
Chloe Reynolds
Suddenly everyone is a fitness guru?! Standing out in the fitness industry during Coronavirus
Updated: Apr 16, 2020
Since the COVID-19 pandemic began to pick up speed in the UK and Europe, most of us have had our lives completely turned upside down. Gyms began to close their doors and more of us started to rely on technology and social media to fill the gaps that have been left in our lives. From this sprouted a wave of (mostly) well-intentioned people posting their home workout ideas on social media platforms like Instagram, YouTube and Facebook. Suddenly everyone and their dog seemed to know the best home workout plan. An onslaught of content was appearing every day from toilet roll and baked bean tin workouts, living room HIIT programs and your Mum’s mate Sandra sharing her everyday Pilates routine. However well-intentioned, the internet quickly became saturated with workout ideas that simply aren’t suitable for a vast majority of the population, with the advice often coming from unqualified people.
Many people might use this pandemic to really start considering their health and wellness and will use their increased downtime to take up a new form of exercise. Exercise is one of the only reasons we are allowed to leave the house at the minute and there are numerous, well documented mental and physical benefits of getting active. This is a great opportunity for PTs and group fitness instructors to start helping more people begin their fitness journeys. However, it is not without its challenges.
The entire fitness industry has been forced to adapt due to the closure of gyms and leisure centres and many have turned to social media to serve their current clients and find ways to generate a living. Many PTs and group fitness instructors are self-employed and have seen their incomes wiped out because of the coronavirus. Keen to not be forgotten and to keep their clients and members interested, a swathe of workouts were filmed and chucked up online in the first few days of the UK lockdown. Everyone seemed to think the best way to secure new clients and keep their current ones was to film as much content as possible and throw it up on Instagram without much thought to the structure, branding or timing of the post. Taking a fitness business online and standing out from the crowd is hard, especially when you may not have had a big social media presence before. You are battling against masses of free, seemingly helpful content from social media influencers and corona do-gooders who just want to help people in this tough time, not to mention established fitness brands who are offering their programs free or heavily discounted.
