52 Easy Low/no Cost Marketing and Branding Ideas for your club.

0 comments Posted by Frank Emanuel at 5:51 PM


I love lists and I love marketing! Top 10 lists, laundry lists, to do lists, play lists, set lists. Nothing could be easier. Get in, take what you need, leave the rest. Ironically, with marketing I get carried away on elaborate plans and crazy ideas but when it's time to get down to the nitty gritty here's a list of some really effective simple stratagies I've used through the years. I thought some of you could use some quick ideas to spark the fire.
  1. Guest passes

  2. Flyer's

  3. Doughnut Box

  4. Bottled Water

  5. Take One

  6. Newsletters

  7. Banners

  8. Bandit Signs

  9. Crazy Inflatable Characters on the roof

  10. Sign Flipper

  11. Wrapped Car

  12. Live Remote Crash

  13. Open a phone book and call

  14. Healthy Recommendations sponsorship at Restaurant

  15. Pizza Box Sticky Note

  16. Door hangers at the cleaners

  17. Car wash

  18. Hold A Bridal Boot Camp

  19. Testimonials

  20. New Member Packets

  21. Perks Program

  22. CD/DVD Tour

  23. Trainers Client List

  24. Invite a Friend

  25. Give aways

  26. Internal Posters

  27. Open House

  28. Business of the Week

  29. Corporate Lunch

  30. Club Bucks

  31. Thank You Cards

  32. Birthday Cards

  33. Blog (Not for the faint of heart)

  34. You Tube Tours

  35. Website

  36. Travel Certificate

  37. Inet Radio Show

  38. Weight loss Seminar

  39. Point of sale Referrals

  40. Chotski Giveaway for referrals

  41. Referral contest

  42. Event Calender

  43. Group X Schedule

  44. Scratch offs

  45. Bar Promo

  46. Race day Stretch

  47. Health Fair

  48. Blood Drive

  49. Renewal List

  50. Google Profile

  51. My Space Page

  52. Chamber Membership

There are a ton of ideas out there that can be used even on shoestring budgets. If you have any questions about how to implement any of these ideas or the ton of others I have tried please email me a healthclubpro@gmail.com


 

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How are you Going to Weather the Storm?

0 comments Posted by Frank Emanuel at 10:08 AM

Hope you have been enjoying your summer. Just wanted to write a quick note saying I am sorry that I haven't written much.

WHY?

Well I don't need to tell you their is a recession going on. Things have gotten a ugly - quickly for a lot of good people.
But for the last 4 months I have been burning the midnight oil looking for opportunities.

TURN LEMONS INTO LEMONADE !
During every recession and even depression there are those who were once successful - now at the bottom of the heap.
AND
Those who are smart enough to find opportunities that didn't exist before and turn it into lemonade ( piles of dinero)

THE GOOD NEWS is .....
I have found 3 or 4 of these opportunities and I will be sharing them with you over the next few months.
These aren't stratagies that "SHOULD" or "COULD" work. They are instead things that ARE working now.

I have invested thousands of dollars traveling the country meeting with these "under the radar" club owners personally to make sure they are the real deal. NO - BS here,
That's why I haven't been able to write more often--- Sorry

In fact I am involved in them personally and now I'll spill the beans to you as a loyal Health Club Pro Follower so you can get the results these folks to.

If nothing else- you should know about these programs and I am dedicated to bringing them to you!

 

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Small Groups, Big Results!

0 comments Posted by Frank Emanuel at 11:44 AM

One of the most important principles of marketing is focusing each ad on a specialized niche. By doing this we can use copy that specifically targets the group we are looking for and have a much greater chance of getting our message across.
A good example of this is the "Chicken Soup for the Soul" series. They could have left this at just a few volumes of the general book and sold a couple million copies.

Instead they created more specialized editions like "Chicken Soup for the Pre-Teen Soul" and "Chicken Soup for the Teachers Soul" and "Chicken Soup for the Dog Lovers Soul" etc.

The last time I checked they had over a hundred of these specialized titles. The result is over 80 million books sold. That shows the incredible power of specialization. We want something that is just for us.

