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Yes You Can
Host Hannah Pratt pulls back the curtain on being an indoor cycling instructor and fitness coach while covering online business, grief, and designing your dream life by taking action and allowing your story to empower you. Yes, You Can is the podcast you need to dream bigger, laugh louder, and feel celebrated and supported in your instructor journey. #yesyoucanpodcast @hannahrosespin
Yes You Can
Empowering Fitness Brands: Alexa Cawley on Marketing and Community Building
"Did we just become best friends?"
Alexa Cawley is one of my favourite voices in the fitness and wellness space, full-stop.
From her role opening up the flagship Lululemon in NYC to overseeing 26 studios with SoulCycle as their Regional Marketing Manager, Alexa shares her journey in falling in love with fitness and wellness (despite failing gym class in high school) and the power of community mixed with brand building.
Alexa is the founder of Forever Friday Consulting and the host of the Friday Society Podcast, and Prepare to be enlightened as Alexa Collie from Forever Friday Consulting graces our podcast, sharing her transformative journey from SoulCycle and Lululemon to the creation of a thriving membership platform for health and wellness entrepreneurs.
For fitness studio owners and entrepreneurs seeking practical wisdom and tactics that *actually* work, this episode delivers.
- We cover articulating your company's core values
- Leveraging savvy tools like Zapier and FloDesk
- Implementing marketing sequences that resonate with customers.
- Building community brands and key messages that help articulate who your brand is to potential clients
- The most important things to make sure someone comes BACK to your studi
We're also popping the champagne on the TENTH round of Instructor Magic opening doors next week! Register for my upcoming webinars HERE.
ALEXA'S FREEBIES + RESOURCES FOR YYC LISTENERS HERE
Want to level up in 2025? My Black Friday sale is on now for ALL courses and programs with 25% off! Use code BLACKFRIDAY at checkout.
Welcome to the yes you Can podcast, a soft place to land for fit pros and aspiring entrepreneurs looking for a motivational cheerleader who's been through it all and believes your best life is about being brave and tapping into your magic.
Speaker 1:Hi, I'm Hannah Pratt, an online coach and vulnerability queen. I'm here ready to share my experiences through grief, life and finding my place on the podium to help you level up. So grab a latte and a notebook and get ready to be inspired through the yes you Can podcast. Hello friends, welcome to the yes you Can podcast and happy 2024. I have had a wild end to 2023 and beginning to 2024 that I will share at a different time on a different podcast episode, but today I am so excited to have Alexa here from Forever Friday consulting to the yes you Can podcast. She is the former regional marketing manager for SoulCycle and worked as the community manager for Alululemon. Now she has an amazing membership for health and wellness entrepreneurs, studio owners, solo pernirs, who make an impact on the lives of the people they serve, and she helps them with their marketing and social media. So this is completely my vibe and, as an instructor at the college for public relations, communications, marketing data analytics, this is like what I do on a day to day basis. This is exactly my experience. So we connected over actually having. I don't think we've even talked about this, but I heard her on Elizabeth McRavy's podcast. Elizabeth is our co-web designer. She's an amazing entrepreneur and leader and we both bought a website template from her and the Lux was featured on the podcast and I started following her after that. Then we discovered we had a client in common, ashley Liberty from Onyx Studios, who now is a one-on-one client with me but also took instructor magic and is inside Alexa's membership and also works with her too, which is so flipping cool. So a little segue before we start. There are in on our interview with Alexa.
Speaker 1:I wanted to let you all know that webinar registrations for my free masterclass are now open. It is called five keys to fitness instructor mastery. I have delivered it to more than 1500 fit and pros over the last three years and we're coming up on our three year anniversary of instructor magic, which you can probably hear me smiling because it's absolutely wild that we are at this point. Now. This is round 10 of instructor magic. So how it works is I offer these free masterclasses which not only teach people how the five keys like my curriculum, my go to ingredient list to fill classes, level up and change lives, but also it's an intro into instructor magic, so I talk a lot about stories of people who have taken the course, things that they've learned and my and you get to a little like, get to be taught by me a little bit, so it's a 60 minute.
Speaker 1:We often go over live masterclass with me happening next Sunday, which is January 28th, if you're listening to this live, and then the following Tuesday there's another one, and so you can find registration in the show notes. I also wanted to shout out Alexa has given us some resources and a discount to join her society, so if you are looking in the show notes, there's going to be lots of goodies there. Make sure you sign up for the webinar. I always get the question if I can't make it live, if something happens, will I get the replay? Yes, you will get a limited time replay. The replays are limited time just because we talk about things that are like on the spot and I go through questions with people and so I just want to make sure that it's like a kind of a closed space. But once you, if you join the webinar and you decide you want to join Instructor Magic, you'll also get an exclusive discount for anybody who is there. So I am really, really excited to offer these for completely for free.
Speaker 1:If you're already on the waitlist for Instructor Magic, you will have already gotten this invitation, or you're about to get this invitation, if I'm sending it right with this podcast episode. But I'm just so excited to hang out with it pros and learn a little bit, and I update this masterclass constantly. So it was. It's constantly reflecting what I am doing every week in the studio as an instructor on the podium and somebody who has a community of hundreds of instructors who tell me what is their biggest pain points, what do they desire most? What's the trends going on in their studios right now? What are they seeing? What are numbers looking like? All of those sorts of things are like tactical stuff that we are working through together. So right, I'm just doing the show notes and let's, without further ado, let's just get into our conversation with Alexa Collie. Welcome, alexa, to the yes you Can podcast. I'm so excited to see you again today.
Speaker 2:I'm like my favorite person. Thank you so much. Thank you for having me. I know I I feel like after we recorded on mine that we it was so fun, but we also have so much more to talk about. So I'm excited that we're continuing the conversation.
