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features

App retention: Digital retention top performers

Three digital fitness platforms tell Fit Tech how they work to achieve higher levels of customer retention

Published in Fit Tech 2021 issue 1

Jean-Michel Fournier
CEO, Les Mills Media

It’s the biggest challenge all fitness platforms face in pursuit of building a sustainable business model – how do you keep your cost of acquired customers (CAC) low, while boosting the life-time value (LTV) of each user? High churn sends your marketing costs spiralling as you’re having to spend more to acquire users, so strong retention really is the holy grail for running a successful digital fitness platform – much like a gym.

Building great retention for your app requires several key pillars – providing world-class content and a frictionless user experience is absolutely essential. You augment this by creating a robust community around your app so that it becomes a self-sustaining ecosystem where everyone gives energy to each other – our LMOD Squad Facebook group has 125k members and the level of engagement in there is insane. And when it comes to keeping people coming back for more, gamification and challenges to motivate and incentivise users are incredibly powerful.

Create a robust community around your app so that it becomes a self- sustaining ecosystem

Equally important is the mindset and culture that underpin your approach. In today’s business environment, where things are changing constantly, speed of execution is a lot more important than perfect execution. Make your solutions “good enough,” ship them, improve them based on market feedback, rinse and repeat. This approach brings solutions much faster, and the snowball effect of iterative learning means your product will constantly improve.

Fournier says gamification and challenges are excellent ways to motivate and engage users
Vicky Hallbauer
Head of marketing, Freeletics

There’s now more digital fitness content available than ever before, and a myriad of different apps are available at the tap of a screen.

Retention comes with trust and results. We promise personal development beyond physical transformation. For some, we are a lifestyle, a discipline or even a sport. For others, Freeletics is a philosophy on how to navigate the world. And for all those who believe in us, Freeletics is a community of like-minded athletes.

We listen very closely to the needs of our users and we continuously adapt user feedback into our app. By implementing new features and offering ongoing, helpful content, we are able to support our community of users throughout their fitness journey.

To grow and expand, we need to truly know our audience down to a personal level. What are they looking for? What support do they need? Which triggers or tone of voice will help them to take the steps necessary to move forwards towards their goal?

To learn about this we not only analyse anonymised data from our millions of users, but also run surveys to better understand their needs. We also run all kinds of testing in the app, which assures we offer exactly what our users demand. In this industry, being able to adapt and change perspectives to continuously fit your audience is a huge asset.

Karin Kaellman
CEO, Barrecore

When it comes to our Barrecore app, and really our overall business, we operate along the lines of the classic 80/20 rule. That’s an 80 per cent focus on retention and 20 per cent on new acquisition. Actually, it’s possibly even 90/10.

When it comes to fitness apps, you are inevitably going to have natural churn. So there’s a constant need to top up your audience in order to maintain a certain number of clients, and to also grow.

But there’s no point spending money and/or effort identifying and converting new clients if they don’t stay with you. You’ll just be constantly chasing your tail.

On the contrary, happy clients allow you to grow your business in a sustainable way. In addition, happy clients create high levels of word-of-mouth referrals, effectively allowing you to outsource much of your new client acquisition to your existing clients – for free!

So the majority of our focus goes towards making sure that our online workouts and general service is the very best it can be. Our Barrecore app is really just a pure press and play solution at this point in time – no high tech functionality or retention tools as far as the eye can see (yet). Still, we have incredibly high retention thanks to the quick and sustainable results that our clients see and feel from our unique method. This ensures that they stick around for years.

Sign up here to get Fit Tech's weekly ezine and every issue of Fit Tech magazine free on digital.
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Flooring
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features

App retention: Digital retention top performers

Three digital fitness platforms tell Fit Tech how they work to achieve higher levels of customer retention

Published in Fit Tech 2021 issue 1

Jean-Michel Fournier
CEO, Les Mills Media

It’s the biggest challenge all fitness platforms face in pursuit of building a sustainable business model – how do you keep your cost of acquired customers (CAC) low, while boosting the life-time value (LTV) of each user? High churn sends your marketing costs spiralling as you’re having to spend more to acquire users, so strong retention really is the holy grail for running a successful digital fitness platform – much like a gym.

Building great retention for your app requires several key pillars – providing world-class content and a frictionless user experience is absolutely essential. You augment this by creating a robust community around your app so that it becomes a self-sustaining ecosystem where everyone gives energy to each other – our LMOD Squad Facebook group has 125k members and the level of engagement in there is insane. And when it comes to keeping people coming back for more, gamification and challenges to motivate and incentivise users are incredibly powerful.

Create a robust community around your app so that it becomes a self- sustaining ecosystem

Equally important is the mindset and culture that underpin your approach. In today’s business environment, where things are changing constantly, speed of execution is a lot more important than perfect execution. Make your solutions “good enough,” ship them, improve them based on market feedback, rinse and repeat. This approach brings solutions much faster, and the snowball effect of iterative learning means your product will constantly improve.

Fournier says gamification and challenges are excellent ways to motivate and engage users
Vicky Hallbauer
Head of marketing, Freeletics

There’s now more digital fitness content available than ever before, and a myriad of different apps are available at the tap of a screen.

