For those of you who run bootcamp style training, do you use promotional materials like t-shirts, water bottles, baseball caps?
I’m going to be starting a bootcamp at the start of the New Year and am considering taking Todd Durkin’s advice (based on a great session I took of his at the IDEA World Conference this summer). He’s recommended purchasing t-shirts and the like. Do any of you do that?
Also, do any of you use an auto-pay billing system? If so, how does this work for you? If not, why?
Gretchen, although I don’t hold boot camps at my studio, I’ve have learned that when we give things away for free the clients generally don’t appreciate it.
I would personally do a give away after a certain client reaches a health or fitness goal. I would think that with the right motivational techniques in a boot camp setting, you can get your participants sufficiently motivated to earn a t-shirt, water bottle, baseball cap, etc.
As a small business owner, I believe in addition to focusing on the needs of our clients revenue generation is important.
A viable boot camp business model should maximize participant growth and provide a return on your investment. If you purchase those extras be sure you get a return on them. Worse case scenario, it’d be unfortunate if you made that investment and didn’t get the numbers to make it worth the investment.
If the business model is viable (if I were in your shoes), and people caught on and wanted to participate on a regular basis, then I would think of additional marketing strategies to make the already viable business plan more successful. By then you would know who your market is and would be in a better position to determine what type of freebie might appeal to them.
I wish you the best with your boot camps in 2012
I use T-shirts and make sure they are quality (Not Gildan) so they get use even after the camps. It really does improve cohesion and nobody cares how messed up their free shirt gets. I not only use but recommend auto payment systems. Its solved many money collection issues without me having to get personally involved. “Hey, its not a greedy instructor, its that automatic deductions fault!”