Speaker 1:Well, and I was so curious about you and when you're the guest, you know you're sort of it's not like you're driving conversation by any means, but I wanted to dive more into your background and I was like wait, I'm not the podcast host right now. So I was like we'll park all of those questions because I love it. So, for people who haven't listened and you absolutely should I'll put it in the show notes. I was on Alexa's podcast just a few weeks ago and it was such, it was one of the best podcast experiences I've had. Like it was just so natural and we connected right away. So that's why and I said, Alexa is one of my favorite people, it's true and I think when you find somebody you just align with and completely vibe with, it feels so exciting, because it can be hard in the online space, Like it can be hard, and some people look amazing on their Instagram and then you meet them and you're like, oh, you're actually not like as authentic or funny or whatever. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:And then conversation is hard and you're like no, but I, but I love you in here, Like in my head, we're best friends, and then you're like online.
Speaker 1:Online, you're great, but you are the opposite You're even more fantastic. So I would love if you would do a like a little intro of who you are, what you do, because we have very complimentary audiences and actually a shared client We've talked about on yours too, ashley from Onyx. And so who do you serve, what do you do and how do you?
Speaker 2:help people. I love that so much. Okay, so hello everyone. So I'm Alexa. I'm Alexa Colley. I am the founder of Rubber Friday Consulting, which is a marketing agency really for small businesses. Mostly I serve people in the health and wellness industry, but as of late, I've gotten some you know increase from people in other industries, which has been really fun, especially because what I like to teach really is applicable to pretty much every single small business. I started my career. I worked for Lulu Lemon right out of college literally the day after, and was never into. You know, I liked to eat healthy and I went to a few yoga classes in college but I was not an athlete, you know, pretty much was like allergic to group sports growing up. Yeah, like really avoided. Like fun story, actually, not to go off on a tangent, I had a 4.0 GPA all throughout high school and I almost failed out of high school. I almost didn't graduate me because I didn't go to gym class. It was my first period and I just didn't go.
Speaker 2:Like it was you know, like seven o'clock in the morning, and for a lot of the time I just didn't go. I don't know what. I was thinking that I was getting away with it, but in New York state you cannot pass, you can't like. They won't graduate you unless you pass your physical education component. Oh my goodness. So yeah. So I had to write a like 15 page single spaced essay on my favorite athlete and was their athletic.
Speaker 1:You're like Googling, you're like athlete who's alive right now.
Speaker 2:And so that was how I graduated high school.
Speaker 1:Oh my God, that's. I mean, that's actually kind of a nice hack because you're like you did graduate and hopefully you got, you maintained your 4.0 and you got to flex your amazing skill of writing, which is Right and like and it's a story.
Speaker 2:It's a story that's like a major anyway, and so when she was like you can write an essay. I was like done, yeah, Thank you.
Speaker 1:Thank you, god. So what drew you to Lou Lemon then? If you are interested if you weren't sort of part of the yoga space, because I don't know exactly how old you are, but lemon was like very much synonymous with, I think, yoga for a long time and then they moved a little bit more. But I mean you can speak better to that than anybody, yeah.
Speaker 2:So okay, so I'm 33 now, and so this was about 12, 13 ish years ago and I was walking, I had just come home from college, I went to school in Florida, but I live in New York, and so it was my family, and so after college I moved back home with my parents and my mom and I were walking through our mall and there was a Lululemon store that was being built and she was like, oh, I love that store and I had never heard of it. And it said, like help, want it? And she was like you should apply. And so I did, and I was it and the manager was in there Her name is Liz, she's fantastic and she was in the store and she was like, okay, like she was like you know, let's just chat right now.
Speaker 2:And so we had a whole conversation and from that very first conversation I was like, oh, this is so not the mall job that I thought it was going to be. This company is very different. And so, yeah, so I got hired on full time working at that store and then just eventually started working my way up in the community department, opening up new stores, new markets, really getting ingrained with the communities, the ambassador program, which I'm sure a lot of your listeners know is really integral to Lululemon. So that was a big part of my job, yeah, and I stay there for, yeah, five years, going to different stores, different markets and opening up, like a lot of our flagship locations.
Speaker 1:That's so cool. I love that so much. I've heard that quite a bit from people who have worked at Lululemon. I actually interviewed there twice and they didn't take me either. It's so late, and so you're such a perfect fit no-transcript, something about it. I think it was really competitive to get a job. They're actually when they first came to Winnipeg because it had been like such a long wait.
Speaker 2:And it's such a Canadian like an integral Canadian Right.
Speaker 1:Right, and so it was moving from the West Coast in. But I have heard from a lot of people work at Lulu I have friends who've become, you know, regional managers that there's a lot of upward mobility opportunities, which is really cool, really cool, yeah, so you had. What was your final job at Lulu? What was your job title? If people could recognize that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I was the community manager for our first flagship location in. I think it actually may have been the first flagship location in America at that point Now there's quite a few in, like just all the metropolitan cities but it was. Yeah, it was community manager for our flat iron location. That's what it was called. We moved from Union Square to Flat Iron, so it was for the flat iron flagship in New York. So exciting.
Speaker 1:And then you moved to. Was it directly from Lulu to SoulCycle or was there something?
Speaker 2:in between. So they were in between. I got poached from Lulu by this organic cotton athleisure company and I was their director of marketing for about a year and then they were. Their funding situation was very closely tied with, like, their friends and family, so there was a lot of like inner politics going on, but then SoulCycle poached me from that job, so it was yeah, then I went right in and what was your role with SoulCycle?
Speaker 1:There's a lot. So many years just parked up hearing SoulCycle they would have heard that in the intro, but again from this such an iconic brand, especially called instructors, many of whom teach it at SoulCycle or want to listen to.