So instead of advertising a mempership program, you could offer a special "Bridal Bootcamp Program" or a "New to the Neighborhood Program" or a "Teacher's Special" or "Special Membership for Real Estate Professionals", Etc.

You get the idea.

You may have to create some partnerships for these to work correctly. An example would be to contact all the local Real Estate offices and you could figure out away to market to 2 of the above groups.
As you can see another advantage of specialization is that you can target your ads more directly and save on your advertising budget. Rather than trying to advertise
to everyone in the vacinity of your club you can focus on just getting
to the people you are targeting.

 

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That's what he said!

0 comments Posted by Frank Emanuel at 11:14 AM


Few business leaders or celebrities are as polarizing as The Donald but, love him or hate him he has proven he can build an empire, go broke, fall down, bounce back bigger and better than ever. knowing this I tend to think he is worth listening to and possibly even learning from.


Donald was recently interviewed by my friends over at Bottom Line Publications. Here's what e shared.......


Even in trying times, the charismatic, outspoken Donald Trump manages to stay energetic and stimulated by life. And as we all know, money alone can’t do that for you. So Bottom Line/Retirement spoke with Trump to find out how he stays so productive and keeps challenging himself. Here are his six secrets...


1. RELENTLESSLY CONFRONT YOUR FEARS-You can’t let fear -- fear of the new, fear of growing old, fear of failure -- settle into place in any part of your life. Fear has a way of making problems bigger than they are. The trick is to recognize your fears and then zap them with a problem-solving attitude, faith in yourself and hard work.Example: I owed billions of dollars in the early 1990s, and many people thought I was finished. Major newspapers were announcing my demise. The difference is that I didn't believe that I was finished for one second, no matter what people thought. I simply refused to give in to the negative circumstances and kept working to overcome my challenges. Useful exercise: Rename your fears. Call them "concerns." Just using a different word can affect your approach and reactions. "Fears" create blocks that will only hinder your creative thinking. "Concerns" can be broken down into units of thought and dealt with in an orderly and persistent manner.


2. MAKE YOUR COMMUNICATIONS SHORT, FAST AND DIRECT-As someone on the receiving end of conversations with people who do not know how to edit themselves, I know what agony means. I think to myself, How long is it going to take for this person to get to his/her point?People are very, very busy today. They are overloaded with information. Don’t drone on and on. Don’t force people to sort through it all to get to the important stuff, the good stuff. More often than not, your listeners -- whether it’s your family, business associates or those in a social setting -- will be grateful for your ability to get to the essence quickly for them. In any conversation, I give myself an internal deadline. I say as much as I can in as few words as possible. If you practice this technique every day, whether it’s relaying a message to someone, writing a letter or ordering lunch, it will become natural for you -- and you will accomplish more.


3. PUT BAD NEWS IN PERSPECTIVE-The way you handle difficult situations in life says a lot about who you are. The same event can wipe out one person but make another more tenacious. Whenever I am in the midst of difficult times, I ask myself, Is this a blip or a catastrophe? This question reminds me that most problems are temporary if you keep your equilibrium and maintain your momentum. Realize that there will always be blips in your daily life but that you never know when the tide is going to turn in your favor, provided you are paying attention and still working toward something worthwhile. Example: I was scheduled to make a brief appearance on a boat docked in New York City and then get off before it departed on an evening-long cruise around Manhattan. I was about to leave when I noticed that the boat was already in the middle of the river! I wasn’t too happy about this turn of events, but it wasn’t the end of the world. Instead of fuming and complaining, I adjusted my mood and treated it as an unexpected adventure. I actually wound up having a memorable evening, meeting some fascinating people and getting some great ideas.


