Benjamin Francis and Lewis Morgan were only 20 when they co-founded Gymshark out of a home garage. Francis made clothes with a simple screen printer and a basic sewing machine as and when each order came in.
Today, Gymshark ships out orders to thousands worldwide and has offices in London, Mauritius, Denver, and HK.
Gymshark’s marketing strategy is one of the key reasons for its rapid success. The brand excels at partnering with celebrities and influencers to promote products, and they continue this trend on social media.
In this blog, we’ll examine how Gymshark’s social media strategy helps it stay on top of the fitness apparel game.
Review of Gymshark’s social media accounts
Think about how Gymshark started as a humble drop-shipping company in 2012: it sounds crazy that it’s valued at $1.45 billion today. But the growth and international reach Gymshark has achieved is well-deserved.
Gymshark’s social media strategy is smartly crafted, going beyond merely selling quality gym clothing and accessories. Instead, the brand has made itself synonymous with a culture of health and fitness.
Gymshark does this by maintaining a strong social media presence and an active fitness community online. The brand has millions of fans and loyalists around the world, which translates to followers on online platforms.
Here is the wondrous follower count on Gymshark’s main accounts.
- Instagram: 6.7 million
- Facebook: 2 million
- YouTube: 503K
- Twitter: 368.7K
- LinkedIn: 261K
- TikTok: 5.2 million
- Reddit: 7.6K
So, what does the brand do to gain all this online traction? Let’s dive into Gymshark’s marketing strategy.
What makes Gymshark’s social media strategy work?
Fitness training is not something people take lightly. But gyms are sweaty places, missing leg day is the end of the world, and trainers often quote how their grandmas could do better.
Needless to say, fitness culture and dramatic workout humor go hand-in-hand. This is what Gymshark’s social media strategy capitalizes on.
Here are some ways Gymshark makes the most of its social media accounts.
1. Using consistent and effective hashtags
Gymshark’s LinkedIn page has the tagline ‘Be A Visionary.’ And the physical headquarters famously carries the motto ‘Work Hard. Stay Humble’. The website’s footnote also carries the statement ‘United We Sweat.’
These are great slogans people can bond over and rally around. So, Gymshark’s marketing strategy makes use of these phrases as hashtags. For example, take #WorkoutChallenge. You can see how this video has over 3.5 million views and 142K likes.
2. Capitalizing on Influencer-driven exposure
Considering the target audience is mostly 18 to 25-year-olds, celebrity and influencer marketing is everything. Gymshark’s marketing strategy started with roping in YouTube fitness stars Lex Griffin and Nikki Blackletter, who endorsed Gymshark products in their videos.
Here’s a video from Nikki Blackletter’s channel, back at the beginning of the influencer drive.
You can see in the video how Nikki endorses Gymshark and also includes shopping links in the video description.
This was in 2014, and it was just the start. Today, Gymshark continues to hold audiences’ interest by featuring influencers such as Alli Jo, Nathaniel Massiah, and James Beardwell.
Here’s an inspiring post featuring Massiah. This is an example of the kind of engaging and influencer-forward content strategy that works for Gymshark.
3. Posting content in diverse formats and styles
Diversity is at the forefront of Gymshark’s content marketing strategy, whether in terms of the people featured, workouts covered, or the content formats posted.
To ensure different types of audiences stay hooked to its social media, Gymshark curates a lot of diverse and fresh content in its videos and posts.
The content strategy also uses hilarious visuals and jokes in varied formats. These include static posts, carousels, text-based content, videos, reels, story highlights, tweets/retweets, and shorts.
From this Twitter post above, you can see how Gymshark uses funny memes to connect with younger audiences.
4. Making the most of trending topics and themes
Gymshark’s content strategy combines trending topics interspersed with motivational quotes, workout tips, fitness education, and inspirational photos and videos.
Seasonal and thematic content also comes into focus here. During Halloween, Gymshark had a bunch of spooky content uploaded. Now, for Christmas and the holidays, the brand is actively promoting products as gifts.
And, using social listening, the brand uses trending and appealing content, which draws in more likes and comments.
For example, memes like this one posted on Facebook are very much on-trend and current. Add to that the internet’s ever-present obsession with cats, you have a winning post on your hands.
5. Creating an interactive and engaging space online
As evident, Gymshark is all about community and the fitness spirit. Just like how Gymshark has the Lifting Community Club and events in the physical world, it also has a great online platform. Gymsharklifting is Gymshark’s lifting community Instagram page with over 1 million followers.
The point of this community is to build on the culture of lifting and take the sport forward. Gymshark posts regular motivating messages and images to encourage audiences and lifting enthusiasts.
The commitment to lifting and consistent relevant posts keep online community members engaged. This leads to a lot of interaction and traffic to the page.
6. Curating and promoting user-generated content
Collecting and posting relevant user-generated content is a staple of Gymshark’s social media strategy. With so many people actively recording their workouts and posting them across social media, there is no dearth of good content.
