CBBE on Social Media for Gym Chains

The lack of CBBE awareness of marketing managers in combination with the conferred power of consumers represent a challenge for gym chains to gain strategic advantage through their social media marketing efforts. Thus, social media should be considered as a tool to create CBBE including its four brand assets. Some of the actions referring to the individual brand assets are interrelated and therefore cannot be clearly separated. Furthermore, social media initiatives might result in additional positive effects on other brand assets. In the following, several managerial implications are introduced which are partly illustrated by examples based on a fictional gym chain (i.e. Best Gym). All implications are dependent of the gym chains’ financial resources. Although this section refers to managerial implications for social media, these implications are often interlinked to offline actions.

One main objective of the social media marketing strategy of gym chains should be to create brand awareness. Therefore, influencer marketing is identified as one of the most effective tools. However, it is fundamental to choose influencers who represent the gym chain as well as the target group’s values and needs. In order to increase the brand’s reach, it is recommended to not limit the social media marketing to fitness influencers but to also include influencers from different areas such as fashion and music. The influencers could promote the gym chain by tagging it in their workout posts and stories.

Further, captions and hashtags such as “This is my favorite gym ever! The people are amazing, their

110 service is great, and the atmosphere is super motivating!

#BestGymEver” should be used to underline the gym chain’s values. This initiative could be accompanied by sponsoring local fitness athletes. Further, real life events (e.g. open-door events, fitness events, festivals, concerts) could be sponsored and broadcasted via a live stream on the gym chain’s Instagram profile for consumers. To increase the motivation of purchasing a gym membership the whole live stream could only be accessible on the website for paying customers. In order to promote the sponsored events accordingly, countdowns could be set and shared in the gym chain’s story on Instagram.

Besides influencer marketing, regular discount codes and promotions for new and existing customers should be implemented. Christmas, Valentine’s Day or the beginning of summer represent special occasions where consumers are aiming

at becoming more sportive and are thus looking for a new gym membership. In this context, promotions such as one month of free training for new customers or monthly percentual discounts for existing customers could be created (see Figure 16).

Moreover, fitness challenges such as a “Yoga Challenge” could be initiated animating the followers to participate (see Figure 17). The consumers who have successfully taken part in the challenge are asked to nominate a certain number of friends. Another approach may be to involve employees in fitness challenges. An employee performing a sporting exercise such as pull-ups could be presented in the gym chain’s Instagram story. Afterwards, the consumers are invited to complete this exercise faster. Since the customers are supposed to tag friends, the engagement of the community would make the challenges go viral and brand awareness would be created. In order to reach even more consumers, collaborations with nutrition and other fitness-related brands (e.g. protein bars, healthy snacks) could be entered.

Figure 16: Instagram Post Example – Special Offer (Pixabay, 2016-a). Source:

Authors' own Depiction.

111 Both brands could benefit from this collaboration by sharing it in their Instagram stories and posts. Additionally, thy gym consumers would gain knowledge and additional health information.

As for consumers, the gym chain should strive to include them as key part of the social media content creation process and encourage them to create UGC regularly. For instance, by asking them to share the location of the gym and using unique hashtags which have been promoted by the gym (e.g. “#BestGymEver”,

“#MyFavoriteGym”). In return, some of the posts could get reposted on the gym chain’s Instagram account. Similarly, the brand can encourage the consumers to post transformation pictures. As such, the gym chain could promote this action by featuring the best transformation pictures on their social media and reward them with a merchandise or workout gear in addition. Other than that, social media marketing measures like paid ads should also be considered to create brand awareness.

Further, it is fundamental to actively seek brand loyalty as it leads to competitive advantage. As the offline gym experience is of major importance in the process of strengthening brand loyalty, it should complement the social media marketing strategy. In fact, it is recommended to build a strong brand community which is based on the shared interest of fitness to enhance the brand loyalty. Therefore, customer events could be organized by the gym chain, e.g. parties, fitness festivals or cooking classes, which are then advertised on the gym chain’s social media account.

To arouse the customer’s interest social media concepts like storytelling should be considered. Therefore, workout tips, instructions and healthy recipes could be divided in multiple content parts and shared separately in different posts or stories (see Appendix 7). Hashtags could, again, support this action (e.g.

“#StayTuned”, “#ToBeContinued”).

Figure 17: Instagram Post Example - Yoga Challenge (Pixabay, 2017-a). Source:

Authors' own Depiction.

112 Likewise, brand associations and the perceived quality are often shaped by the offline experience of the consumers but can be strongly influenced by the social media strategy of the gym chain.

As brand associations are rooted deeply in consumers’ minds, building and maintaining positive associations should be focused strongly in the process of the social media marketing strategy creation. This refers to the clear communication of the gym chain’s USPs. In order to find out which attributes the gym chain is associated with, surveys could be carried out in the Instagram story function (e.g. “Which attributes do you associate with our gym?”, see Figure 18). The gym chain should adjust its communication on social media in the case that the results do not reveal the desired associations. Overall, it is fundamental to embed the consumers in the process of building brand associations.

Since the brand community is a significant contributor to brand associations, the gym chain should highlight its community on social media. This could include pictures of their target group in group workouts or customer interviews about what they like best about the gyms. Moreover, the functional values of the gym chain should be emphasized (see Figure 19).

These values can be transmitted through Instagram stories and posts about the equipment, i.e. machines, facilities, course rooms. As a gym chain’s service represents a significant reference point for consumers, individual employees could be introduced. Thereby, they could tell more about their work or their favorite part of the gym (e.g. “Hey Name XY, what is your responsibility in our studio and which workout is your favorite one?”).

This traces back to the aspect of perceived quality. Here, the service and the gym chain’s quality should be pointed out. For instance, by introducing all unique features the gym has to offer, e.g. saunas, showers,

Figure 18: Instagram Post Example - Quality (Pixabay, 2020). Source: Authors' own Depiction.

113 chill areas, equipment. Customers can, again, be involved in this

action by participating in Instagram stories in which they are asked what they like about the machines, for instance. Regarding the brand asset of perceived quality, Instagram polls, question and survey functions are a recommended tool to use. Consumers could be asked “Do you like the quality of our gym?” in order to assess whether the communication strategy on social media should be reconsidered in terms of quality (see Figure 18).

Considering all of the above-mentioned implications for gym chains referring to CBBE, it can be concluded that various measures on social media can effectively contribute to enhance the individual brand assets. Nevertheless, the most important managerial implication remains that the consumer should be included in the strategy creation process and a clear communication of the USPs should be ensured.