Why CrossFit Affiliation is Worth Every Penny Today
Why CrossFit Affiliation is Worth Every Penny Today
And why if CFHQ does their job - this article won't age.
As the CEO of PushPress, I spend an insane amount of time thinking about everything that impacts the gyms on our platform.
In the local business markets that gyms compete in, one of the most important drivers of leads and organic sales is Local SEO. When I look out across all of the different industries PushPress supports, one crazy thing rings out:
CrossFit gyms have up to a 50x better chance to get discovered by a local searcher than any other general fitness type.
The massive benefit that CrossFit has built into its brand, is the fact that it’s known as CrossFit. If you were to open a non-CrossFit gym, you would have to compete for keywords on local search such as “Gym Near Me” or “Fitness Near Me”.
Ranking for “gym near me” is almost impossible as you have to compete with some of the big boys (Planet Fitness, Yelp, Equinox) on those terms - but I’ve personally been able to rank some of our PushPress clients for the term with some hustle and hard work.
Even so, I’d argue ranking for “gym near me” isn’t worth the work because the person searching for that is more than likely looking for a self-service $9/month location. Not your cup of tea.
While the search volume for CrossFit near me goes way down (in some cities as much as 50:1 less searches for CrossFit as “gym”) - the intent goes way up.
Anyone searching for a CrossFit gym has high likelihood that they know what happens inside CrossFit gyms and is looking specifically to join a CrossFit gym.
Or - in the search marketing world - you have a great viewer with high intent and likelihood to buy. GOLD.
Your Affiliation Fee Value
If you ever are questioning why you’re paying CrossFit HQ $3000 per year just to use their name, this is exactly why.
To rank in the top 10 for a Google Search for a highly intentional buyer could justifiably be worth $5 per search or $20 per click. How many people do you get on your website every month?
If it’s more than 30, you can thank CrossFit for that. Because “Aurora Strength and Conditioning” will get you 2… maybe 3 visitors a month looking for a S&C gym.
Where Should CrossFit Focus?
CrossFit HQ should recognize this and continue to do EVERYTHING they can to continue driving up the awareness and searches for the term CrossFit.
The more people searching “CrossFit near me” the more Affiliates win. There’s honestly no other value proposition that they have direct control over as large as this.
Over the last 5 years, CrossFit hasn’t found success here. I urge them to place attention towards this. Compared to 5 years ago, we’re about 1/2 as popular as we were back then across the board - including during the main hype of the entire ecosystem - The CrossFit Games.
Now, the interesting thing here is - even with declining search trend, CrossFit is still crushing the “fitness chain” competition in search popularity.
Also, interesting to see CrossFit overcome Peloton in search popularity as recent as last month.
Sport is The Way
In this humble guy’s mind, the Sport of CrossFit and the CrossFit Games drives all interest and attention and that’s where maximum attention should be placed. I think their drive to help affiliates run better businesses is also a great place of attention but unless they adopt something closer to a franchise play (which is against all of the ethos of CrossFit currently) - I cannot see how they can possibly make a dent.
Drive the sport, but every single ad, commentary, and mass media moment should celebrate the local gym working with average people. they should be telling the story of every person who got off of meds while in a gym - not the story of the elite 0.001% of the world of CrossFit.
If CrossFit can grow that interest graph by 10% (which should be easily attainable with focused effort) - they could theoretically increase the number of looks you get at your gym by 10%. If you were able to grow your business by 10% overnight, how would that look for you?
This is incredibly insightful and stresses that CFHQ needs to be a media company first, and a licensing company second. Everything else is a distraction. Without having value in the term “CrossFit”, there is little reason to Affiliate. They’ve taken their focus off this and now people are taking control of the functional fitness narrative and not referring to it as “CrossFit”.