4. DON’T TAKE YOURSELF SO SERIOUSLY-Over the years, I have been offered a lot of TV commercials and turned most of them down. But my favorite one allowed me to display a self-deprecating attitude that I think took people by surprise. It’s a commercial for Visa. I’m shown on the top of Trump Tower in Manhattan holding my credit card when a gust of wind blows it out of my hand, down many scores of floors to the street below. Next, I am seen rummaging in a dumpster in search of my lost card. A well-dressed passerby remarks, "And I thought he was doing so well." I do take my work seriously -- but the ability to laugh at myself keeps my perspective intact, adds an element of fun to my endeavors and makes people realize that I’m a complex person, concerned about more than just ambition.


5. NEVER LET ONE PERSON DETERMINE YOUR WELL-BEING-Several years ago, the now notorious hedge fund manager, Bernie Madoff, approached me in Palm Beach, Florida, where we both owned property. He said, "Why don’t you invest in my fund?" I had enough going on in my own businesses, and I didn’t know much about him, so I declined.I know a lot of very smart people who became victims of Madoff’s unscrupulous scheme and had their futures severely compromised by it.Money is not a prerequisite to live an active, exciting life, but it does provide security, confidence and comfort. The takeaway here is that you must be careful with your financial transactions no matter how much you like or respect a person. Never bet the ranch on one person or one person’s idea. Spread your money around with numerous people and organizations. While we have no guarantees in life, we can take precautions.


6. TURN YOUR PASSIONS INTO PRODUCTIVE ACTIVITIES-One thing that I’ve learned about life is that it should be a series of discoveries. Remember how exciting it was to learn to ride a bike? If you can capture that kind of excitement as you age, you will never "stop" -- you will always be on your way to finding where you are meant to be in life. Remember, whatever you do at this point in your life, it’s better to love it. Enthusiasm on a big scale equals passion, and passion is what gives you the resiliency to take yourself to amazing places.Example: I love playing golf, so when I was looking for new real estate projects, I wanted to build the world’s greatest golf course. I spent five years reviewing sites around the world and turned down more than 200 possibilities. Finally, I found a dramatic, 1,400-acre landscape in Aberdeen on the north coast of Scotland with miles of spectacular oceanfront and sand dunes of immense proportion. The place had sentimental meaning for me -- I have Scottish roots, and my mother’s first language was Gaelic. I knew this was the right place, but the scope of development and the cost, one billion pounds, was such that no one thought I would get approval to go ahead. In fact, building this course became such a saga that the BBC hosted several documentaries and HBO did a feature. I’ll be breaking ground in 2010.

 

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Set the controls for SALES!

0 comments Posted by Frank Emanuel at 1:05 PM

I do a lot of reading (makes me feel smarter than I really am) and I stumbled upon an interesting article those of us who sell memberships, manage staff or do any people-centric work should be aware of but experience tells me most are not.

In the past I've been turned on to all kinds of tips , tricks, and tactics by the guru's to get the deal, some are great and used frequently some are crap and should be left down in the dungeon from wince they came. But none are effective without the presence of one key factor......

Conversation Control!

A sale, by definition is transfer of emotion. So therefore, we must put ourselves in the best position for the exchange.

In all advisory work many words are exchanged (especially getting someone to prioritize a healthy lifestyle). It is therefore vital to have skills in managing conversations. Such skills can be called conversation control.

This does not mean manipulating other people’s natural conversation although it does imply giving it gentle pushes in particular directions from time to time.

The best way to be effective is to understand what you say and how you say it so you can influence others through your own example.

The essence of conversation control is your ability to manage your own conversation. This is not about overcoming objections or asking qualifying questions and uncovering hot buttons. What we are talking about is the ability to guide the conversation so you can do all of those things effectively.

Here is what you are trying to control.


when to be problem centered or solution centered

when to converge or diverge

when to emphasize facts or feelings

when to speed up or slow down conversations

how to identify cues and clues

how to summarize and move conversation forward

how to recognize, understand and appreciate, but assert your views

how to move from the past to the present to the future

how to manage win/lose aspects of conversations


In all of the various conversation dynamics the most important thing is to remember what the client says about him or herself. That is the key to raising energy levels; openness to your ideas and that is the key to action.

In giving advice, seek to help, not please your friend. ~Solon

Some excerpts from Source : Conversation Control Margerison C J (1988)

 

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