Exceed Fitness Franchise Goals with These Winning Local Advertising Strategies

As the fitness industry stabilizes from the post-pandemic boom, fitness franchises must focus on new strategies to stay competitive and meet their members’ demands. A recent Placer.ai report highlights key trends among fitness chains, including the shifting preference towards evening workouts, the rise of specialized fitness offerings, and young, single professionals as growth drivers. 

Fitness franchise marketers who equip their franchisees with local advertising tools to capitalize on these trends will recognize increased revenue, build stronger partnerships, and outpace competitors. These tools streamline campaign execution, ensure brand compliance, and make adoption easier for franchisees. By automating complex tasks and providing actionable insights into campaign performance, these tools allow fitness franchisees to focus on serving their members. 

Platform-Specific Strategies

Facebook

Facebook’s massive audience spans a wide range of age groups, making it ideal for reaching every demographic. Its sophisticated targeting capabilities allow fitness franchisees to connect with high-intent local audiences, driving traffic and membership sign-ups. Radius, zip code, and city targeting hone in on specific service areas, and minimum budgets of $1 a day make Facebook advertising attainable for most local businesses. Dayparting by location can increase performance and improve relevancy.

Instagram and TikTok

Vertical video content dominates on both Instagram and TikTok, and these platforms are ideal for promoting special classes, facilities, and amenities. Reels on Instagram and Facebook offer broad demographic reach with quick, impactful ads, though music usage is limited to original or licensed tracks. TikTok, appealing to a younger crowd, provides flexible video lengths for varied storytelling and boasts a vast music library. Both platforms offer valuable analytics, guiding franchisees to optimize their ad strategies. By empowering your franchisees with local advertising technology, you help them overcome the challenges of creating short-form video and enable them to take advantage of the power of vertical video advertising.  

While Reel’s targeting parameters are the same as Facebook’s (see above), it should be noted that TikTok parameters differ in several meaningful ways. First, TikTok does not allow for radius targeting, but rather focuses a level up to zip code, DMA, or city. Second, TikTok’s minimum budget requirements are higher at $50 per day. These spending requirements are lower than in years past and will continue to decrease as more and more advertisers leverage the tool and publish ads.

Amazon Ads Sponsored Display

Amazon Sponsored Display is a powerful new tool for targeting fitness enthusiasts based on purchase and viewing behaviors in the Amazon ecosystem. Tiger Pistol’s collaboration with Amazon Ads introduces Sponsored Display Ads to a broad range of businesses, including those not selling directly on Amazon, like big health clubs and gyms, specialty boutiques, and small fitness studios. Amazon assembles high-intent audiences from its vast data, allowing fitness franchisees to reach potential customers efficiently. Creative execution is a cinch, and Amazon Sponsored Display requires no minimum daily budget.  

As the fitness industry stabilizes and evolves, gym chains must stay agile and responsive to changing consumer habits. By empowering franchisees with local social advertising tools and strategies, gyms can address key trends identified in the Placer.ai report. Using platforms like Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, and Amazon Sponsored Display, fitness brands can meet their members’ needs, stay ahead of the competition, and drive traffic and membership sign-ups effectively.