Fitness challenge ideas that keep your members coming back

What can you do to make your fitness studio stand out from the crowd? How can you keep your members motivated, particularly after the initial buzz of a new membership fades? 

Two words: fitness challenges.

Fitness challenges are a great way to engage and motivate your members. You could run a push-up challenge. A step challenge. A weight loss challenge. You name it, as long as it’s got a specific goal and a target time period, a fitness challenge will push individuals beyond their comfort zones — and keep them coming back for more.

What are the benefits of a fitness challenge?

Offering structured, supportive challenges in your gym will help foster a sense of community and camaraderie amongst your members — which in turn helps you nurture longer-term relationships and increase word-of-mouth referrals. 

Specifically, fitness challenges can help you:

• Grow your revenue. With so many people talking about how great your challenges are, you’ll have new members signing up each week. 
• Motivate your members. Everyone needs a little extra inspiration from time to time. Fitness challenges do just that, engaging your current members and making them more likely to stick to their fitness routine. 
• Build community. There’s nothing like a healthy dose of friendly competition to get members talking to each other. It all fosters a stronger sense of belonging within your fitness studio. 
• Boost your brand. Whether you share the results of fitness challenges on social media, or there’s just general buzz about how great your challenges are, it all helps increase brand visibility and awareness.

They’re fun, they’re fast, and they feel a lot more doable than many longer-term commitments. No wonder fitness challenges are now one of the highest tools for community engagement in the fitness industry.

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How to set up a successful fitness challenge

As we’ll explore further down, there are loads of different themes you can explore for a fitness challenge. Yet, no matter what type of challenge you decide to run, there are a number of common elements to consider.

1. Set realistic, flexible goals

‍A fitness challenge will typically include a set goal. Yet every member is unique, and will be coming at your challenge from a different starting point. For example, if you’re doing a body transformation challenge, some people can easily shed 5kg in a month while, for others, 2-3kg is more realistic. Instead of prescribing a specific number, let members set personal goals (hint: it’s easy for them to do this in Hapana’s fitness challenge app).

2. Create a space to share progress

In the gym, you could set up a whiteboard or chalkboard for members to record their progress. Or you could keep it digital, setting up a WhatsApp group for members to swap their stories and post their latest achievements. 

3. Name your prize

‍What’s a challenge without a reward? Sure, many fitness challenges are just about personal glory, but it doesn’t hurt to throw in some fun prizes. Think merch, free memberships, or treats from local businesses. If you’re turning it into a competition with prizes, then just do your due diligence — you will likely need to add some terms and conditions, outlining things like the rules of the competition, eligibility, entry methods, prize details, and how the winner will be chosen. 

4. Get consent

‍If you’re planning to promote the competition — for example, on your socials or your website — then you’ll need to get consent from each participant before you proceed. ‍

5. Keep members motivated

‍Think about how you’ll encourage members to keep going and not give up. This could be emails or reminders to complete daily tasks, or notifications via your member app.

Fitstop revived the idea of fitness challenges to power its phenomenal growth. See how they did it.

Ideas and inspo for your next fitness challenge

Now that you’re sold on the concept of running a fitness challenge in your gym, you’ve got to decide on an actual challenge. Here are some ideas to get you started:

Seasonal challenges

Use the changing seasons as inspiration to get people moving. Just coming out of winter? How about a Spring reset? Or, if the end of the year is looming, what about a ‘New year, new you’ challenge?

Habit-building challenges

‍While the jury’s out on exactly how many days it takes to change a habit, many people agree that it takes about two months (or 66 days) before a new behaviour becomes automatic. So why not set a two-month challenge — like, attend 20 classes in 8 weeks — to try and get that new, gym-going habit to stick. 

Body composition challenges

‍Many people join the gym with a particular goal in mind. Help them realise this goal by setting specific challenges (for example, lose X% weight or gain X% muscle). Hapana’s fitness studio app integrates with popular body composition scanners to make it easier for your members to track their progress. 

Time- or target-based challenges

Over a set period of time (like, 30 days), you could challenge your members to complete a certain number of classes, or a certain number of exercises. Like, 20 burpees or push-ups per day; or “as many reps as possible” (AMRAP) in five minutes. ‍

Holistic/lifestyle challenges

‍Beyond burpees and bench press, many of your gym goers are on (or want to climb on board) the wellness wagon. You could tap into this trend with challenges around healthy eating, meditation, stress management, hydration, and more.

Fire up your next fitness challenge on Hapana

It’s one thing to dream up a fab new fitness challenge. It’s another thing to roll it out in your gym. At Hapana, we wanted to make it easier for fitness studios to offer challenges — so we built the challenge app, where you can easily set up a new challenge, and your members can sign up and track their progress. It’s a great way to help members feel connected, have fun, and smash their goals, all while feeling a part of your gym community.

So what are you waiting for? Set up your next fitness challenge and see the difference it makes to member engagement and your bottom line.

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