With a novel concept in a competitive niche, Fast Fitness to Go shows how a subscription site can generate reliable revenue early on compared to most online start-ups. Founder Shay de Silva spoke with us about the key factors in creating downloadable exercise videos for traveling professionals, what WordPress plugins have helped her push conversions, and why she’s pursuing group subscription opportunities for her B2C site. Plus, learn how the site converts 11% of visitors to its email list and 2.5% to paying subscriber.
Company Profile
Founded: 2012
No. of Publications: 1
Employees: One full-time, plus 5 freelancers
Business Model: Subscription-only
Paying Subscribers: Under 100
Location: Washington, DC
Website: http://www.fastfitnesstogo.com/
Target Market
Fast Fitness to Go targets professionals who travel frequently for work and are already into health and fitness; De Silva says she’s “not trying to convert people sitting on the couch.” And while most of the site’s subscribers are traveling professionals, de Silva was surprised to find a secondary audience among moms — either working moms who don’t have time to go to the gym, or stay-at-home moms who can’t leave their kids to go work out.
Content
Fast Fitness to Go’s premium content consists of 25-minute workout videos that focus on strength-training and cardio.
The site also sends members PDF downloads with sample meal plans, charts to track their workouts, and tips to change habits related to diet and exercise.
Obviously, Fast Fitness to Go has a lot of free competition, particularly from YouTube. But the site’s videos have two main features that translate into selling benefits:
- None of the videos require weights or equipment. De Silva found when she was traveling that she would get half way into a YouTube exercise video and the instructor would pull out weights, which she obviously wasn’t traveling with, so she’d either have to abandon the workout or start over, which was a time-waster in her busy travel schedule.
- The workouts are consistently delivered three times a week, and are varied, which is better for overall fitness. Finding one video that works when you travel is not sufficient for people who want to see continued results from their workouts.
- The videos are emailed to subscribers, and therefore require no Internet-access once downloaded. This is big member benefit since travelers often have sporadic Internet access.
In addition, de Silva shoots all the videos outside, giving subscribers a better view than their dingy hotel rooms. None of the videos have music or an underlying soundtrack, which allows subscribers to work out to the music they enjoy.
Three videos are released every 28 days, two of which focus on strength training and cardio and one of which is exclusively a cardio workout. The site also sends weekly email reminders with motivational tips.
De Silva choreographs and films all the videos on her own. She films using a Panasonic DMCG3 camera, which can film in HD. All the videos are edited through iMovie. Since all the videos are filmed outdoors, de Silva often films when traveling (although some videos have been shot in the greater DC area). She makes sure to film a number ahead of winter when filming outdoors becomes difficult.
Revenue Streams
Fast Fitness to Go is already generating five-figure revenues after a year of operation, 100% of which comes from subscriptions.
The site offers multiple plans:
De Silva says the one-month and six-month plans are the most popular (practically a 50/50 split between them), and the three-month option is least popular. All of the plans automatically renew.
The site had a one-year plan priced at $228, but prospects reported that that was too much to pay up front, and thus a barrier to entry.
The site has also acquired a corporate/group subscription from a travel agency. Group subscriptions are priced between $1 and $15 per employee per month, depending on the size of the organization.
Marketing Tactics
Organic Search and Referrals
Fast Fitness to Go gets most of its traffic from organic search and from other blogs, where de Silva makes it a point to comment on relevant articles. The site has some SEO, but is still relatively weak in this department.
Social Media
Fast Fitness to Go has a strong presence on Twitter, Facebook and YouTube. Facebook has been the most promising with lots of interaction. The site even conducted a PPC campaign through Facebook, which de Silva said was great for gathering email opt-ins, but not paying subscribers. Through the site’s YouTube channel, a London-based app developer MyAppMentor reached out and the site is now in talks with the app developer to create a freemium mobile app of the videos; brief videos will be made for free, but users must pay to get extended content. De Silva doesn’t expect this to be a major revenue source, but it does allow for branding and international reach.
Events
Fast Fitness to Go has been an exhibitor at a number of local health fairs, which de Silva says helped generate brand awareness.
Affiliates
Fast Fitness to Go has a number of affiliates that market the subscription product. Affiliates get 50% of any term’s subscription price (i.e., $47, $77, $97), and continue to get 50% for the length of the converted prospect’s subscription.
De Silva first approached Commission Junction to run her affiliate program, but it said her site needed to be bigger. So instead, she installed a WordPress plugin to run her affiliate program (see Vendors & Technology).
Fast Fitness to Go also gets some traffic through word of mouth referrals, but the site is yet to initiate a formal program to track and convert these leads.