Speaker 2:So yeah, so I was regional marketing manager, so I oversaw 26 studios in New York, hamptons, new Jersey and Long Island.
Speaker 1:Amazing. The Hamptons is also a very iconic SoulCycle. Like if anybody listened to the founder story and have heard about the barn and like I don't know if that's what it's called, but like that's I was, I was just obsessed with hearing about that. You still see that location be the same sort of, have the same sort of culture that they describe, the founders describe. And so what was your experience like working in marketing for these brands, maybe not not being the instructor or not being somebody who teaches classes? Like how did you sort of or even with Lulu, you know, not necessarily being a yogi and a runner like how did you sort of put yourself in the mind of of your customer or your ideal client not having those experiences?
Speaker 2:Yeah, you know, lulu Lemon, I will say I it was such a. It was such an adjustment with, like my mentality and what my peers were going through at the time, like all of my friends were.
Speaker 2:you know, we were young 20s in New York so, like all of my friends, to bond with their coworkers, were going to happy hour and getting drunk and that was what they were doing going out to fancy lunches and you know they all had these like big desk jobs and I felt so behind. But as time started going on, you know, within like the first six months, I was like whoa, I think I'm really happy. I said what's going on here? Like I don't, this isn't my desk job.
Speaker 1:I'm seeing happier than them, yeah.
Speaker 2:I was like I feel happy, but I don't think I'm supposed to be happy.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:Like part of my desk job, like you know, um, and it's become. It's like, how did we were we were going to bond with our coworkers through workout classes, so, and like through like checking out local entrepreneurs and local small businesses, because that was just so deeply ingrained in the brand of Lululemon was organic community building, and so for us to hang out as a team, we would always start it with yoga class in town or, you know, we would have. We had a really good relationship with SoulCycle, like they just let us pop in for free all the time free shoe rental, free everything and it totally changed my approach to health and fitness, because I used to always think that fitness and you know, like we grew up in the nineties, like nineties kids, it was hot Like diet culture was really closely tied with fitness, and so that was my opinion of fitness was like if you only go, if you want to get jacked or whatever. I didn't think that it was going to be an area of like community building. So working for Lululemon totally shifted my opinion there and I started to realize like, okay, this is where I'm going to meet my lifelong best friends and I still like sort of this day I'm like going to someone's wedding next month, like we're still like so close, and so it was really, really cool for me to be like, okay, I can be happy and feel part of something when fitness is sort of the forefront, but it's really like connection. So that was always really fascinating to me.
Speaker 2:And then working for SoulCycle you know, by that point I had gotten really into fitness and so I was like, okay, cool, you know, it was a really it was obviously a pivotal, like you said, iconic brand, and so you know why, of course, I would want to be part of that. Like my resume, you know, even just having that name on my resume was insane and so I felt so, so lucky to be there. And like the riders, their love for the brand just carried everything. Like that was just all you had to do if you were having a bad day was go into the studio and like see people afterwards talking to the instructor and you know, just like crying, being like you've changed my life, like it was just, you know it was impossible not to get that endorphin rush. So I think, honestly, just being part of both of those brands and seeing what it was doing for the greater, you know, like the greater population, even just start my little like echo chamber bubble, it was just fantastic.
Speaker 1:It's really interesting Like I think that's such an important comment you made about the shifting of what fitness and wellness like, what the culture was like back then, because I'm you know, I'm 36 now and in the 2000s there was a lot about like losing weight.
Speaker 1:You know the OC, like it was. It was all about like weight loss and I think SoulCycle is one of the first brands that I recall of it being more than like really promoting more than the burn, more than the calorie loss. Like more than all of the stuff about shrinking or changing your body. Like even just by virtue of having a dark room and like less visibility of riders, which is something I always promote to people who are like what's the clot liking class? Like you can do whatever you want in the back, like you can be visible or not, and it's everybody has. Like is lit by candles. Like it's not, it's not where people know necessarily what you're doing or measuring what you're doing. It's not about that, and so that was like would have been really interesting to work in that space and see all of that firsthand, because boutique fitness I think sort of in the 2010s like started to have this momentum shift where really people were recognizing that it was about community, and both brands you were for were trailblazers in that regard, for sure.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, it's amazing, it really. I was just presenting to this this student group at BU recently and we were talking about how you know I was it's so funny and I felt so dated because I was like, oh God, I'm so old Because I was trying to explain to them that, prior to Lululemon, charging $98 for a pair of leggings was people like both of my huge jobs right At Lululemon and at SoulCycle. Many, many times I would have people come in and just laugh at my face, right, just absolutely laugh at my face and just be like what do you mean?
Speaker 2:$100 for leggings? Are you kidding me? Like you know, just absolutely insane. Sorry, rocky's going off, yeah, yeah. Like I would have people coming in for at SoulCycle. Being like my daughter wants a gift card. I'm supposed to like, why won't I just get her a gift card to do, you know, to go out to dinner or whatever.
Speaker 2:And it I remember being at SoulCycle being like, oh, people are doing this instead of going out to dinner, Like even if someone doesn't have absolutely you know, totally expendable income, they're taking this money and they are choosing to use it here, and it's because it made them feel good, right? It's because the conversation was not about how you looked.
Speaker 2:And you know it's. It's funny, I think, especially when it comes to a company like SoulCycle and I've worked now at this point in my career with a lot of the larger fitness chains when you have that many instructors like when you're building a company to scale you're always going to have people who have different, different backgrounds when it comes to how they motivate, how they apply body image into their teaching, right. And so I do think, like you know, we had to be very strict at SoulCycle with our branding guidelines and with what we said, but still, you know, we still did Turkey Burns. I think a few of the studios still do Like there is some terminology that's kind of like leftover from back in the day. But yeah, overall I think they took a pretty good brand approach of, you know, feeling first.
