Sell By Chat for Gym Owners: Does It Work?

Amanda Chace runs the show, and she's been acquiring leads since Chris Cooper issued his challenge in December. Amanda, welcome to the show. How are you today?

So it was very hesitant to share this group in there, but I think there was another member in the Two-Brain family that posted how they went about doing this. So I took what they posted and I revamped it. And essentially just like Coop's been saying for years, help first. So I just offered you know, a way to get through the, all of the advice that's out there. And because I am a mom in the group, I think it was well received.

So out of the 150 new people that have come into my Facebook group, I would say almost 90% of them are coming from that post that I made in the moms group.

And that whole thing, what you've done instead is you've, you know, put yourself in the community. And now when you have some something to help with your offer of expertise is genuine. It's helpful. And it doesn't seem like solicitation because if I just popped in there and I was like, Hey , I just started a local Foxborough group. And they're like, who is this guy? And what's this deal and why does he have a Canadian accent, right?

Yeah. That wouldn't work so well, but for you because you're part of it and you've laid these tracks, made these connections. It works really well to say, Hey, I actually started a group to help you guys with these problems. And it seems helpful rather than like, here's the carrot and you're luring people in.

So they're intrigued by it , the idea of what we are in this gym, but I didn't just wanna throw it out there. Hey, come in and talk to us. Right. And I would follow some of Chris's sell by chat , instructions, if you will . But I just found that , a lot of these, and I know there's a lot of other owners that are doing this that feel the same way. A lot of these moms just needed a little bit of an outlet to talk to.

It's almost like having somebody that they can vent to that they don't really know in their life. That's listening. So that was important for me because a few times I started these chats in the messenger. I would, I would start to, Hey, I'd start to say, all right , why don't we chat? Why don't we get on the phone? Let's let's meet. And right away, it was like, oh, I either got ghosted or they were like, oh yeah , it's really busy. And , to be honest with you.

So right now, Mike, where we are i outside of Boston is just like most places. There's a little bit of a uptick in COVID cases. So a lot of people are kind of laying low right now.

So that's how the leads have been coming in and that's how I've been nurturing them . I would say one thing that I've learned from this is when I created the group, when you're making the rules and how to have your leads come into this group. I did not ask for an email address at first, and that was a big mistake. So I think it was , I think 90 requests were coming through and I was all excited.

I'm hitting go, go, go, and then wait a second, beyond this group, how am I gonna be able to get ahold of these people? So then I started making your email address, be part of how to get into the group. And so now I think I have close to 80 new emails that I can use . Again, I haven't put them into our system yet in terms of getting some of our daily emails, I wanna make sure I build up this trust first. And then I don't have an endpoint .

I think it's gonna happen in a few weeks when I transfer these email addresses over, but I wanted to get those conversations going first in messenger .

So we'll get into the exact mechanics of it . But first I wanna ask you sales figures , you've got anything that relates to these leads . Like, are they showing up and purchasing yet? Or is this a long play that's gonna , you're gonna see more results later.

So overall five, if you will, sales have come from it. Which is which five more than we had before this.

But the point is is that you started a new thing and you haven't spent Facebook advertising money on this project. This is an organic thing, which is kind of cool because so you've made five sales from it for the cost of your time and your resource and so forth. So let's quickly just go over the mechanics of this whole thing. We've covered a little bit about it already. Few details we'll throw out for people.

So what you've done is you started a group and the basic idea is it would be called something like fitness and nutrition in X or some variation thereof. Don't make it a clever group, right? You don't want, people have to figure out it's like , the DaVinci code here. We don't want people to have to figure that out for themselves, make it blunt, and then add your region , your area, whatever your gym catchment area of your gym , if you will , or something like that from there, what are you doing ?

So you're getting people in there . Talk to me about the steps that happen from there. How do you get them to start talking ? What are you giving away in that group ?

I will say , at some point Facebook may, if you have the same message and you copy and paste, Facebook may like flag you for a moment and not let you send messages for about 24 hours. So I learned that really quickly

And for me to be responding back with likes and comments and following up with questions, and then again, I'll send that ebook in messenger. So I will say that the commitment at first can feel overwhelming, especially if you do a big drop in an outside group and you're inviting people in.

I would say, if you haven't done this yet, be ready to kind of sit at your computer, give yourself a couple hours, drop that in that group, and then wait for everything to come in and just be ready to like and comment like and comment and send. Otherwise it'll feel a little overwhelming. If you jump on later in the day, whoa , you have all these notifications.

So that, what that does is just says , Hey, offer to help DM me, that post kind of people see it and act on it. But it's not one of those large things where 50 people comment or whatever on your post, and then the original group owner boots you because you're siphoning people out. So that's a really interesting one. Yep . I love that strategy. That's very clever.

