The health large is embracing in-person occasions and social media content material to assist its members forge a deeper reference to their favourite trainers
iFIT is on a mission to push linked health ahead.
The Utah-based firm is greatest recognized for its giant library of digital health content material, which permits customers to stream instructor-led exercises from gear on IFIT-owned manufacturers like NordicTrack and Freemotion Fitness.
It additionally needs to be recognized for pushing the envelope with regards to how digital health customers interact with their favourite trainers and exercise content material.
Mark Phillips, iFIT’s chief advertising officer believes it’s time for a brand new manner of approaching linked health with the pandemic now within the rearview mirror.
“There’s a novel alternative in the meanwhile to strive new issues, to innovate and to create a distinct user-engagement mannequin from what we’ve seen earlier than,” Phillips informed ATN.
In-Particular person Occasions Convey Members & Trainers Nearer Collectively
iFIT’s technique consists of discovering new methods to attach its greater than six million members with the trainers they see on-screen, together with by means of in-person occasions.
This push started in earnest in 2023, when iFIT despatched a few of its members to a business shoot in Los Angeles the place they received to fulfill their favourite trainers on set.
“Your complete crew and set, trainers and members, all people was in tears,” Phillips recollects. “It’s an extremely emotional expertise whenever you join a member with a coach, as a result of they’ve had such a formative position in these members’ lives.”
Constructing on the success of that occasion, iFIT has launched a sequence of experiential occasions constructed round in-person connections.
Final yr, the corporate partnered with Alex Gregory, an Olympic Gold Medalist and founding father of Thoughts Physique Row, to shock iFIT members with an immersive, five-day rowing expertise in Avis, Portugal. On the occasion, iFIT members received to fulfill standard iFIT trainers together with John Peel, Hannah Eden, and Paulo Barreto, take part in exercises, and attend fireplace talks and mountain climbing experiences.
iFIT can even be sending members to the 2025 London Marathon and Boston Marathon, giving them possibilities to attach with iFIT trainers on the occasions and thru social media initiatives.
iFIT plans to create extra in-person occasions to offer as lots of its members as doable the possibility to fulfill their favourite trainers. Concepts embody extra vacation spot journeys in addition to meet-ups between trainers and members on the iFIT places of work in Utah.
“We’re attempting to not simply put faces to names; we’re attempting to construct relationships on a a lot deeper degree with our members,” Phillips says.
Extra Significant Social Media Interactions
iFIT can be leveraging social media to create deeper connections between its trainers and members.
Ashley Paulson, an iFIT trainer {and professional} triathlete with 160,000 followers on Instagram, lately ran within the Nice World Race, a worldwide marathon occasion that takes place on seven continents. iFIT sponsored Paulson’s participation within the occasion, serving to her create social media content material that was promoted by means of iFIT channels.
Like Paulson, many iFIT trainers have giant social media followings. Phillips says iFIT works to assist its trainers construct up their social media presence, viewing this as a win-win for the model and its trainers.
“One of many joys about our coach mannequin is that we are able to help them to do issues outdoors of iFIT as nicely,” he says. “Social is a incredible software for that.”
iFIT additionally shoots stay content material from its occasions for social media, together with on the latest Portugal journey.
“That’s going to be a way more necessary channel as we transfer ahead,” Phillips says of stay social content material. “In some ways, it’s blurring the traces between the content material you devour on our gear and the content material you devour on social media and our different channels.”
Personalization Is Key
On the finish of the day, iFIT’s new user-engagement technique is designed to make health extra customized, Phillips says.
iFIT will look to drive personalization by means of experiential occasions like in-person conferences, however it is going to additionally achieve this by means of tech improvements.
Final yr, the corporate launched AI Coach, a synthetic intelligence software that acts as a personalised health coach. Presently obtainable in beta mode, AI Coach communicates with members by means of textual content messages, provides every day exercise plans and offers pleasant motivational nudges to work out.
For Phillips, personalization is the important thing to getting individuals to truly follow their health routines – and to conserving iFIT members on the platform for the long run.
“The present of health is an unbelievable factor, however all too typically, it’s been promised, and for a lot of causes, it hasn’t been delivered,” he says. “We now have a novel alternative to assist individuals be far more practical of their health journeys.”