A Forbes article talks about how Gen Z and Millenials will continue to drive fitness trends and the fitness industry. Gymshark echoes this in YouTube shorts or Instagram posts and stories, where it promotes athletes and fitness enthusiasts.
Being featured by a brand like this is a big deal and is aspirational for many. So, you can see why people flock to these social media accounts. It also keeps users inspired to upload gymming videos by tagging Gymshark.
7. Giving out regular product updates across platforms
From its website to its physical outlets and third-party sellers to social media, Gymshark relentlessly posts about product updates and sales. The brand lets audiences promptly know about new releases and events, and it does this across all platforms.
Here’s an example of their Black Friday Sale posts, taken from Twitter and Instagram.
So, no matter which social media app users prefer, they would see the same consistent messaging and product updates.
8. Advocating for sustainability and the environment
As is usually the case, when a brand gives back to the environment and social/ environmental causes, it gains more favor among people.
Gymshark’s social media strategy involves promoting its sustainability efforts and environmental drives.
Apart from the environment, they sponsor gymnasts and wrestlers and hold various fitness drives and community events. The attention to community and how Gymshark’s marketing strategy leverages this are elemental in their popularity and online success.
A high-level overview of Gymshark’s social media strategy
Gymshark is a rapidly evolving and continuously expanding brand. And it has millions of devoted followers across social media platforms. Let’s look at what this online pull means for audience engagement-
1. Gymshark on Instagram
Gymshark has 631 total posts and 6.7 million followers on Instagram. But this number is dwarfed by the number of engagements the brand has had in just the last 3 months or so.
With 7,121,637 engagements generated from just 112 posts, it’s clear Gymshark’s social media strategy works wonders for its Instagram account.
The recent post advertising giveaways for over $10,000 is Gymshark’s top post by number of engagements.
2. Gymshark on Twitter
Gymshark has just 368,646 followers on Twitter; a much smaller amount compared to the millions on Facebook and Instagram. Yet, the brand is most active on Twitter.
The brand posts frequently on Twitter, sharing memes, product updates, motivational quotes, and retweets.
You can tell Gymshark’s content marketing strategy is strong on Twitter: Even though tweets form only 12% of their post types, these are the brand’s most engaging posts.
3. Gymshark on Facebook
Gymshark has around 2 million followers on Facebook, but this is not a platform the brand is very active on. Considering the average ages of the brand’s customers and audiences, it’s no surprise Facebook isn’t a primary focus.
Even so, Gymshark’s marketing strategy includes posting on Facebook at least once every two days, if not every single day.
In the last 3 months, they’ve posted 75 times and gotten 25,138 engagements.
Pro-gym quotes seem to work best: The highest engagement is on a humorous post comparing gyms to love stories.
4. Gymshark on YouTube
Gymshark’s YouTube channel is a treasure trove of funny trending user videos, workout tips, and educational series. It also features many interesting interviews and profiles of athletes.
With just 2 posts in the last 3 months, the brand doesn’t post often on YouTube. But the channel’s 398 videos have a total of 130.46 million whopping views.
And whatever Gymshark does post on YouTube, it has a good reception.
Their most popular video is a fitness test carrying the famous Gymshark hashtags and featuring well-known users/influencers. With over 8K likes, the video fits right into the brand’s fitness culture.
Boost your online reach and sales using social listening and hashtag analytics
Gymshark has steadily built an empire based on fitness and the gym culture, and it has done this by optimizing its social media platforms.
The key pillars of Gymshark’s marketing strategy are:
- Using market research to analyze social media trends and post content with trending topics and lighthearted memes, thus grabbing audiences’ interest and fancy
- Collaborating with influencers to promote the brand and expand their reach through people following the influencers, thereby drawing in more traffic
- Creating a culture of fitness and encouraging the community to keep working at their goals, thus being motivating and aspirational to online members
Want to get your online sales skyrocketing with the help of relevant influencer marketing? You can easily track social media analytics and leverage influencers to master online marketing.
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Frequently Asked Questions
1. What social media platforms does Gymshark utilize in their social media strategy?
Gymshark utilizes a variety of social media platforms such as Instagram, YouTube, TikTok, Facebook, and Pinterest to reach and engage their audience.
2. How does Gymshark engage their community through social media?
Gymshark engages their community through social media by creating captivating content that inspires fitness enthusiasts, hosting interactive challenges and giveaways, responding to comments and messages, and featuring user-generated content to foster a sense of community.
3. What role does user-generated content play in Gymshark's social media strategy?
User-generated content plays a significant role in Gymshark's social media strategy. They actively encourage their community to share their Gymshark experiences and workouts using #Gymshark and regularly feature this content on their social media platforms. This helps to build brand loyalty, showcase the effectiveness of their products, and create a sense of authenticity and relatability among their followers.