And then the second thing that you've got going on here is you're dedicating time to it and knowing cause Facebook and, you know , Instagram and all these social media platforms are instant places now, right? So people expect instant stuff. So if you sit there and you make your post, and then you go on to coach four or five classes and people have done their stuff, they're gonna forget. When they see something, they want something. So you are dedicating time to it.

The part that I wanna get into now, just so that people understand is what is the e-book, what's the give here? What are you using as call it lead magnet or hook?

There's countless, before I joined Two-Brain I would get emails from Coop and I'd flag them all and I wanna read it and I wanna read it. And I wanna listen to Mike on the podcast and if it seemed like it would take more than a few minutes of my time, it was flagged and then maybe I wouldn't get around to it. So in this case, I wanted to make sure it was really quick. Someone could read it, you know, while they have two minutes before their kid gets their attention again.

So that was important to me. So a lot of it was coming from what I was writing in the past. And then what Two-Brain has offered, stuff that Chris Cooper has written himself stuff that other owners have written. And I'm actually utilizing a lot of my peers in the Two-Brain g roup. So I'm a part of a lot of their groups. And when I see someone post something and the way they articulate it, ask for permission, I copy it. I make it my own, make it my own spin, and then I post it.

So that's how I'll convert either things to post i nformation to eBooks if you w ill. So it's a simple PDF. Y eah.

It doesn't have to be, you know, the exact macro tracking plan for fat loss in, you know, intermittent fasting. It can be something more simple where it's just like, here are five holiday eating tips, right. And it can be very basic low level. The point is, is that the title of this thing, what you call it and picture that's on it should look enticing to someone who is a part of that group.

So if you've called it fitness and nutrition, it needs to solve a fitness and nutrition problem and it should be quality, right? You need to give away something good. And again, it doesn't have to be the entire keys to the city, but it should be at least something. Do you have a title of a couple of that you've given away by any chance?

And they were a little intimidated about what they should be posting. And I think it's just important to remind ourselves that a lot of the leads that at least they're coming through minus the current members that are at my gym , that are in this group, the other leads, they aren't following the same fitness and nutrition things on Instagram that I'm following. Right . They're not exposed to this information all of the time. They're exposed to honestly what's thrown on the news.

What's the biggest thing on new year's fas diet. And this brings back to why it's important for me to build that trust at first. Yeah . Because what I know what I have to say is really important and they need to hear it. But I wanted them to trust me before they heard that through me. So it's not, I'm not recreating the wheel. Like you said, it's not an extensive macro guide. It's just really basic information that they may not see on their social media feeds. And that was important.

They're seeing my posts more often, they're commenting and liking and then I'll comment back. And now you get those new leads starting to see these, these pop up on their social , on their feeds. Because again, if you're part of 30 groups, it's really hard to get top of mind. It's really hard to get that top five. So a lot of it would be, I think on Sunday we try to post some Sunday morning on some recipes and food prepping ideas.

If someone's heading to the grocery store, the Sunday scaries talking about what are people, you know, what do they think about on Sundays? And then Fridays, it's going into the weekend, tips, you know, whether it's nutrition or fitness. So , of course it's geared towards my group and the majority of my group are moms, if you will .

So it's, it's trying to , you know , how do you fit in something in between when your kids are going to school or picking them up and then I'm asking them what they're doing. So what did you do today? What did you, what are you doing in the next five days? Just trying to have conversations. And if I feel like I need to take it off into a messenger, I will , but I'll make that clear. Hey Kathy , I'm gonna send you a direct message.

We can talk more about this so that other people are seeing me, oh, this is actually someone real. That's actually having these conversations.

She just woke up , the idea though, is you're just being human beings, starting conversations, asking questions, generate engagement, doing the things that will build the quality of this group. And the mechanical aspect of that, that you said is it gets people liking, commenting, triggers the Facebook algorithm to perhaps feed them this group more often or whatever it is. But the main point is you're giving away info regularly.

And then every once in a while, there's a big thing that they have to ask you for essentially. And then you start those conversations. Tell me a little bit about those larger conversations. You've hit it at the smaller ones where you talk , like when someone's, you know, you get enough response on a general post. Talk about the big, like the lead magnet ones where it's like, okay, I've got the seven tips for better sleeping, they leave a comment , you message. 'em. How do those chats go?

And Mike, I'm not an expert in sleep , but I certainly have some, you know, put your phone away. There's certain things that people just need to hear , about that topic and it'll help them. So I'll just try to prompt a question. I think the biggest thing is the follow up . So if I don't, so again, if I'm dedicating an hour or two without, throughout the week to answer or send these messages and answer these questions, there needs to be some follow up as well.

