What is a brand?

A brand is the perception that your audience, your competitors and the market have of your business.

You can have an influence over your brand. You can shape its visual identity and verbal expression. You can direct the way it is represented in your marketing, studio design, programming style and so on. But you can’t own it, because your brand is what other people say, think and feel about you.

Put simply, a brand is not for the owner. It is for the audience.

“You can have an influence over your brand, but you can’t own it. Your brand is what others say, think and feel about you.”

How strong are fitness brands?

If you stretch the definition to include sport, then some of the world’s best brands live in this sector. Nike, for example, is arguably the greatest brand ever created. What it’s selling isn’t shoes. It’s pure brand. Simple, bold and all about feeling – perseverance, hard work and achievement. It’s beautiful.

In the fitness sector, I’d pick out SoulCycle. It brought soul and fitness together in a new way, creating a brand that essentially sold a lifestyle. The problem came when everyone else started trying to be SoulCycle too. Instead of being unique with their own brands, they copied SoulCycle – and that was a major mistake.

A brand has to talk to its own clearly defined audience. SoulCycle is a New York brand that addresses a very specific New York niche. It has successfully taken its brand elsewhere, but if you’re an independent studio in Vancouver, say – which is where we’re based – there’s no point copying SoulCycle. Create something that’s directly relevant to your own audience.

Is this the secret of a strong brand?

The strongest brands are always those with a very clear definition of who they’re talking to. Once you know your audience, you can tailor your whole brand around them – not only your branding but everything you offer, every element of your experience, your pricing, how you speak to people and so on.

This is simpler for a boutique studio than for a big box club, because boutiques can be very specific in their focus. For example: ‘I want to talk to mums who are just getting back to an active lifestyle.’ Boom, that’s it. You don’t go on adding other audiences. Others may come to you, but these mums are your first-class passengers and you craft everything around them. You understand the transformation they’re looking to buy from you, build all your packages and services around this and stay laser-focused.

“If you try and connect people to a business, it won’t happen. You have to connect them to your purpose.”

Strong brands also understand why they exist and are able to connect their core audience to this brand story. In the world of boutiques, this is often linked to the founder’s personal story.

That’s the great thing about fitness: it’s all about lifestyle and the stories are very real. In more corporate sectors, you might have to make up a purpose and brand story, but in fitness the stories are alive, sitting at the heart of the businesses we work with.

If you try and connect people to a business, it won’t happen. You have to connect them to your purpose, your story and the transformation you’re selling – and all of that can be done through a strong brand personality.

What is Creative Fit’s approach?

Our three-step Brand Bootcamp Method starts with a brand strategy workshop. We define what makes the business special, as well as its purpose and mission: why was the business started, why does it exist, why should it be front-of-mind for people?

We then define their ideal client, including through consumer interviews where we ask about their lives, challenges, current habits and how they think working out might help. This allows us to create a persona that we can build everything else around.

The next bit is really fun: What would your brand look like if it were a person? If you want people to connect with your brand, it needs human-like features, so how would it look, talk and behave? What would be its tone of voice and its values?

Finally we move on to positioning, mapping the brand in the market – noting its USPs vs the competition – as well as mapping what it’s doing for people and why they should care.

By the end of this process, we have a pretty strong roadmap for the next few years, as well as an understanding of what’s needed to create the desired brand perceptions.

The resulting brand guidelines can be shared with anyone involved in bringing the brand to life, from interior designers to lighting engineers to photographers.

“Don’t copy other brands. You’ll simply be talking to their audience, not your own.”

Step two is brand design, creating the visual and verbal expressions of the brand. Logo, look and feel, website, studio signage, messaging, apparel design… anything that’s part of the experience, both in and away from the studio.

Step three is about growth, using predominantly online channels to reach even more individuals who match the studio’s now well-defined audience.

Whether they’re start-ups or existing businesses looking to refresh their brand and realign with their purpose, the vast majority of our clients go through the full three-step process. This is certainly where we see the best results.

Tell us about your indoor cycling clients.

We’ve worked with a lot of boutique cycle studios over the years, including Spin Society, Ignite Cycle, Tru Ride, Soar and Define.

Tru Ride was fun, with a very colourful personality. It was bold for its time – this was 2017 – with mantra walls stating ‘We make you look good naked’ and apparel with slogans such as ‘I spin for wine’. We worked together for a number of years until it was acquired.

Define was a franchise business offering indoor cycling, barre and strength classes. It was very clear on who it was speaking to, with a strong brand and a consistent experience across all disciplines that meant it attracted those who wanted to do all three. Our relationship began in 2016 and we’re still working with the founder today, as he now brings boutique fitness into residential rental developments.

Spin Society is another great one: we’ve worked with them consistently since 2016. These are friendly, energetic, fun studios that are perfect for beginners. The latest iteration of the brand really reflects this, with lots of colour, smiles and laughter in the imagery – a stark contrast to all the monochrome colour schemes and serious photos we see in this sector.

“It is the idea of boutique fitness that people buy into. Invest in your story.”

As a small Vancouver-based operation, there was a moment of concern a few years back when Spin Society realised SoulCycle was coming to its city. It’s a story we’ve heard a lot, as you can imagine, but we worked together to map out how Spin Society’s brand could be ‘more Vancouver’ than SoulCycle, giving it a local resonance that would set it apart from the competition.

SoulCycle came and went. Spin Society has another studio opening soon. That’s the power of knowing your story and speaking to your own audience.

What are your branding dos and don’ts?

Number one is probably the most important: Don’t copy other brands. You’ll simply be talking to their audience, not your own. Your messaging will be relevant to their audience, not your own.

Number two: Don’t wait for your business to generate results or income before you invest in branding. Similar to the Nike example, it is the idea of boutique fitness that people are buying into. Investing early is foundational for this type of business, establishing a story and purpose that people want to be part of.

Finally, if yours is a new business, market it as early as possible. Understand what makes your brand special and build curiosity around that. Don’t wait until the doors have opened and your classes are half empty. Get out there early.