Speaker 1:I love that because it is that consistency of language is something I teach inside my programs and when I do training with motivators or when I've been a part of training groups. I talk about the importance of that consistency of language, not because we're trying to present limitations on instructors' creativity, but to provide like a consistent experience. Yeah, who are the client? Who are the writer? So they can trust you, so they know that, they can trust that they're not going to be preached to about calorie burns or near dinner, which I think at this point we all agree is like outdated language.
Speaker 1:I think it's kind of like now some people are maybe like left behind a little bit, but really the majority agree that's outdated. But when instructors have consistency in the way they deliver a class, then they can add creativity on top of that and bring their own method, their own whatever, to the template that they're given. But brand language sometimes in my experience of being both a marketer and a person who's on the ground doing the thing, sometimes it's like oh, corporate wants us to do this or corporate wants us to say this. Did you ever have experience like that experience being the regional marketing manager for 26 videos of sort of applying those guidelines to and having to explain why or like. What was the experience like with being in the role you were in?
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's a great question. Not at SoulCycle, and I will say for being a huge company, we've really functioned in a pretty intimate manner.
Speaker 1:Like our.
Speaker 2:The office that I worked out of the West Village headquarters was quite small. It was beautiful. You know, being a small business owner now I'm like I wasn't small, but yeah, it wasn't, it wasn't the biggest office ever, right, and everybody kind of worked very closely. You would see everyone who was in the office. You would pass them at some point in the day, right.
Speaker 1:Like it was.
Speaker 2:It was still pretty close and a lot of the instructors, especially the New York City instructors, would pop in all the time. So we really did function at SoulCycle with like pretty I don't want to say strict at all, but just pretty like it was our default to kind of just always focus on feeling first.
Speaker 2:And if there ever was an instance. You know, the talent office, like talent management was right on the first floor. Everyone you know knew the three people that worked in there. They would always go in, I would always see. You know, sarah, who now works for Solid Core, is a good friend of mine. Like I would always see her texting the instructors if anything ever came up, so like there was a really close line of communication there. Right, I do work with another similar brand now that I won't name, and they deal with a lot more.
Speaker 2:If I think what you're saying of like like I'll never forget, I went to one of their classes in a different at a location that I don't normally go to, so I didn't know this instructor well at all. But it was 4th of July and she just kept saying like okay, you're going to go to the barbecuator, so you have to work extra hard. And she just kept saying like calories, calories, calories. I mean it was like what are? Like, come on, like it's, I get it and I understand it's a motivator for some people, but it was just so distracting to me and I do think that that is sometimes I don't know if you agree I think it's just sometimes the signal of a newer instructor.
Speaker 2:Yes, they just don't really know what to say yet and, like you're saying, like they don't know how to bring their own magic yet to it. It's like, okay, let's just default to talking about burning calories. So, yeah, so it's SoulCycle. We didn't really encounter that too much, luckily not in the New York market anyway. But for some other brands, I think, that are a little more like aesthetically focused, it's been a little bit more of a challenge.
Speaker 1:I also think it's like it. Soulcycle had such a strong brand from the get go that it attracts a certain type of instructor and it would have. And because the talent, like the audition process is is, from what I've heard and understood, it's like the best and the brightest sort of get in, not to say anybody who didn't get in. It's not the best and the brightest, but it's like it's competitive, it's extremely competitive and so not just competitive in your abilities but in making sure that you, they would have the ability to like, choose them the most aligned people versus. I think sometimes companies were recruiting instructors. They don't have the, as they definitely don't have the strong of a brand as as recognizable, their values aren't completely defined yet in the way they market, and so they're going to get different people and sometimes you don't even realize that you need to say those things you don't need to like, that you need to communicate brand values as a part of your training, because it will appear in moments like that where, where we just assume we're all on the same page, when that's not necessarily the case, and I totally agree that it is sometimes the default.
Speaker 1:Just like things when people, when instructors would say like core on or you know, like these sort of throw away phrases that actually like, what does it mean? Like, what do you mean by that? And intentional language is sort of lacking from their ability and their skill. They just don't have it yet. So I completely agree Is there, from your experience of working with so many brands now, because you're consulting, you have your membership and you are working with boutique fitness studio owners in such a like direct capacity, do you what's their biggest challenge? Or how do you advise them on bringing their brand values into their training and into, you know, all aspects of their business? Like, how did that sort of start for them? Yeah, that's a great question.
Speaker 2:So I do a lot of work on messaging when it comes to both my private clients and everybody in the membership. There's an entire like a full course inside the membership on messaging and some of what I do is an exercise that we did at Lululemon, which was like our core value work right and it's I'm sure you've seen it, but it's like you know, you go through, you have a list of a hundred words. You got to pick out 20 that feel like they represent your brand, then you cut them down and then you cut them down again.
Speaker 2:And what I really say to people is put those five words that you ended up with on, a, post it. If every email, every social post, every conversation does not feel like those five words, then you need to revisit sort of what's going on with the brand, right? So, like core value, work is truly, truly so important. Another thing that I like to advise clients on is what is results when it comes to your company? And I know, like the word results, we get so triggered, especially like people in our age bracket, because the night break, like the diet culture thing, like results has to mean a before and after Ackens picture, like duh, that's what, but it's not the results.
Speaker 2:Are somebody coming out of your class feeling inspired? The result of your class? Is someone feeling more connected? Right? So it's like we think about results so often as like 20 pounds lost. Yeah, it's not. It's like that somebody was having a horrible morning, they were crying. This morning they took your class, they came out feeling like they can handle things. That's what a result is, and so what have you gained?