So for me, it's just setting my calendar to say, go through the Facebook messenger and check in on those people. Hey, thinking about you. Again , pulling some of the stuff from Chris, Cooper's sell by chat . Hey, I was thinking about your problem or your fill the blank. This is what I think. But again , it's always just kind of bringing it back to them and how they're feeling. So someone think someone the other day said, I'm really interested. I'm extremely interested in trying CrossFit.

I'll let you know when I'm ready . Ooh . Okay. Here we go . So it's like, what do you think's holding you back? Is it your schedule? Is it your brain? Like what's going on? You know, so it's just trying to dive into that.

And at some point, you know, if they think about fitness and nutrition, they're like I met Amanda at a party and this digital group is the equivalent of that party. Tell me about how those conversations now. So you get to the point , like we have a script. So we, and again, this script is not hard and fast where you have to follow it.

It's just an idea and a guideline of what might work in these chats where it's like , I'm, you know, I was thinking about your problem, here's some things, can we come in and talk about it? How do you deliver that in general? Like when you get, like, how do you know when a lead or chat, I guess we'll call it is ripe for that the next step to come in and meet with you and have a no sweat intro.

And I think it brings it back to the point of, you know, some of these leads are friends with current members that are in this group and they know that Kim does CrossFit and CrossFit Torque, and they know that Kim loves it. They don't really know if they wanna do it. Right. But now they've been introduced to me. They have another person, another face that they can relate to. So now they have two people that they trust that are doing this thing.

It makes it a lot easier for them to come in through the door or have these conversations. So to answer your question, how do you know they're ready? you know, a lot of the times I can just tell by the way, they're sharing information with me that they're ready to take that step, but there is some barrier to it. It could be schedule, could be finances. It could be the keyboard warrior that they just like to spit it all out, but they're not ready to talk about it in person .

It's just trying to read the conversation and sometimes you hit it , right ? And sometimes you don't , you know , my undergraduate degree is in psychology. So I feel like there's a little bit that helps with that.

Where you're using your current clients to get to your next clients. Because the person that's most likely to buy from Kim at your gym is Kim's partner. Or Kim's kids or , they wouldn't buy necessarily, but you get the idea. Affinity marketing. This is a nice extension of that. And then all you're doing is you're starting these conversations. So I think it would be a mistake for a gym owner who starts this to say, this is gonna solve all my problems right now. My marketing thing is done.

I don't need to spend more money on Facebook. I'm gonna have 150 leads, Twitter y ou k now, all these conversations a nd sell a bunch of stuff. I think the g reater idea i s I'm gonna expect t o h ave s ome l eads f rom some very i nteresting people who are warm, that I hit t hem at exactly the right time, but it's more likely that I'm g oing to talk to people. And in those conversations, I'm gonna get an opportunity to help. And you can think of these as like a pre n o sweat i ntro, right?

Where you're finding out what their things are. Like you t alked to this one person, and I think it was she said, I 've thought about CrossFit for a w hile. O kay. So now, you know, this person is probably interested in high intensely functional training to some degree, probably in a group setting. And that gives you, you know, more information that you can then use later on. If that person said, a h, you know, I've looked at CrossFit.

I just never really liked it that much, but I've always wanted to get fitter. Y ou're like, maybe this person is a personal training client, right? Do you l og that info? Like, do you have like a giant, excuse me, giant spreadsheet for all this info. So when you're like, y ou k now, person X said this, do you note that down? O r how do you track t his s tuff?

So whether it's fitness, nutrition, mindset, all of the above, and then specifically , because fitness and nutrition is really our crux here, are they personal training or they group, it's funny that you say that I had a really great conversation going back and forth with someone and in nowhere in the group does it say CrossFit Torque, our logo is on the eBooks. It says Torque health and fitness, home of CrossFit torque.

So we're having this great conversation and going to schedule the no sweat intro going to confirm the address and few seconds go by. And she pops back in, she goes , oh , CrossFit Torque, I don't want CrossFit. No, thank you. And I was like, wait , wait, whoa. We just had this really fantastic conversation about what your goals were, how we could help you achieve them. So then I tried to save the conversation, talked about personal training and , have not heard back from that person yet .

I'm not considering that person to be lost though . I'm putting it on hold for right now . Yeah .

For me and where we are 11 years in, we're at just like a lot of the small businesses going through a little bit of a staffing crisis, if you will, we're in need of some coaches. Yeah . We don't have the ability right now to take on seven to 10 new clients in this month. The way our onramp process works with personal training and getting them in with nutrition, we don't have that. We only have the capacity to take on three to five people.

