4 min
Any business that is ready to turn a challenge into an opportunity will find a higher level of success in the current climate. Now is a tricky time to run a fitness business and the industry (and those operating within it) face insurmountable challenges.
It’s more important than ever to be ready to adapt and change, ready to innovate your business and the model you use to run it. As any successful entrepreneur will tell you, adapting to change in a business environment is the key to triumphing.
In this article, we will look at the importance of adapting to change in business and exactly how you and your company or brand can do it. Most crucially, we learn how adaptability is the new competitive advantage in the rapidly changing fitness space. We outline the best business model options that you can pivot to or add-on to your existing model.
It’s time to rethink your business model.
What is the best business model strategy?
A business model strategy can be simply defined as: “The addition, subtraction, or adjustment of business models within a business to achieve a goal.”
Businesses exist to exchange value for money. The strategic and practical elements of that exchange can be described with nine different elements, mapped on a business model canvas .
These are made up of factors such as customer value proposition, customer segments, channels, customer relationships, revenue streams, key resources, key partners, key activities, and cost structure. You probably already have a business model in place that is helping you to achieve the specific and unique goals of your organization.
When creating and filling out your own canvas, it’s important to brainstorm and conduct research on each of the nine factors. The research and information that you find should be placed in each of the relevant sections if the canvas. So be sure to have a model canvas ready to fill out when approaching your new business strategy (these can be easily found online via a quick Google search).
Many predefined Business Models exist (Retail, Manufacturing, Franchise, SaaS, etc.) Plus many businesses have multiple business models. So, why is it important to adapt to change?
Why is it important to adapt to change in business?
When it comes down to it, change is always an opportunity to grow. In a climate where laws, movement, and restrictions change day-by-day, this is more crucial than ever. In the same way that animals evolve and adapt to their environment, so too should your business. Keep your finger on the pulse of the industry and the way that consumer behavior changes to make sure that you don’t get left behind.
How? The best way to do this is to reassess your business model from time to time to see if it is still working or to check where it could be improved. Here we’ll outline the best business model adaptations for you as you embrace the ever-changing competitive landscape of the fitness industry.
What is the best business model?
Depending on your goal you can decide which model suits you best. But the most significant ways you can adapt your business model are as follows:
Improve efficiency
In this case, you would refine and improve elements of your business model that are already in place. For example, what changes can you make today to increase the efficiency of your customer value proposition or your revenue streams?
Intensity
To alter the intensity, you would remove a business model currently in place in order to better allocate or conserve your resources - this might be an especially useful strategy for you right now if you are struggling with finances in the aftermath of closures and lockdown.
Diversification
To diversify your business model you would expand your existing model into new territory, tackling a niche otherwise new to the business. This model is all about innovation. Not currently offering online or digital classes for members ? Now is the moment to diversify your offering.
Adjacency
This is all about developing a brand new business model that leverages much of the same elements of an existing business model.
Innovation
With even more potential to transform your business than diversifying, this model means developing a radically different approach to your business and the way you run it.
How can Virtuagym support you in adding, subtracting, or adjusting a business model?
By working with a software provider such as Virtuagym, you have the potential to embrace a hybrid digital model that will enable you to pivot your business model and implement new strategies of innovation, diversification, and adjacency and support continuous strategies of intensity and efficiency.
By adding digital elements to your business you are able to increase the value of your memberships and adapt the way your business operates. By introducing new revenue streams via digitization or additional services you have a competitive advantage in the changing space of fitness, which is going increasingly digital.
Combining online and offline training is a catch-all way to innovate your company, diversify your offering, and enhance your current model.
