that has led to loads of followers. Her number of followers themselves make her an influencer. Every day her followers increases, and that in turn increases the amounts of likes and comments she gets on each picture. Every day she holds the power to influence more and more people. The photos she chooses to post are as real as they can be, while still promoting her personal brand. These pictures include her at the gym, or what she is eating at that moment. Each of these pictures then have captions that seem as if she is having a conversation with the viewer. Whenever she posts videos, she talks in a conversation tone which helps her followers to relate to her even more. Sophie’s post constantly makes her viewers feel as if they know her, which helps lead to her personal success. Through her posts, she shows her being part of the leisure class, as they show what would be acceptable in a lifestyle like hers. Finally, her posts provide a sense of escapism. Through her posts, she invites her followers to do what she is doing in order to build your fitness experience. Clearly, she is already influencing her current followers, and she is on her way to influencing thousands more.
Speaking of Gains by Brian’s posts, how did she get to the level that she is at today? Well you know, one day she just decided she was going to influence all of her followers and BAM, 126 thousand followers just decided to trust her opinion. Well…something like that must’ve happened, right? To start off, she made her brand evident. In every single one of her posts there is something that either relates to fitness or personal health. The minute you glance at her account it screams her brand. That directly leads to building her community. All of her social medias are consistent with one another and all connect. Any picture posted on Instagram is also seen on her website. Any video she posts on YouTube is advertised on her Instagram stories, and also posted onto her Twitter. Each of her outlets have links to the other in order for all of her followers to have the most interactive experience possible. She engages with her audience consistently throughout the day, and that only increases her credibility and her followers. Each one of these postings have optimal quality. They all seem professionally taken or edit and all follow the same aesthetic and tend to have similar looks. She also excels in community involvement. All of her posts encourage her followers to ask questions or to send in emails regardless if the post is a picture, a video, or an Instagram story. Her success of being an influencer was taken to the next level when she received multiple endorsement deals. Currently, she has endorsements with both Women’s Best and Gymshark. Women’s Best is a weight loss program that also carries sportswear, and Gymshark is a clothing line that carries gym wear exclusively. Both of these endorsements represent her personal brand that she worked hard to develop.
Sophie uses her social media in order to endorse these products. The majority of her posts are of her wearing Gymshark and Women’s Best clothes and products. This is beneficial because her followers see her using the products and in turn those products become credible. Her followers will begin to think, “if these products are good enough for Sophie to use, they are definitely good enough for me to use.” They begin to think that if she has success while using these items, they will also have success if they use them. Along with this, whenever Gymshark releases new products, Sophie is one of the first to get it. She then uses her social media sites to review the products and compare it to the previous ones. This provides her followers with a better understanding of the product and helps them make a better decision in when they’re ordering a Gymshark item. Personally, I am a huge fan of Gymshark clothing lines, however I find that everything fits differently. Having Sophie review the products lets me understand the differences between them and gives me an idea of what sizes I should order for myself. Sophie also provides her followers with the chance at asking questions about the products in either the comments, or sometimes if she does a live stream. This gives the idea that she is really having a conversation with her friends, since she is able to converse back and forth. I think this just adds to her overall success. Breaking that wall between the viewer and the talent essentially shows people that Sophie is a real person and that she genuinely cares about the people she is influencing. She gives off the idea that we are all one big community, and everything she succeeds in is a win for all of us.
Not only does Gains by Brains provide reviews on her endorsed products, but why I think she has so much success is because of her online coaching. Through her Instagram she posts short clips of different work outs. In the captions she explains why those workouts are important and key tips in order to see best results.
She will also post YouTube videos of different topics all relating to health and fitness. These video topics include how to cut muscle mass, how to bulk lean muscles, why you are not seeing definition in abs, and a whole lot more. This is an effective way to sell your brand without selling an actual physical product. Each of these posts help people get started on their fitness journey through helpful tips and demonstrative clips. She will also post about the food she eats and why she eats it. She believes that working out, as well as good nutrition will help people see the best results.
These workout plans and food tips were then expanded to her website, where you can buy different nutrition and work out plans that best fit your needs. Each of these plans of personalized through communication with Gains by Brains and are created to help the users reach their goals in a set time period. These workout posts help break up the constant selfies of her working out or in different athletic clothing but still relates to her personal brand.
But just like everyone, Sophie sometimes does post about her regular day life outside of the gym. In the captions she will still discuss how she used the day to reach her personal fitness goals, but they post itself may not be of her working out. I think this shows her followers that she too is a regular girl that decided to change her lifestyle. This encourages her followers that they too can reach their fitness goals if they have the dedication that she has had throughout her journey. That’s her main objective — to prove to anyone that they can do whatever they like if they have the determination. Throughout all of her posts, whether they are workouts, endorsement posts, or food posts, they all encourage followers to live their best life and try their hardest to succeed.
I know that Sophie, or rather Gains by Brains, has influenced me over the past year. I am really into fitness and following Gains by Brains has only strengthened my love for it. On a weekly basis I wait for her to post her YouTube videos and I follow her tips religiously. I follow her nutrition tips and I find myself working towards the same goals as she does. Before following her, I didn’t care or know what Gymshark was. But now a year later I have multiple of my own items, all of which Sophie has. I would also never order a product that Sophie hasn’t reviewed. I feel that I can trust her opinion and know that if she likes the item, so will I. I know that without following her on each of her social media outlets I would not have achieved as much as I have. Sophie has just dipped her toe in the waters of being a social media influencer, yet she is off to a great start. Competing with so many other fitness social media moguls, Sophie has a lot to live up to, but considering the success she has had over the past year I think she will definitely make an impact on the fitness world.
