Using the information from some promotingactivity.com workshops I ran in West London, Fusion Lifestyle team and Hounslow Borough Council set up a series of programmes to encourage women back into exercise.
Community Sports Development Manager Jo Valks explains “the results have been fantastic! All the classes were really well attended and spinning has now been fully incorporated into our leisure programme – we are also hoping to offer netball on a regular basis when we can find a suitable venue. I think the fact that we offered free taster sessions was crucial in developing such a high attendance – a lot of the people who joined the classes wouldn’t have attended if they had to pay, but now they are involved in sport and activity again and are keeping on with it, which is the exactly the result we were looking for.”
The team used the market segmentation toolkits on promotingactivity.com to identify the two most prevalent female demographics in the borough – in this case ‘Leannes’ and ‘Chloes’, young women who may not be doing as much exercise as they could or should be. Research has shown that aerobics and netball are preferred sports for both groups so the decision was made to offer a Back to Netball course and some new fitness classes that concentrate on core stability and spinning.
“Promotingactivity.com really helped us in shaping our bid for the Play Sport London funds,” explains Jo, “the market segmentation toolkits were really helpful as they helped us identify just where our target market lived, which is particularly useful in such a diverse area as Hounslow. We found that there was a high density of Chloes and Leannes living in the centre and east of the borough, so we concentrated on activities that not only suited our target market but that also matched the facilities we had available in those areas. The information also meant that we could carefully target our marketing materials, ensuring that we were more effective in getting our message out to the right people.”
Would you like to know how to replicate this success in your area? You can with the promotingactivity.com workshops – find out more.
The funding process was managed by PRO-ACTIVE West London, with the help of funding from the London Development Agency’s Play Sport London programme.