16 Marketing Tips to Gain New Tennis Club Members

As we already discussed in our last blog post, marketing to potential new tennis club members should be different from marketing to existing members. 

The following suggestions will help you put together a membership marketing strategy for your tennis club or tennis organization and give you some tips on how to make it more successful.  

Figure out this before you launch any membership marketing campaign

Know your audience! Your audience is your target marketing persona - your ideal client that you would like to market to. Knowing your audience means understanding who your ideal client is, what their goals and needs are, and how you can best help them to achieve those goals and needs. Without this valuable information, and marketing efforts will be a waste of time and money. 

Get everyone on your team on the same page regarding membership goals

Everyone on your team should be on the same page when it comes to your marketing and sales goals and knows the chosen way to achieve them. To best communicate your goals, make sure they are SMART - specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, time-based.

• Specific: The goal should be very clear with no room for misinterpretation.
• Measurable: The goal should be quantifiable, and easy to track.. 
• Achievable: The goal should be attainable, not unrealistic.
• Relevant: The goal should contribute to your big picture goals.
• Time-bound: The goal should have a clear start and end dates.

Take a look at the following bad goal example and SMART goal examples:

Bad Goal Example: I’m going to increase our tennis club membership. 

SMART Goal Example 1: I’m going to implement our 2022 marketing plan by doing all listed tasks weekly, to increase our tennis club membership in 6 months from now.

SMART Goal Example 2: I’m going to spend 2 hours per week calling my list of sales leads for the next 3 months, to engage with them and convert them into members.

SMART Goal Example 3: I will begin working on the Google Ads campaign and have it up and running by next week to increase our membership sales. Then, I’ll analyze and evaluate my results in 3 months. 

Ways to reach new tennis club members:

1. Be where they hang out

Is your ideal tennis club member a 21-year-old hanging out on Instagram? If the answer is yes, then you must have an Instagram business account. Are you marketing to moms and dads? Then be sure to become part of the local Facebook parent groups or leave some brochures at the pediatrician’s office (only if they allow you to do so, of course). 

2. Partner with complementary organizations or brands

Collaborating with organizations that have a similar target market to yours is a great way to reach new people. 

For example, if you are a tennis club, you can partner with restaurants, doctors’ offices, hair salons, or local transportation services. Offer something that is of value to them (e.g. promote them to your existing members in your next email newsletter or social media page).

You could invite an expert from that organization for an interview that you can record and post on your website or video channel, ask if they would like to write a guest post for your blog, or get a quote for an article you’re already writing. By asking for their expertise and valuable opinion and making them look good in front of your audience, will certainly encourage them to share your content with theirs. 

3. Make a website 

Having your own tennis business website instantly adds credibility to your organization. Creating a website has never been easier and it does not have to cost a fortune. 

There are so many user-friendly platforms - Wix, Shopify, BigCommerce (affiliate link), WordPress.com, Weebly. However, if you choose to use a platform like WordPress.org (which is different from WordPress.com, and it is typically used by most expert web designers and developers), you can still create and edit a website easily and quickly. You just need to use a page builder plugin like Beaver Builder (affiliate link), which (in our opinion) is the best drag and drop WordPress page builder plugin on the market. 

If building a website does not sound like a fun activity for you or you do not have the time, you can hire a professional - a freelancer or an agency to do that for you. Resourcely® has been providing website design and development services to tennis businesses all over the world since 2015, so please contact us if you would like to discuss and receive an estimate for your website project. 

4. Reach out to former members

Former members surely had a good reason to leave your tennis club. However, some of them might also be ready to come back. So, check-in via phone or email and see whether you can convert some of them into members again. 

5. Encourage members to share your newsletters and social media posts

As part of your newsletter copy, you should always ask your subscribers to share the email with their friends and family or on social media. While many people do not like to do so because they think it will inconvenience people, the truth is, there is nothing bad about asking for help. Helping someone makes people feel good. If you put high-quality content out there and you ask people to share it, they will.  

6. Invite members’ friends and families to some of your tennis club events

Member-guest tournaments and events are often the highlights of the tennis club season. With great preparation and execution, you will have not only happy members but also delighted guests (who might become your new tennis members). 

To make your life easier, allow for people to register for your tennis event online. In-person sign-up sheets can also be left at the front desk of your tennis club, however, do not try to only manage the registration process manually. It is much more time-consuming and error-prone. 

For tips on managing an event registration process, please check out this blog post. It is focused on open house registrations, however, the principle is practically the same.

