Virgin Active was experiencing negative growth, and had been unable to impact the cyclical January, 'new year, new me', enthusiasm followed by rapid abandonment soon after. Virgin Active's business model, where new members sign up for 1 or 2-year contracts, meant that Customer Success staff had to field a high percentage of calls from new members wishing to cancel - and there was massive pressure for constant acquisition via discounted offers and giveaways. None of which addressed the underlying reasons why new members wanted to cancel.
I led this project with the aim of understanding members' unmet needs during the first 30 days of them joining the gym - the acquisition and onboarding phase. This was part of a wider service design project looking at the full member lifecycle.
The project was split into several phases:
Research
Defining member needs and business objectives
As-is member journey mapping
Prioritisation workshop
Ideation workshop
To-be, ideal state member journey mapping
Living service design blueprint
After in-depth interviews (with newly-joined members and a variety of Virgin Active employees who work in the gyms), and diary studies. it emerged that new members had varied and nuanced motivations for joining the gym, but some key themes became clear around intimidation, insecurities, and the need for a plan of action and trusted guidance.
We held multiple workshops with key stakeholders throughout the business to define business objectives, priorities, and key metrics. And then the fun part; ideation with a variety of people from within Virgin Active (not just designers).
Armed with killer ideas that addressed the prioritised list of unmet new member needs, we created a living service design blueprint.
Virgin Active 2020. Team: Jacky Smith - How Might We
Cape Town