Referrals = Attendance = Members

For organisations looking to increase their membership base, exercise referrals are an extremely effective way to do so. But they are often overlooked. Tracking beyond a 12-week exercise referral scheme is not often matched to its initial source. In this enlightening article, we breakdown misconceptions and substantiate the opportunity, with facts and figures based on an anonymised dataset.

Uncover a new source of untapped income by reading on...

(Under) Valued? 

Health and wellbeing referral schemes can be, at times, the undervalued poor relation in terms of lucrative activities in Health & Leisure centres.  No one questions the social and wellbeing value of the schemes, it is after all why most organisations do run them.  But when budgets are being squeezed and the allocation of resources is under debate, it can be a hard battle to justify the investment of time and money. 

This is where data comes in.  Organisations that do run schemes and (this is key) use a system like ReferAll to manage those schemes and collect information about the people taking part are able to pull that information together and combine it with general membership data. 

You Want it – Prove Why We Should! 

And this is where the picture can suddenly be brought into focus and the hard-headed commercial value of running such schemes become apparent. 

A short time ago we ran such an analysis of data with one of our major clients, and the section below is a review of that analysis from Stu Stokes, our Managing Director. 

That Really Is Interesting 

We ran an analysis on a sample of anonymised referral data to understand the potential revenue generation of an exercise referral programme to the wider membership base.  

498 members were created following a referral to the service. Data was linked between ReferAll and the Leisure Membership system.  

Duration 

• Average time from date of referral to join date was 117 days (includes 12 weeks of the exercise referral scheme).
• Average duration from “join date” to either “date cancelled” or “date of summary” was 17.3 months. We noticed that this number was continuing to increase. 

Potential Revenue 

• Based on the number of memberships created (498 members) and an assumed charge of £20 per month (replace with your membership costs) the initial month of membership could generate £9,960.
• Assuming that members retain for the average period of 17.3 months (rounded up to 18 months) each member could generate a minimum of £360.

The Message 

Understanding the customer journey from point of referral to membership creation is necessary to fully understand the potential revenue that a health-related programme could bring to your organisation. Further to this, health outcome data can demonstrate value to both people referred and funding partners.  

So, there you have it.  Referral Schemes can, actually, be a source to generate paying memberships.  This is an added value to running schemes that may be more relevant than ever in the current economic climate. 

ReferAll offers the latest software solutions available to make it easier for leisure providers to receive GP referrals, support patients to become more active, and manage exercise referral schemes. Our experienced team provides everything you need to deliver effective and successful programmes. So why wait? Start improving your communities' health and wellbeing today with ReferAll.