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Like what have you gained in your experience and like your life because of this class. Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 2:And like I really like for people to focus on that, like what they want the desired result to be, of their class, and that is also, you know, something that you want to message.
Speaker 1:I love that. I wish every studio did this exercise because I think that, like the owners have sometimes the best intentions, the founders have the best intentions and they have their, their vision for their company and they have to then hire and deal with admin and HR and turnover and training and leases and equipment failing and all this sort of stuff. And when you have core values that help that everybody's aware of, like very similar to how, like Disney would run their you know their parks, like everybody knows, if something happens, they can make it right with a certain amount of money and, like under $100, you can fix the problem yourself. You don't need to go to anybody else because that's like the customer's experience is paramount. And when you have that being your guiding ethos, I guess with your, with everybody, from who's answering the phones to your instructors, to your leadership- yeah.
Speaker 1:It's just, they're on the same page and you don't need to like train for every situation because it's just, it comes back to those five words or those three words, or whatever it is, of how you want people to feel, so you can make exceptions to the rule of certain things or allow somebody to to cancel late because they're you know, something happened, instead of feeling like you need to follow the rules and then ruin that person's experience and then have them word of mouth. Yeah, totally, they like my. Somebody just died and they canceled. They still charge me a late fee, like it's things like that where you you can refer back to your core values and you have your, your everybody aligned, but it's also the stuff that nobody wants to spend the time doing. Yep.
Speaker 2:Yep. At SoulCycle I worked with this woman named Gabby Cohen and she was our head of I think she was our head of PR and she was on my podcast a long, long time ago. But she that is still to date is like one of my favorite conversations because she was a hospitality major. That was her training, right. She went to NYU for hospitality and so for her to be then work in PR at SoulCycle felt so misaligned when she was just like marketing is hospitality, that is it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, like yeah, soulcycle way that we would do things is was so courteous, right. Someone would message us and be like I was stuck in traffic. That's okay, don't worry, we get it. Totally sucks Like we will see you next time. Credits back in your account, like that kind of thing makes a lifelong customer and, yes, it might be charging you $34 in the interim, but like 10 years of a loyal client is so much more important than pissing someone off or making them just feel like you know that you didn't really see them and you weren't with them. So the hospitality aspect yeah, it's just so huge.
Speaker 1:It's so huge. I think sometimes we like when I'm working with smaller studios, I know that that, like late fee, those add up, right, those totally add up, and I've seen people really struggle with like, well, look, what do I do? Our cancellations are off the charts. And it's sort of it's like there wasn't necessarily enough long term planning the very beginning of, okay, we're gonna have a cancellation window, but we're also going to be reasonable people. But when the cancellation windows two hours, well then of course you're going to get people into the habit of doing that, you know, three hours in a head, and so they apply that rule. Then once it's become a big issue, once, like once their classes are half full when they were wait listed before.
Speaker 1:And the language I see on social media posts is always like very corporate. All of a sudden, like you know, carousel, new policies in effect, and it's like the most corporate language. And I feel like it's like this, this one extreme to an X where there's it's super lax and then it's super extreme because they're trying to claw back. Yeah, what from? Like the, the communication perspective of like communicating these policies, and then we can maybe talk about, you know, email marketing and funnels and all that stuff. Like how do you best recommend brands to to communicate some of these like very real, you know, like rules and regs and whatever. Like the awkward, please shower before and after class. I've had to write these, by the way, and it is off Like let's send it to this segment of yeah you dear it but how do you recommend that brands communicate sort of in a, in a way that still sounds like them and a human?
Speaker 2:Yeah, always, always, often, like, no matter what you're saying, you have to say it a few different times, always keeping it in your brand voice, right? So, like if your brand voice is super conversational, make sure that you're writing this email as if you were speaking it to somebody over coffee, but put it as yes, like, put it as a pinned post, right of like. Just your policies, things you like people to know, put it in every single email footer of PS don't forget.
Speaker 2:Here's our. You know rules and regulations, like whatever it is, every confirmation email. Just make sure that you're repeating yourself, because the one huge mistake that I see most business owners make, myself included. It's so easy, it's just thinking that people read our stuff as much as we read our stuff, and it's just not the case, right, we live in skim culture, people just skim right past and that's it.
Speaker 2:So you really need to make sure that what you need to say, the things you need people to know, are taking up. You know some serious real estate when it comes to your marketing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I love that. It's like it's those reminders so that it's not then this like feeling like a calm down and like, oh, who messed up and who's been like pissing off the owner, because like that whole culture can be really interesting all in its own when writers or clients are seeing this stuff come to fruition. Yeah, and so getting onto the communication part of things, I know there's studio owners who are literally like with their notebooks right now, like when you talk about confirmation, like what's what do you find? You, your folks in your membership or your private clients. They're probably maybe at different stages, but what are they missing the most in terms of regular communication, funnels or strategies with their clients that could help with things like return those lifetime customers, like you mentioned?
Speaker 2:yeah, yeah, yeah. That's a great question. Honestly, I would say something I don't see enough of is marketing the magic of what is actually going on in your studio or in your experience. I don't see enough of that. I want to know what it feels like from 3,000 miles away. I still want to know what it feels like to be in the room with you. So prop your phone up right, Just get the video content. I know you just posted about this today. Just get the content. I don't know why we're still not doing this In the membership this month.
Speaker 2:I literally did a whole social media training. At the beginning I was just like look, I get it. I know people get overwhelmed by social. I know, but we have never been given a bigger gift as business owners ever. It is a completely free way to reach any single person you want to reach. I forgot it was either two or six billion users on Instagram right now. You will reach your people as long as you are trying to market the right way. It doesn't have to be Instagram, it can be your emails. I guarantee you also have a whole long list of all your people on your newsletter that have ever stepped foot in the studio Marketing, the magic of what you actually have going on right now. Take a picture, Do a UGC campaign, Maybe for the month of February. You're saying, hey, whoever features us in a reel this month or whoever shouts us out on Instagram, we'll enter you to win a five-pact.
