More Appointments—More “Shows”—More Sales!

If a club sales manager is on the ball, they will ensure that membership sales staff make the required number of prospecting calls required of them. Call volume is only the beginning however. Calls made do not mean sales made if appointment show rates are poor to begin with. When appointments continually fail to show up, many membership sales staff either avoid making the required quota of daily calls, or begrudgingly continue to do so because it is part of their duties. This of course is not the mindset needed to have success on the phone.

One often wonders; what comes first?—a lack of success, or a defeatist attitude? It doesn’t matter. What does matter is to make every live connection on the phone count, to not only double the amount of appointments made, but to double the amount of appointments showing up. There is little value in booking 10 appointments in one day, if only one or two of them end up visiting your club.

History has shown that in the fitness industry, on average, 7-8 out of 10 prospects who are called will book appointments — and from those who show up, approximately 50% to 60% will enroll on their first visit. Although those closing numbers should be—and can be—higher, the problem for the most part is that on average ONLY 30% of prospects who make appointments actually show up to the club (this 30% includes those who miss their first appointment and have to be called to be re-motivated and re-booked, so numbers are obviously lower in clubs where such follow up is not done).  Yes, it is a numbers game, but these are numbers that can be increased dramatically with the proper training.

Without establishing a solid connection with the potential member, and not discovering their ultimate buying motive, they will often book an appointment just to get the membership sales person off the phone. In some cases, they may even intend to show up to the club when they make their appointment, but within minutes of hanging up they either forget about it altogether, or make a conscious decision not to keep their appointment.

In this training module, your employees will learn how to connect with telephone prospects be it with outbound calls or information calls they are speaking to, so that the potential member becomes motivated and excited to visit your club. They will also learn that booking an appointment is NOT a 30 second endeavour, but 2-3 minutes of establishing trust, rapport, need and desire.

Some learning topics include:

  • The Mindset of a Successful Dialer
  • Overcoming Call Reluctance
  • Handling Incoming Information Calls to Improve “Show” Percentages
  • The “Universal” Outbound Phone Script to Use for ALL Prospecting Calls
  • Don’t Give up—Follow up
  • Phone Call Physicality: Using your Body to get Better Results
  • Strategic Dialing
To receive a free phone, or email consultation, please list the main concerns you are having at your club and provide your preferred method of contact on our submission page.