Conversion Tactics
Fast Fitness to Go converts about 11% of site visitors to its email opt-in list, and about 2.5% of email opt-ins convert to paying subscribers. These are impressive numbers.
The site’s main conversion tactic is allowing access to one full-length video. Prospects must provide an email (and opt-in to the email list) to receive an email with the video link. On the video viewing page, there’s a timer where the prospect will be notified that she has 10 days to decide if she wants to be a subscriber. If they take the offer, they get a discount. The prospect can keep going back to that page until the timer runs out. (See Vendors & Technology for plugin info.)
After the video link is emailed, the site then sends 5 emails over 10 days with additional free content — shorter videos, tips about health and fitness, etc. After that point, prospects continue to get the weekly email newsletter.
The site started conducting A/B split tests on email subject lines recently. One test found that a headline in a question form got 15% more opens than a headline not in question form.
Group Sales
At this time, group sales for Fast Fitness to Go are generated through word-of-mouth. Sometimes that allows the site to work with the decision-maker, and sometimes not. All the sales are closed by de Silva via phone or email. The site only takes credit cards for group subscriptions, but would be willing to invoice a large corporation should the need arise.
Retention Tactics
The average account lifetime is 6 months across all subscription terms (one-month to six-month; most of the subscribers who tried out a one-year subscription term cancelled after six months, which is why de Silva discontinued it).
The site’s main retention tactic is to continue providing quality content of varied workouts on a monthly basis, as well as auto-renewal on all subscription terms.
About Shay de Silva
Shay de Silva came into the subscription content business by translating her own personal need into a consumer-centric product.
“I was traveling for work and couldn’t find anything that would fit my routine. I really like habits, so I started handwriting my own workouts before every trip for what I could do in hotel room. People started commenting that I was losing weight while traveling and asked what’s going on”
Her biggest surprise is how hard it’s been to get traffic to the site. “I had plans to get 100s of subscribers in months, but it’s takes consistent, daily effort before you’ll see big changes.”
Her best advice for subscription professionals, especially small ones, is to be willing to adapt. “I’ve talked to other business owners who are very set on ‘this is what I’m offering.’ But it’s important to give customers what they want. I wanted the videos, but a lot of feedback I got was that people want more motivation. Making those small changes along the way makes a big difference — not only in terms of getting more customers, but getting more loyal customers.”
Vendors & Technology
Hosting — AN hosting
www.anhosting.com/
*De Silva recommends them strongly, saying their 24/7 phone support and customer service are “amazing.”
Payment processing –PayPal Pro, which allows you to get credit card number and keep customer data.
https://www.paypal.com/webapps/mpp/paypal-payments-pro
Email management — aWeber
www.aweber.com
CMS — WordPress with multiple plugins, including ScarcitySamuri for the video viewing countdown timer and Market Samuri for SEO assistance.
http://wordpress.org/
http://www.scarcitysamurai.com/
http://www.marketsamurai.com/
Web design — Stephanie Zamora.
http://stepheniezamora.com/
Video Editing — iMovie
http://www.apple.com/ilife/imovie/
Consultants/Freelancers –Amy Scott for editing written content, right now at Nomad Editorial
http://nomadedit.com/
Analytics — Google Analytics
www.google.com/analytics/
Subscription Site Insider Analysis
First, we want to congratulate Fast Fitness to Go on finding a way to distinguish themselves in a highly competitive niche with lots of free content. The site clearly knows its market niche. We also like that the site has taken advantage of some relatively low-budget technologies (WordPress templates and plugins) to create a clear and time-sensitive conversion process. We also think it’s great that the site is pursuing group subscription opportunities; with the growth in stay-at-home workers and freelancers, we imagine Fast Fitness could find more of such opportunities with large corporations or organizations like Freelancers Union.
Given the site’s great conversion rate, the biggest area for improvement is in driving traffic to the site. We recommend a strong SEO strategy, as well as more aggressive marketing through affiliates, partnerships, and a formal word-of-mouth program (perhaps a gym-like program — discounting existing members if they bring in a new member). Health fairs are great, but we recommend de Silva lead a workshop or give live presentations instead of manning a booth. And this sort of B2C site is prime for television PR, so Fast Fitness should create a media center on its site with easy-to-download logos, photos and video, as well as reach out to broadcast outlets through HARO and SheSource. Fast Fitness to Go’s one weak spot may be its email-delivered videos — they’re ripe for piracy, so de Silva should take steps to prevent copying. But overall, we expect Fast Fitness to grow and the site’s substantial gains in under a year of operation should provide a healthy benchmark for other companies or individuals looking to launch B2C subscription sites.