Speaker 2:Start getting that content, just having that fun thing to do. That's one thing that I would say is really missing. It's just actually marketing the experience, actually capturing video or photography content of the experience. The second thing is just a regular communication newsletter.
Speaker 2:I know a lot of business owners also get really overwhelmed or they're kind of sporadic with the email newsletter. My biggest tip there would be just pick a theme, pick a template. Have four things that you want to address. Commit to it for 2024.
Speaker 2:The four things you want to address in every newsletter this month it's going to be maybe you're going to do a fun body part focus. Maybe you're going to talk about I don't know glutes. This is how your glutes support your low back and they support your hips so that when you're doing these things during the day, like you're moving through your day pain-free. This is where you'll notice us working on our glutes in class when we step up out of the saddle. All that easy. Maybe it's community, a member spotlight. Maybe it's a local small business spotlight in your area. Maybe it's your instructor's favorite song that they're playing and you're just linking to it. That is easy to replicate. I think the solve for that or the problem that kind of precedes that is. A lot of people think that they just stare at a blank screen and they're like okay, well, I know, I have to write a newsletter, I have no idea what to say. And then they're opening up Facebook and they're online shopping and they're like no wait.
Speaker 2:I have to write the newsletter and they're going, you know, and it's just like, or you know it's seven hours and fast. So following a template, I think, is a really important solve for that. Just like overwhelm, the feeling of like well, I don't know what to say.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and the template is like it's nice because then it also helps you remember, as you're experiencing or seeing things in your studio like oh, that member, that client, that writer just celebrated a thousand rides. That would be a great feature for next week, exactly. And it starts like bank all of these stories and just take photos as you're going and then it becomes easier, instead of you know starting from scratch every week. And people like to see the consistency, they like to know that you have a member feature. Maybe it's not a weekly newsletter, maybe it's every two weeks, maybe it's a monthly, like well, here's what's happening this month Start eating.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Monthly is great, and guess what? All those things that we just covered in the newsletter are your social posts.
Speaker 1:Yes, that's it. Yeah, those are your social posts.
Speaker 2:You just literally especially if you're doing them in Flodast you just screenshot it and you put it on Instagram and that's it. That's your marketing. You know it's like things don't have to be as hard as I think, as hard as it feels.
Speaker 1:Is that what a lot of people who struggle with social media say to you? Is that they don't know where to start, or it feels too hard or they just don't know what to do.
Speaker 2:They just don't know what to say.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and so with your membership, what is sort of the like you cover one topic per month, like tell us about that in terms of what support you offer, because I think it's even though I'm in marketing and I'm in communications like it's something that so many business owners need, but there's something specific about fitness and wellness brands and communicating what's happening, and sometimes we feel really hesitant to like pump our own tires, and it's really like focusing on the clients and the writers and sharing them behind the scenes of what's actually happening. So it's simplified in that way. But what do people experience in your membership? What's behind closed doors of your society?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so I. It's truly it's been the most fun thing to create, and just now, I think we're in year three and just like watching it evolve over time has been so amazing. And what's really fun is like so there's I think now there's like 110 business owners and they're everywhere. They're all, so they're like there's a whole group of them in Australia. We've got Portugal, like there are people just everywhere, and the most rewarding thing is just realizing that that doesn't matter at all. Like none of this information changes.
Speaker 2:The foundational principles of good marketing don't change anywhere. Like across the world, it's all exactly the same thing, and it's that your clients want to be seen, they want to be appreciated and they want to feel like they're part of something Right. So it's like how do we make that happen? And we want that to happen. We want your clients to feel amazing, while you also feel really good, and that you feel like easeful, right, and that it doesn't feel like running a business is, like you know, with a ton of bricks on your chest. Like it should just feel easy. All of your systems should just support you being able to spend most of your time with your clients. So that's really what I like to teach is just like total foundational principles. So, yeah, so you said I pick one topic a month, which is what I do this year for 2024, I actually like took it another step further. So for Q1, we're focusing on brand awareness. Q2, we're focusing on client retention. Q3, we're focusing on all of your systems and tying them together. And then Q4, we're focusing on, like CEO mindset and leadership.
Speaker 2:And then each month inside of that, so like, for example, now it's January, we're recording this we did social media this month. So this was like my social media, like commandments, the things that really make it easy, that allow you to kind of like post with ease while also being directive in your business. Right, Because like something super important is like a lot of people don't know what to post and then are like, okay, well, I'll just post this one thing just to like get something up there and there's no direction. You're not actually telling someone what to do and like that's fine if you're a lifestyle creator or, you know, if you're not trying to sell anything, but we're business owners. So like, having direction in your social posts is really important. So like end your post with hey, by the way, if we've never been to our studio before we offer two weeks unlimited to all our new clients, you know whatever, just like have a direction for people. And I have to tell you it is insane.
Speaker 2:That was like one of the many tips that I gave in this webinar, just one, I think. That's second. I think that's just common knowledge, right, but I know it's not. I got five messages yesterday from people who were like, oh my God, I got a new client. Someone messaged me that they want to do this. Wow, I never would have thought to put you know, to take my intro offer in the caption and I'm like, yeah, duh, like yes, we want to direct people towards something.
Speaker 1:So, yeah. It's doing a kindness to them. Right Like it's, I think it goes. I think it's rooted in a resistance to selling and stealing. Clz, yep.
Speaker 2:And.