So that was important for me as well, not to overwhelm the systems

that we had in place by trying to schedule all these no sweats. I'm okay with only having five no sweats in the next couple weeks from this group, that's okay with me. But if an owner's in a different situation where they're looking to bring in new people, you can attack it in different ways. I'm seeing this group as a way, obviously, to help as much as I can. I plan on reaching out to another town's mom group soon with the group as well to get more people in.

But I'm seeing it as an opportunity to show how else we help the community with our couch to 5k programs that are open to non-members our nutrition programs that are open to non-members. When we do all of our fundraising efforts, when we do anything, we call it torque nation cares. When we do anything outside to help the community, that's a lot of where I see this group helping with as well as kind of expanding our reach in that capacity.

So , but I also need to make it work for me as well . So I'm gonna have the post be scheduled around there . So if I do it that way , sometimes I'm really good at it, two hours to get everything downloaded and converted to a PDF and then posted , and I try to have it, you know, be relatable. So on Mondays, if I'm posting an ebook or Sundays, then on Wednesdays or Thursdays, I'll have a really simple post or a question that reflects back on that ebook.

So try to keep the conversation going in that manner. But if I don't, if I'm not able to get it ahead of time, it only takes a couple minutes to create this ebook or create the PDF. If you already have the content written to convert it to an ebook three minutes, maybe if you're trying to make it pretty , and then scheduling it again when I can , when I have a moment to sit in my computer.

So I think you can get it down to a science where you only really have to commit 15 to 20 minutes every four days, if you will. In the beginning, it takes a little bit of routine to get into it, but it doesn't take a lot of time after that.

No one will do anything. Nothing will happen. And people, gym owners have had this experience with their own private members groups, right? If you're not active in those groups, nothing happens. But once you get that momentum going , things kind take off and all sudden you see people organizing wine nights and mobility , you there's all the stuff that when communities get together online. You have to steward that group and you have to budget that time.

I think what I'm getting from this conversation is one of the most important parts for gym owners is to look at this as again, a long play. And it's not, this is not the trigger for 150 no sweat intros, which no micro gym owner wants anyways. I remember , I've done some six week challenges back in the day. And we had some of those situations where we ended up booking like 40 or something no sweat intros in a week. And it just destroyed our systems.

It ultimately was a good financial boon at the time, but long term didn't work out quite so well. So it's not, this is not that. This is conversations and it gives you an opportunity to like warm your leads for lack

of a better term. We've covered a number of tips in here. Is there anything else that we haven't talked about that you might wanna tell a gym owner who's thinking about doing this? Anything else that you could give tips for success that you could give them ?

And I know Coop commented said, no, just put them in your general lead campaign. That's my hesitation. So I think if a gym owner's gonna gather all this information, they should be ready, should know where they're putting these email addresses. They should know how to convert them into their system so that they become a long term lead if they haven't become a short term .

We had just recently we've had two or three people that have been on our email list for a few years now, reach out and said , they're finally ready to join. So, and that was a long time coming.

That's the short version, the more tailored version, if we'll call it, that would be to create a lead sequence that applies just to these people. And you know, I'll give you the third step there is even to take a look at your spreadsheet. Now you've got the list of names, the list of emails, and you've got that third column, which is the information you've acquired by sell by chat. You could start to segment them.

If one wanted to , into like nutrition people, personal training people, coach to 5k people. And then you can start to retarget them with other campaigns, if you so desired. But the main point is that you've got their contact information. They know who you are and I'll give you this too. One of the things where if you just send them an email and it doesn't even matter what the email is, they're gonna see your name in their inbox. And that's something, right? Sometimes in the marketing world.

And this is very counterintuitive to me, but I've learned from our marketing experts. Just having your name in the inbox is another step or another link in the chain. So you have lots of options there from a low level in the general lead nurture to very specific targeted sequences. And again, I love the idea. Isn't it cool when you see someone like two years later, you check the stats. You're like two years later, have you ever asked those people? Like, what was it that's finally made you do it?

Like did get a chance to ask these guys?

If you don't regularly use your email lists and these, you know, the things that you've acquired, this valuable contact information, if you don't do it and you don't commit to a schedule of sending newsletters and emails and nurture sequences, which can be automated. If you don't do that, nothing will happen. It has to keep coming. People need to keep seeing things. It's like that conversation with that friend, think about a friend , that you don't talk to anymore.

At some point there was a last conversation and that's the equivalent of these, these situations. Amanda, thank you so much for this. What's the next guide you're gonna release. Can you give us a sneak peek of what that is?