Objective
Attracting new clients to the first classes with the special offer: “Three workouts with a trainer for 12$”.
About the project
At the start of work the studio in Primorsky District had just opened, and it was necessary to attract regular customers and generate a flow of inbound leads to the workouts. The studio was not a typical gym with workout equipment: it represented primarily functional training types, as well as exercise therapy and rehabilitation.
By the launch of the advertising campaigns, there had already been an Instagram account https://www.instagram.com/basis_fit/ and a website https://basis-fitness.ru/, which highlighted the main advantages of workouts at the studio.
There is just one location of the studio, so we planned our work only within Primorsky District in Saint Petersburg. The main male and female audience size was no more than 450 thousand people aged from 20 to 50 years old.
Stages of work
- Choice and preparation of the landing pages
- Analysis of the target audience
- Analysis of the competitors’ advertising, preparation of banners and advertising texts
- Testing of audiences and ads
- Upscaling of the results
Choice and preparation of the landing pages
As advertising platforms we used only Instagram and Facebook. We chose several landing pages for testing:
- The studio’s website https://basis-fitness.ru/
- A quiz with short questions https://mrqz.me/5e44d500c336da0044d7a13e
- The studio’s Instagram account https://www.instagram.com/basis_fit/
- Facebook lead generation forms
Before the start of work we had changed the logic of the site to make it easier for the visitor to perform one main target action – to leave their contact information in order to sign up for the workout. It was this action that was considered as conversion.
Analysis of the target audience and the competitors’ advertising
Nowadays, fitness is an integral part of life for most people who care about their health. Therefore, as the main one we chose a wide audience limited by age (20-50 years old) and geolocation (Primorsky District), subdivided into men and women. Thus, the advertising optimization could show better results.
Certainly, as part of data collection for primary analytics, we also tested more narrow audiences limited by detailed targeting, for instance: people interested in sport and fitness, in functional training types, exercise therapy and rehabilitation, personal training; people wishing to get slim, lose weight etc.
Preparation of banners and advertising texts
The studio somewhat stood out among the competitors because it was the professional level of functional training types that very few competitors in the district could offer. A lot of them used static banners for advertising, and at our disposal there were videos of very good quality, previously shot for the Instagram account. We immediately decided to use them.
Here are some examples of the promotional videos:
The texts focused on several main areas:
- A special offer in honor of the studio opening
- Losing weight after the holidays / before summer
- Emphasis on the workouts safety and efficiency
Testing of audiences and ads
After the launch of the first advertising campaigns it became clear that some narrow audiences generated cheaper leads than the wide audience. However, such audiences are significantly limited in size (approximately 10-15 thousand people), so we shouldn’t expect upscaling of the results from them. With the budget of about 13$ a day, such audiences burnt out in 1-2 weeks, and the cost per action sharply increased two- or threefold.
On the contrary, wide audiences initially had a slightly higher cost per action, but we could easily scale up our work with them to generate a steady lead flow. Men and women didn’t make significant difference for the cost per action.
In the first 2 weeks of work we received about 40 applications for the first 3 workouts with a trainer for 12$.
Next, we evaluated the conversions of different landing pages.
- The form of lead generation showed the lowest customer conversion rate. Despite the additional questions which required a manual response, there were a lot of non-target applications.
- Directing traffic to the Instagram account resulted in uncontrollable applications, because traffic can’t be optimized for a specific conversion.
- The quiz showed good results, but still more expensive than the website, and the applications from the quiz weren’t so converting.
- The site generated average-price leads, but the customer conversion rate was the highest – of about 40%. At this stage the cost per action on the site started from 6$.
We chose the studio’s website as the main landing page, because it had the highest conversion rate. In addition to tracking leads directly in Facebook Ads Manager, we evaluated the number of leads in the website CRM system. They were 20-30% as many. This is due to the fact that many people didn’t submit their application right away, but followed the Instagram account and made their decision later. Besides, a significant part of additional leads was generated through the referrals of existing customers.
Upscaling of the results
We focused mostly on the wide audience limited by age and geolocation. Through the advertising optimization we have been able to keep the cost per lead under 11$ for over 6 months.
The ads are updated about once a month in order to overcome banner blindness and the linkage to events and the season. It’s important, considering the limited audience size. We also create the retargeted databases of the people who engaged with the site but didn’t submit the application.
The cost was also influenced by the limitations of work and the temporary shutdown of the studio because of COVID-19. Even after the reopening, a lot of people were less willing to attend public places. During this period the cost fluctuated between 4,5$ and 10,5$.
Considering the additional 20-30% lead flow through the site, the final average cost per action for the period was about 8$.
Results
Even considering the coronavirus situation, we managed to keep the steady lead flow at an acceptable price and within the limited audience size. Average ad frequency during our work increased up to twofold per person.
Period of work: 6+ months
Received applications directly from advertising: 386
Cost per lead directly from advertising: 10,5$
Total applications received from the site: 510
Cost per lead from the site: 8$
Average conversion rate at the first payment: 40%