Fitness Routines and Social Media Usage

12 out of 12 consumers are actively pursuing some form of fitness. However, it is noted that they talked about fitness with different levels of encouragement and passion. On one side, Charles argues for his gym membership with “[…] I'm not a very sporty person, so I'm not into some kind of sports. So, the only way for me to stay fit is by going to the gym”. On the other side, Thaddeus describes himself as a

“[…] very passionate sports man”, who accomplishes several other sports activities with friends next to working out in a gym.

10 out of 12 consumers have a current gym subscription. However, David and Sandra, who are no present gym customers state that they had gym memberships in the past. David explains this with his current living situation, which also sets the conditions for his fitness routine. Going to the gym obtains only functional values for him, as it is “[…] more means to an end than an end itself”. On the contrary, other activities that he defines as his hobbies such as surfing, or skateboarding contain emotional values and are “[…] more an end than a mean”. 6 out of 12 consumers describe going to the gym as their hobby, whereas other participants view it more as something that should be accomplished as Annika points out:

“I try to go to the gym two times a week. Sometimes I am better at that, sometimes I'm really, really bad at it”.

8 out of 10 current gym customers state that they are doing other fitness routines next to going to the gym. The most mentioned alternative is running, followed by yoga and home workouts. At this point, the influence of the Coronavirus outbreak on the consumers’ fitness routines is noticeable. Since all gyms were closed by the governments in Denmark, Germany and Portugal at the time of the interviews (week 14, 2020), the participants are pursuing other fitness methods to stay active. As an exceptional consequence of the Coronavirus, many brands offer free access to their online fitness videos for one up to several months, which is why Sandra acknowledges that there are “[…] lot of things going on where you have some people showing your exercises for free, which is nice”. The free access to home workout videos as well as the obligation to practice social distancing thus results in the high popularity of home workouts at the moment.

78 12 out of 12 consumers affirm that their fitness routine plays an important role in their lives. Amelie describes her routine as “[…] more like kind of a lifestyle to be active”, while the importance for Apolline is “[…] on of a scale of 10, I would say 10”. Achieving fitness goals is also interconnected to achieving other goals in life as Andreas affirms that “[…] it makes me mentally fit because when I try to achieve the goals in the gym, on the other hand, I try to reach my personal life goals”.

Having a fitness routine is highly valued by the consumers as it has great impact on other aspects of their lives. 9 out of 12 consumers share their most desired outcome of working out, which is escaping the stressful daily life with what Charles describes as “[…] the sense of achievement, the sense of stress relief”. Besides that, 4 out of 12 consumers mention the high learning effect as another desired outcome of a fitness routine. Apart from working out in order to feel less stressed, fitness routines and goals help the consumers to learn more about their body, the right nutrition and how to lead an active lifestyle outside of the gym as well.

As a transition from the importance of fitness in the participants’ daily lives, the consumers were asked to evaluate the importance of social media in their daily lives. On a scale from 1 to 10, 7 out of 12 consumers evaluate the importance of social media with a value higher than 5. While two consumers give it the lowest value of 3, 4 out of 12 consumers evaluate it with an 8 or higher. Hereby, the average lies at 6.9. At this point, the implications of the Coronavirus leading to social distancing again are noticeable. As many participants state, the lockdown of most social interactions has increased their social media usage drastically. Focus of the usage lies thus on staying up to date on friends’ lives and find entertainment. As social media enables the consumers to stay close to each other while considering physical social distancing, Sandra admits being “[…] very addicted to that at the moment”.

Aligned with Sandra’s statement, 6 out of 12 consumers mention the danger of being addicted to social media. Most interestingly, these six consumers all evaluated the importance of social media as above 5.

Charles, for instance, who defines himself as a heavy social media user, admits that there are “[…] videos that hook you in, and that you end up watching for hours”. In order to avoid being addicted and wasting too much time on social media, Amelie controls herself and limits her social media activities to one hour a day. The waste of time through social media is also mentioned by consumers who evaluate social media

79 as less important for themselves. Annika, for instance, would be happy if social media would be switched off and would “[…] actually sometimes enjoy it because I get annoyed at myself about how much I use social media sometimes and how much time I'm wasting on it”.

12 out of 12 consumers are using both Facebook and Instagram. In addition, nine of them are using other social media platforms as well, most frequently including Snapchat, YouTube and TikTok. However, all 12 consumers report that Instagram is the social media platform that they use most. The main reason for this is that content on Instagram is perceived as more relevant than on other platforms by the consumers.

For David, Instagram is the only platform that keeps him informed about his social network, whereas other platforms are purely used for entertainment. Instagram is the most informative and efficient social media platform to keep consumers up to date because their peers also use it the most. Moreover, 6 out of 12 consumers mention the visuality of Instagram compared to Facebook as the main reason for using Instagram the most. While Apolline describes her usage of Instagram as “[…] a personal magazine”, Charles describes his feed “[…] as his universe”, that is carefully curated and enhanced by following interesting accounts.

12 out of 12 consumers mention that they are using Instagram more for communication with friends than with companies. Hereby, Instagram serves as an alternative for WhatsApp, on which direct, one-to-one conversations are happening. However, on Instagram, people can get updates on their peers’ lives without necessarily engaging in direct conversations since users post pictures that are available to all followers.

In contrast to their communication with friends on Instagram, the consumers’ opinions are divided in regard to the communication with companies over Instagram. While all consumers follow brands and companies on Instagram, only 5 out of 12 consumers declare to have had an interaction with companies in the past. This happened mostly through participating in polls in the companies’ Instagram stories or by using the platform as a customer service tool. Nevertheless, 12 out of 12 consumers do not recognize an impact on their communication with brands because of Instagram or Facebook. However, all of them admit that following brands on social media has a high influence on their consumption. According to Csanád, this is especially applicable if he is about to make “[…] a high involvement decision, or a high involvement purchase, when I'm actually trying to get as much information as I can”. Here, the way

80 brands represent themselves on Instagram has a major influence on the consumers’ perception of the brand as Apolline thinks that “[…] the brand image is reflected on the different posts that the brand is actually posting”.

It is noticed that although 10 of 12 consumers are current gym customers, only 1 out of 12 consumers follows his gym’s profile on Instagram. While 7 out of 12 consumers assume to find the social media content of their past or present gym chain potentially interesting, there are also strong opposers. Although working out multiple times per week in the gym, Andreas has no interest at all in content that his gym chain could share on Instagram, since it all seems like a big promotion to him. For him, his gym chain’s Instagram presence is all about “[…] looking at all these Instagram gym models. For me it's always the same content, and it's quite boring”.

In contrast to following gym chains on Instagram, 9 out of 12 consumers are following at least one account of a fitness lifestyle influencer, often several. Hereby, the fitness content is not necessarily the motivation to follow them originally but the insights into the influencer’s daily life and other interests such as fashion, food or travel. Accordingly, fitness related content is often consumed on Instagram as a popular side effect. Still, many influencers focus on sharing details on their fitness routine online, and Sandra describes them as her “[…] daily inflow of inspiration”, of which workouts can be done at home or whose accounts she might follow as well.

4 out of 12 consumers are aware of the fact that there are many free home workout videos available on social media, which are posted by gym chains and fitness influencers. However, the consumers do not follow these accounts but only visit them from time to time when they want to be exposed to that content.

Annika does the same where she “[…] would actively search for those people if I want that input, but I don't need to see it every day”. Accordingly, the interest in gym and workout content is present, but is only temporary and does not has the extent at which the consumer decides to become a follower of the influencer or gym chain.

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