This past week we ran a Fit Body Boot Camp promotion with Group-on in 23 regions across the country.
I think it’s safe to say that this was the largest fitness based Group-on promotion ever. With thousands upon thousands of deals sold, I have to
admit that I was wrong about something I said about six months ago.
Deal of the day sites are not dead.
They are, in fact, very much alive.
Now having just come off a HUGE Group-on promotion for practically every Fit Body Boot Camp location in the U.S. I can tell you that this stuff works…
…BUT ONLY IF YOU HAVE YOUR SYSTEMS SET UP.
Otherwise you can expect complete and total disaster, which is what most people experience with deal of the day site and therefore end up hating them and wrongly calling them a waste of time.
There are three major factors in making your Group-on deal a massive success.
And by “massive success” I mean converting at least 30% of deal of the day buyers to ongoing clients who either 1) pay for a year in full, or 2) continue with your program on a 12 month recurring basis.
Never mind the money that you’ll get from Group-on, that’s just chump change compared to what you really stand to make if you get the follow three factors right.
1) The deal itself.
2) Your on-boarding proccess.
3) The clients experience and conversion.
First, the deal itself has to make sense. You can’t give the whole farm away, but you can’t expect to charge anywhere near what you really charge either.
Folks who subscribe to deal of the day sites simply want a deal.
This doesn’t mean that they’re “deal hoppers” or cheap or broke, or unwilling to pay full price – it just means they expect a DEAL from a D-E-A-L site.
When we were working with Group-on to set up our 23 region deal, we had to set up some ground rules.
It helps to have a relationship and history with them.
For us the ground rules were simple.
We wanted a short term (16 day) low cost deal and a 30 day higher priced deal (but for a better value than the 16 day deal).
We know our metrics… we know that about 80% of the buyers will take the 30 day deal which gives us the opportunity do two things…
1. To give the buyers a better experience and to indoctrinate them for a longer period of time – this making closing them easier.
2. Offering to absorb the cost of their month into an ongoing program (effectively giving them their first month for free) is a really cool way to convert buyers into clients.
We don’t agree to long 6, 8, or 12 week deals.
We keep the price of the deals as high as possible by stacking the value during the negotiation process.
FBBC maintain one of the highest buyer approval rating with Group-on making Group-on more likely to negotiate with us.
(We work hard at servicing every buyer and potential buyer… more on that in a minute.)
Secondly we take all of the buyer and potential buyer interaction off our Fit Body Boot Camp owners and we handle all of the phone calls, emails, FAQ questions and buyer support in house.
We set up special phone lines and numbers to field the incoming calls around the clock while the Group-on promotion is running.
We also field all email inquires and Group-on site questions so that FBBC owners can do what they do best which is to continue work with their clients and not have to worry about deal of the day buyers.
And this proccess keeps Group-on happy because they know that their buyers and potential buyer have a centralized place to call, email, and ask questions before and AFTER they buy.
Now once people buy the deal they are sent to calendar with limited spots per day where they can schedule their first orientation.
This way the FBBC location is not going to get random walk ins, or a boat load of people coming in at once and totally trowing off the vibe of your boot camp.
That can really piss off your loyal clients.
And even if the occasional Group-on buyer happens to miss the online scheduling calendar and walks into a location, they are politely asked to go back home, schedule their orientation, and to come on that day that’s specially designated for them.
This keep the trainer, clients, and deal of the day buyer cool as a cucumber.
Thirdly, and this is the most important part of the whole thing…
FBBC owners deliver the “wow” experience, show them how FBBC can be their fitness and fat loss home and then take them through the client conversion process.
Here’s a video of Fit Body Boot Camp owner Butch Nieves from New York talking about how he converts deal of the buyers to ongoing, long term clients.
I’d like to know what you think… Leave your comments, feedback, and thoughts down below. And Feel free to “like” tweet, or +1 this post if you got value from it 🙂
B