Dynamic Pricing Could Revolutionize Your Marketing Toolbox

Versatile Fitness doesn’t rely on traditional marketing techniques to get new customers. Instead, the San Diego-based fitness studio focuses on a more modern, social media-based marketing approach.

“I have not paid one dollar for marketing,” Versatile’s founder Bryan Mistretta explained. “We actually don’t have a sign on our gym.”

Despite his atypical approach to marketing, Versatile has been successful in finding and acquiring new members. Many new clients come from word-of-mouth or Versatile’s introductory offer and those that come typically convert to full members of the studio.

Even with the successful growth that Versatile has seen, Bryan faces the same problem that plagues many fitness and wellness business owners: empty spots during class.

“After two years of building the business, we developed those classes that were much fuller than others,” Bryan said. “Our early morning and late night classes would have waitlists for months, while some other classes were empty.”

Instead of canceling the classes with lower attendance, Bryan again turned to digital marketing to help him fill those spots, using a dynamic pricing model to fill Versatile’s less-popular classes.

Dynamic pricing, or the ability to adjust class prices based on the time a class was booked or how many spots are open, helps businesses like Versatile fill spots in less popular classes. Dynamic pricing can even account for the weather, traffic or special events—helping you maximize how many students you have in class, no matter what’s going on in your area.

The most important component of dynamic pricing for Bryan? The ability to reserve spots, even in the most popular classes, for his regular members.

“Being able to adjust the pricing on those popular classes is very important,” Bryan said. “You want to be able to give preference to one of your members rather than someone who is just dropping in.”

With Mindbody's dynamic pricing model, businesses can select which classes qualify for discounted spots and when those spots are released. This method allows fitness and wellness businesses to keep their current members coming back to their favorite class while bringing in new customers at the time—and price—that’s perfect for them.

For Bryan and Versatile Fitness, dynamic pricing is another way to get prospective clients through his door—and keep his focus on growing his business, rather than the empty spots in his classes.

 “I’m going to run a class whether there are four people or twenty people,” Bryan said. “I’d rather have more people there, and dynamic pricing is a way to get people through my door.”

With dynamic pricing, Bryan can retain his members and keep them happy—all while bringing in additional revenue from new drop-in customers. And that, for Bryan, is a perfect solution.