Call: 1300 422 542

Connecting Social to eCommerce: How a Crossfit Gym found great success

Discover how a Crossfit gym found great success in their digital marketing by connecting social and ecommerce. Learn what drove them to make significant improvements and how they built an online presence that works for them!

 

All small, medium and large businesses have one thing in common: they require customers and sales to remain in business.

With consumer purchasing habits changing so quickly, it’s no surprise that eCommerce makes regular news headlines. It is reshaping the Australian retail and business landscape. Look no further than the impact of Amazon online shopping in Australia on the stock prices of Woolworths and Coles.

So what are the facts that we know so far about consumers and their habits online? According to a report by eMarketer:

  1. Projected growth of online sales has been estimated to reach 32.56Bn by 2017, a YOY growth of 21.62%
  2. According to Nielsen, 82% of Australians were online at least once a day at the end of 2013
  3. 50.3% of Australians shop online, and 32% spent more time shopping online than in-store
  4. Google’s Consumer Barometer has Australians at one of the highest connected levels in the world, with an average of 3.1 devices per person.
  5. The social commerce market in Australia had an estimated value of AU$300M, with 57.4% of the population utilising Facebook.

 

If you are a business selling directly to consumers, then questions like this come to mind. “What is your online sales strategy?” “What is your social strategy?” “How are you connecting social and eCommerce together with technology to automate and simplify?”

 

Connecting Social and eCommerce

To answer these questions, I have taken the opportunity to interview a newly established brick-and-mortar business in the fitness industry. My aim was to understand how they used social media to grow their online presence and brand quickly. Similar to how they effectively connected social media to eCommerce and converted potential prospects without any human interaction.

In 2000, CrossFit was launched by founder Greg Glassman growing from the 1st CrossFit Affiliate to now over 13,000 globally, according to LA Weekly.

Cobi Head, a non-commissioned officer in the Australian Army and a personal trainer, joined this community in 2009. Cobi and his partner, De-Anna, moved to Darwin, Northern Territory, 18 months ago, driven by a passion to work in a field that they believed could improve lives. Since then, Cobi has made the decision to launch CrossFit Abode, which opened its doors in July of this year.

Crossfit Abode

Like every startup, Cobi’s main concern was how to build a client base that builds revenue for its business. Through previous experiences in the CrossFit community, Cobi had developed knowledge of how to create a successful online following. The ultimate goal, however, was to create a following that could be turned into new customers.

 

Turning to Automation and Customisation

The first step for Cobi was to create an online platform that linked social media to eCommerce automatically so that no human interaction was required in this process. Cobi worked with Zenplanner to build an integration of his online social, eCommerce and website platforms so they could automatically link with each other for seamless Point of Sale from end to end. With this integration he begun targeting specific demographics with social campaigns, which link in directly with the eCommerce. Cobi gave the example:

“We can run a posted post or ad campaign on social media, which links into our integrated website and straight to signing up, filling out electronic waivers and booking appointments and even sales.”

None of this sales process requires any human interaction whatsoever.

 

Tracking Spend and Conversions

For Cobi, measurement of what works and what does not is critical. When it comes to marketing, many small businesses spend $1,000’s per year on marketing advertisements such as the yellow or white pages, radio or TV, but have no fundamental understanding of how those marketing dollars were converted, if at all. When asked on how much Abode spent in boosting, or adding budget to, Facebook posts and if he saw it as a successful tactic, Cobi said:

“At the moment we are spending approximately $100 a week boosting posts. Posts that highlight our niche, such as the facility, the community, the programming, I will generally boost.”

Cobi has social media leads tracked via the analytical tool integrated between Facebook and ZenPlanner. This then gives the power of reporting detailed information on where the prospect found out about Abode.

 

 

“Facebook also have their own analytics, where at the end of the campaign, a report is sent out detailing click throughs, reach etc. From these two pieces of data, I make a determination whether to run again, alter the ad to make it more successful, or stop it and try something new.”

 

 

Seeing the Benefits of This Strategy

Since launching the Abode Facebook Page and eCommerce integration on April 28th, two months prior to the opening of the gym, Abode has turned nearly 15% of of its page likes in 142 prospects, of which 101 are now current members. 16 have completed a free trial and are in the process of booking in their first session, 18 have their free trial session booked in over the next seven days and the remainder are prospects that do not fit into the above categories (drop ins, holidays, nil returns).

“The Social and eCommerce integration has saved countless hours of trying to ‘sell’ memberships to people over the phone, and in this day and age, people would rather just search for the information on a website, and make their own decision without feeling ‘pushed’ into it.”

For Cobi’s business, eCommerce has become the primary generator of new customers. From this story, we can see how important planning and thinking through systems and processes can be. And if done and measured correctly, this can produce excellent results over and over again.

 

Some Final Thoughts

The eCommerce market is growing rapidly, and customer buying behaviours are changing rapidly along with it. If they haven’t already, all businesses must incorporate social and eCommerce into their overall strategy for today and the future. As I was thinking about my last story around the demise of Blockbuster and their failings to acknowledge and adjust to a changing landscape, one of Cobi’s statements came to mind and reinforced why innovation and adjusting to the market are always required:

Today’s status quo does not guarantee you will be in business tomorrow.

 

 

If you have other general questions about connecting social and ecommerce, Business IT, Communication and Security solutions, feel free to comment here or send us a message, and we’ll respond to you as soon as we can!

 

Share This Post
Subscribe To Our Newsletter
Name*
This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

More To Explore

Find out what our team can do for your business.

Let us know how we can help

Contact Us
Name*
This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.