Speaker 1:I did quotes for anybody who did not watching this and like the thing is it's doing somebody a kindness when they're inspired or when they need somebody to hold their hand, especially a new client. They need to know that it's easy and that you're inviting them and you're inviting them to take the next step.
Speaker 1:It's not that you're pushing anything on them, especially if it's a call to action at the end of a caption.
Speaker 1:It's not like you're like in their face, but if they like what they see and they're curious, then like, oh, okay, it's a two weeks intro and this is the way I do it, instead of it being like an exclusive club where they have to go and search for the information and feel like there's a hundred steps before they even get in the doors, which is one of the also the hardest parts is showing up to someplace you don't know.
Speaker 1:So I love that so much, just the call to action. The next step in the social caption Is there like a tip or a trick you would give for anybody, for a studio owner who's thinking about retaining that first time customer and I say tip and trick I really mean strategy, but like people love to hear tips and tricks because it sounds easier to implement yeah, that first time customer or client, like getting them to come through the doors and then retain them and I know that you have metrics from you know souls, like what worked there, but based on your experience, Just don't let them leave thinking no one knows who they are.
Speaker 2:Don't let them walk out the door without acknowledging that they're new and that they just tried something new. It is just a. It's just a fact that as we get older, we try less and less things for the first time. So you really, like they did do something big. They took time away from their job, they took time away from their family, they took time away from what they know to show up for you and just make sure that they know that you see that from them. So there's all fun things you can do, right. So letterboards on the front desk like welcome in Alexa, you know anything like. There's so many different things you could do. Making sure the instructor says, like Alexa, it's your first time, that's insane, like you're crushing it right. Whatever it is actually doesn't matter. It's just to make sure that they know that like you see them and that you know that they've come in for the first time.
Speaker 1:I love that. That's so good. It's like it doesn't really matter what it is Like. It's really like just making sure that person feels welcome in some way and that they're acknowledged and that they're like they're meant to feel, like they're celebrated. We celebrate the shit out of our first time writers and it's love. The fun thing is that everybody in the room knows now I don't even need to. I was going to say command. I don't even need to prompt them or cue them to cheer for that first time writer. I'll say we have a first time writer and before even say their full name or their name, people are already cheering and like whipping their towels around.
Speaker 1:And I love that and you can build that community. But you just have to start by, you know, letting the motivator or instructor know that there is a little note on their podium that says first time writer and there's a touch point system there, so that it's like it's part of your culture that you folks are celebrated, and then they're going to want to come back, even if it was hard and they didn't get the moves or they didn't, you know, hit things perfectly. It's sort of relevant and it is, you know the instructor.
Speaker 2:The instructor is the product, and so that is something very important to keep in mind. So making sure, like if the instructor can say to them afterwards, like how are you feeling, how'd you like it? You know, that's just. It's the extra touch that I think is super important, and just making them feel seen.
Speaker 1:For instructors and like, well, we'll have to wind this down soon, just again so hard, but for with your experience of working with brands, and so it's like, oh, for instructors. Like I guess it's like the promotion of instructors is always something really interesting to me. I train fit pros how to market themselves and develop personal brands and utilize the platform they have and the podium they have to do other things. But from the brand's perspective, like how do you, I guess, balance promoting specific instructors or like what's the approach to that? Like how do you recommend doing that as a, as a studio who might be struggling with not playing favorites and not whatever?
Speaker 2:like you know it's it's an interesting thing I've been on both sides, and so you know that's a great question. It's the product. The product is the class, right, and but the instructor, the instructor is really what drives it home, and so what I, what I do like to recommend for studios is to always have a newsletter in your nurture sequence. Maybe it's your second or your third newsletter that just has a fun little tidbit about each instructor their favorite music, maybe their favorite thing to do, but again, it's following that template, right?
Speaker 2:So maybe it's like three things about you know, hannah, that you didn't know? This is her favorite artist. This was her first concert. This is her favorite move off the bike. You know fun little things in there, but you treat everyone equally. So that way the client knows like, okay, each class is going to feel a little bit different, but then it's sort of the studio's responsibility to make sure that they all follow that format. But yeah, that's I usually. I love when a studio has has that in there.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I mean instructor bios too, Like I mean I don't even think we have that actually, but it's when you're, when you're a prospective client, writer, whatever. It's like. You want to go to a class, you want to invest your 45 minutes of time or 60 minutes with somebody whose music you're going to like number one for me, yeah, I'm like, if I know they love all cool hip hop, I'm done Like I'm 100% and say less, like I don't really care anything about anything else, and so, like, if you can communicate that in some way, it's it helps people spend more time on your website and feel more informed when they come in as well, totally.
Speaker 1:And I think it does then incentivize instructors to to share that and promote that, which makes it a little bit easier, because I often hear from studio owners, like my instructors are promoting their classes and it's like well, are we making it easy for them? Like, are we providing them with opportunities?
Speaker 2:that they get excited about and link to your instructor's Instagrams on your website in the bio Like. If they're someone that likes to use Instagram, help them out with that Right Like you. Yes, yeah, big thing to do.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I know it's like let's make it easy and let's like it's not about getting everybody to the studio's Instagram, because sometimes those are not the most exciting anyway, and like, yeah, like, let instructors fly as long as there are people you can trust. Yeah, so sort of wrapping this up. I loved the question you asked me on your podcast, so I'm going to ask you the same question which is your favorite tech tool? And I'll give you two if you want, because you just want, and then I like, and then I was like I don't know what to say.
Speaker 2:Well, no, okay. So the one that you said, my assistant. When she was editing our podcast, she was like I think I'm going to try out, and Hannah recommended it and I was like go for it. So, yeah, so now she's going to be using I forget what it is, but the one.