Be sure to collect email addresses for both the member and the guest. Stay in touch with them not only before and during the event but also after the event. Thank them for participating and include a call-to-action (CTA). 

7. Give members some branded merchandise and encourage them to wear it 

Branded merchandise is an excellent method of spreading awareness of your brand or tennis business. If you have a well-designed branded item, with an interesting slogan, you will not need to encourage people to wear or carry it. They will probably approach you instead. The more people see your tennis business name, the more opportunities for conversations about your company you will have.  

Branded car bumper stickers (or simple fun tennis-themed stickers) are an excellent giveaway, so hand them out to your existing members, colleagues, and club staff.

8. Create a promotional video and share it on all your social media 

Video content can be used in so many different ways. Whether it is designed for brand awareness or to drive traffic to the website, once you identify the exact goal of your video, the creation process goes faster. 

As always, having a professional by your side makes the process much easier and faster. However, with the current technology and some solid planning, you can create high-quality video content on your own too. 

9. Film existing tennis club members testimonials and ask for online reviews 

Testimonials and online reviews improve your tennis business reputation. Why? Because people search for online reviews when choosing a new service provider. So, once you get that positive feedback from a customer, ask them for it in writing or, even better, see if they would agree to film it. 

10. Participate at an event for your existing students 

You can try to do community service, run or walk a 5k together as a group. Give away free shirts, small towels, or other branded merchandise to those who join in.

11. Experiment with Facebook or Google ads 

Both Facebook and Google are advertising platforms. Both can be significant drivers for your tennis business marketing. 

If you have never done any pay-per-click (PPC) advertising, it can be intimidating to get started. In that case, it is often best to consult with a marketing company or a freelancer that specializes in Google Ads and Facebook Ads. 

In our opinion, Facebook Ads are easier to set up, but that does not mean they will be more successful. If you end up advertising on both, be sure to review and track your campaign results, so you know which of the two is your top performer. 

12. Be on social media to reach more potential tennis club members 

According to Hootsuite, there are more than 4.5 billion users on social media, each of whom spends on average 2.5 hours per day on these channels. So, there is a lot of opportunities for any business to gain business via social media. 

The challenge with this marketing method is that social media is full of clutter and noise. So, the hard part is not creating the account, but setting up a social media plan - in short, that is where you will post, what you will post, and why. Get inspired by competition and pay attention to other businesses you like and what they are doing on social media. 

You should also decide which social media platforms are right for you and whether you have the time to manage them all. As always, this process starts with knowing your target audience. 

13. Put up flyers around town 

Creating a flyer is pretty simple - check out this recent tutorial on how to create one quickly and easily:

https://www.resourcelymarketing.com/create-tennis-event-flyer-with-canva/

Next, think about where people who you target are likely to be and look for high-traffic spots - stores, libraries, coffee shops, churches, auto shops, and community boards. For many of those places you might need permission to distribute your flyers or brochures, so be sure to check before you get in trouble or have your print budget go into the trash.  

14. Submit your tennis club information to local and industry-specific directories 

Directories are listings of businesses on a website. Online and local directories typically describe the businesses and provide links to their website. Many of those directories are free, while others charge a small fee. 

So how do you find such directories? Simply open Google or your preferred search engine in the browser, and type "(Your industry) + business directories” or "(Your city, county, or state) + business directories."

Once you find one that looks appropriate for your tennis business, you can typically fill out an online form and request to be listed. As long as those online directories are not spammy, your business could benefit from being listed there. 

15. Create a Google My Business page

Google My Business is an excellent opportunity for your business to appear in Google search results. What is Google My Business? It is an online business listing, which is completely free. 

When someone searches for “tennis club near me”, Google shows a list of tennis club locations based on your current location. You can post your business’ photos, website, phone number, and address. Additionally, people will be able to post reviews about your tennis business, to which you can respond. If you have not taken the time to create a Google My Business listing, you are missing out on one of the best free opportunities of appearing in Google search results. 

16. Reach out to schools, universities, and colleges in your area

If your target audience is part of local schools, colleges, or universities it is worth checking if they would work with you. You can volunteer to teach tennis in elementary or middle school PE in exchange for passing out program brochures. 

Local college programs may also be interested in using your business in some of their class projects. You can also offer to sponsor an event or charity on campus. If they do not allow any of that, shake hands, thank them for their time and give out your card in case there is an opportunity in the future.   

Do you have any other ideas or strategies to increase a tennis club membership that you would like to share? Please comment below and let us know!