Retention comes with trust and results. We promise personal development beyond physical transformation. For some, we are a lifestyle, a discipline or even a sport. For others, Freeletics is a philosophy on how to navigate the world. And for all those who believe in us, Freeletics is a community of like-minded athletes.

We listen very closely to the needs of our users and we continuously adapt user feedback into our app. By implementing new features and offering ongoing, helpful content, we are able to support our community of users throughout their fitness journey.

To grow and expand, we need to truly know our audience down to a personal level. What are they looking for? What support do they need? Which triggers or tone of voice will help them to take the steps necessary to move forwards towards their goal?

To learn about this we not only analyse anonymised data from our millions of users, but also run surveys to better understand their needs. We also run all kinds of testing in the app, which assures we offer exactly what our users demand. In this industry, being able to adapt and change perspectives to continuously fit your audience is a huge asset.

Karin Kaellman
CEO, Barrecore

When it comes to our Barrecore app, and really our overall business, we operate along the lines of the classic 80/20 rule. That’s an 80 per cent focus on retention and 20 per cent on new acquisition. Actually, it’s possibly even 90/10.

When it comes to fitness apps, you are inevitably going to have natural churn. So there’s a constant need to top up your audience in order to maintain a certain number of clients, and to also grow.

But there’s no point spending money and/or effort identifying and converting new clients if they don’t stay with you. You’ll just be constantly chasing your tail.

On the contrary, happy clients allow you to grow your business in a sustainable way. In addition, happy clients create high levels of word-of-mouth referrals, effectively allowing you to outsource much of your new client acquisition to your existing clients – for free!

So the majority of our focus goes towards making sure that our online workouts and general service is the very best it can be. Our Barrecore app is really just a pure press and play solution at this point in time – no high tech functionality or retention tools as far as the eye can see (yet). Still, we have incredibly high retention thanks to the quick and sustainable results that our clients see and feel from our unique method. This ensures that they stick around for years.

Sign up here to get Fit Tech's weekly ezine and every issue of Fit Tech magazine free on digital.
More features
Editor's letter

Into the fitaverse

Fitness is already among the top three markets in the metaverse, with new technology and partnerships driving real growth and consumer engagement that looks likely to spill over into health clubs, gyms and studios
Fit Tech people

Ali Jawad

Paralympic powerlifter and founder, Accessercise
Users can easily identify which facilities in the UK are accessible to the disabled community
Fit Tech people

Hannes Sjöblad

MD, DSruptive
We want to give our users an implantable tool that allows them to collect their health data at any time and in any setting
Fit Tech people

Jamie Buck

Co-founder, Active in Time
We created a solution called AiT Voice, which turns digital data into a spoken audio timetable that connects to phone systems
Profile

Fahad Alhagbani: reinventing fitness

Alexa can help you book classes, check trainers’ bios and schedules, find out opening times, and a host of other information
Opinion

Building on the blockchain

For small sports teams looking to compete with giants, blockchain can be a secret weapon explains Lars Rensing, CEO of Protokol
Innovation

Bold move

Our results showed a greater than 60 per cent reduction in falls for individuals who actively participated in Bold’s programme
App analysis

Check your form

Sency’s motion analysis technology is allowing users to check their technique as they exercise. Co-founder and CEO Gal Rotman explains how
Profile

New reality

Sam Cole, CEO of FitXR, talks to Fit Tech about taking digital workouts to the next level, with an immersive, virtual reality fitness club
Profile

Sohail Rashid

The app is free and it’s $40 to participate in one of our virtual events
Ageing

Reverse Ageing

Many apps help people track their health, but Humanity founders Peter Ward and Michael Geer have put the focus on ageing, to help users to see the direct repercussions of their habits. They talk to Steph Eaves
App analysis

Going hybrid

Workout Anytime created its app in partnership with Virtuagym. Workout Anytime’s Greg Maurer and Virtuagym’s Hugo Braam explain the process behind its creation
Research

Physical activity monitors boost activity levels

Researchers at the University of Copenhagen have conducted a meta analysis of all relevant research and found that the body of evidence shows an impact
Editor's letter

Two-way coaching

Content providers have been hugely active in the fit tech market since the start of the pandemic. We expect the industry to move on from delivering these services on a ‘broadcast-only’ basis as two-way coaching becomes the new USP
Fit Tech People

Laurent Petit

Co-founder, Active Giving
The future of sports and fitness are dependent on the climate. Our goal is to positively influence the future of our planet by instilling a global vision of wellbeing and a sense of collective action
Fit Tech People

Adam Zeitsiff

CEO, Intelivideo
We don’t just create the technology and bail – we support our clients’ ongoing hybridisation efforts
Fit Tech People

Anantharaman Pattabiraman

CEO and co-founder, Auro
When you’re undertaking fitness activities, unless you’re on a stationary bike, in most cases it’s not safe or necessary to be tied to a screen, especially a small screen
Fit Tech People

Mike Hansen

Managing partner, Endorphinz
We noticed a big gap in the market – customers needed better insights but also recommendations on what to do, whether that be customer acquisition, content creation, marketing and more
More features