Speaker 1:It's good. Yeah, yeah, I tell everybody. But I'm so happy. I know I think I saw the behind the scenes of her editing and I was like I hope she hears this whoever's editing it and it's like it could be easier. Maybe I don't know, I don't know.
Speaker 2:Okay, zapier number one, absolutely Favorite ties all your softwares together. It just makes your life so much easier. So, like you segment people. So like, when you booked your podcast recording slot with me, you got added into a workflow on flow desk, which is my email provider. You got an email from me that was like hey, here's what it is, use these headphones. You know all that kind of stuff and that way you are also in my email provider. Now, as someone who's been on the podcast, I can reach out to everybody who's been on the podcast in 2024 and say hey, do you guys want to do round two? If you do, you know, email me what topic you want to do. Like, client segmentation is so important and Zapier makes it really easy, so that is one that I would say is super, super important.
Speaker 1:Okay, oh my gosh Do you have a separate email service provider. I know like does it include a concert? Float us Okay.
Speaker 2:Obsessed. I am not affiliated with them anyway. People literally I know it like sounds like I work for them and the way I talk about this product.
Speaker 2:I don't. I'm obsessed with it. Emails are gorgeous, the templates are beautiful. The copy that's already in there is really helpful for being like. You know, if someone doesn't quite know what to say. It's $19 a month. It's insane. Yeah, so the emails that I see from you know I work with a lot of clients and I get to see all of their systems on the back end. I do a lot of share screen on Zoom during my week and the people that are not on Float Desk.
Speaker 2:It just everything takes them three times as long. It is not as cute and it's just. You know there's.
Speaker 1:Yeah so.
Speaker 1:Float Desk I always recommend Float Desk, especially if somebody's newer to email marketing, I mean and it's changed significantly from when I first was looking at it. My biggest pain point, I guess, was that it didn't give me the analytics back in the day when I first signed up. Like that I wanted, like the numbers of different things, yeah, but then you sign up for something like Active Campaign or ConvertKit and it's way more confusing, although I do love ConvertKit. But, like now, float Desk has improved that tons and I think it's an easy, like low lift system that is also aesthetically beautiful and in like wellness and fitness, that means something that makes more sense. What is your favorite fitness booking platform?
Speaker 2:It's Moments.
Speaker 1:I love it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I work with them pretty closely and they're just fantastic and like I'll just email them and be like hey, can we get visit? Count on, you know the class schedule and they're like done, like I really like. So I like working with them, but I also it is miles ahead.
Speaker 2:I'm ahead of everything else that is out there the marketing sequences that you can set up are so amazing and I'll say the best part about it that is really been like a profitable feature for my clients is so you can set up text messages right, Like you can set up all these automatic text messages but your studio gets a phone number so your clients can reply and that goes straight to you. So it's, you know, and I know, like Brandbot has this, but Brandbot's kind of difficult for people to set up, especially if you're not working.
Speaker 1:I worked in it.
Speaker 2:I know you're tired. It's hard Moments is just easy to be like hey, I'm Anna, like I hope you loved the. You know the class today. Like shoot me back if you need anything. It's just it's. It's super easy to use, it's really intuitive, it's very pretty, yeah, and the marketing sequences are amazing and the reporting that you get is so easy to pull that it's it had saved my clients so much time like so much time.
Speaker 1:The reporting and, like you, should not have to be a like a data analyst or scientist to be able to pull reports, and sometimes, as a person who teaches marketing I teach a marketing, data and analyst class I cannot figure out how to pull a damn report Like there's there is something missing.
Speaker 2:I know there's something missing. I know and it's. I also got to tell you like. I think it's. I think it's on purpose, because it's usually like the, the one big conglomerate that like will not be named. Like it's, it is easy to pull conversion data from your intro offer. It is like any person who knows how to use Excel. Like it's easy to do, they gate, keep it to then sell their additional like CRM platform, which is also hard to use in that it's not user friendly.
Speaker 2:It's just like it's. It always feels like with certain companies, like it always feels like you need to do another upgrade and another one, and then you need to do this additional platform If you want to see this report. Like come on, like no one has time for that, like just just make it easy.
Speaker 1:And they're all open to the sonars, like just make it easy, make it easy. I love that. You know well, is there anything else you wanted to add for our listeners? I mean, I think this is going to be probably, I think this is going to be so fun. Alexa and I were talking about doing like, like meeting up in a state somewhere and just like meeting up with all of our friends who we know online and like having a fitness wellness chill time.
Speaker 2:I really think we should do it. I literally I'm just going to text you and be like hey, april 10th, I'm going to this hotel.
Speaker 1:I'm like great, I'll meet you there. I'll fly in. You can see, I was joking with her before. I was like, do you want me to six foot tall? Just because I needed to like prep people? Oh, and I was like I can see you can manifesting that we're going to meet in person. You see a tall, lanky woman walking towards you. It's amazing. Well, thank you so much. Where can people find you? Listen to your podcast, sign up for your newsletter, all the things, yeah.
Speaker 2:On Instagram. It is at Alexa grow my business. I'll send you a link. So if people want a little sneak peek of the Friday Society membership for your listeners specifically, I'll send you a form that they can just submit their info and I'll send them some free content.
Speaker 1:Amazing. We love free and easy stuff to make marketing more fun and grow our businesses. Okay Well, thank you, Alexa, so much for being on the SCCAN podcast and thanks everybody for listening. Thanks for listening all the way to the end of the SCCAN podcast. If you love this one, I would so appreciate a rating and a review on Apple podcasts that lets others know that, hey, this is a good podcast and it's worthwhile to listen to. If you really loved it, make sure to share with somebody you love who could benefit from a little magic and motivation in their lives. Thanks so much, friends, and have a great day.