Salon, spa & fitness
Gym Customer Acquisition Cost Calculator
Works what a member costs to acquire, where joining offers are the main expense.
Result
Sales time is included because it is a real cost of winning work even though it never appears on an advertising invoice. Recovering under 100% on the first job is normal in the trades, provided customers come back.
Get a Free Business AuditHow the calculation works
Marketing spend plus the value of joining offers and waived fees, divided by members acquired who remained past the early churn period. Measuring retained members rather than joins is the correction that matters, since a discounted join that cancels in six weeks cost money and returned very little.
What moves the number
- Marketing spend and promotional offer value.
- Early churn in the first weeks.
- Sales staff cost where there is a sales function.
- Referral share.
Where this one goes wrong
Heavy joining promotions attract members who respond to promotions, and those cohorts churn faster, which means the cost per retained member is substantially higher than the cost per join. Measure by cohort and track how each promotion's members behave over the following months. Referrals are the counterweight, since referred members both convert better and retain longer, making them cheaper on both measures.
Before you quote
- Measure cost per retained member, not per join.
- Track each promotion's cohort over the following months.
- Build referral mechanisms, which perform on both measures.
Questions
About this calculator
Why is cost per retained member higher than cost per join?
Because promotional joins churn faster. Members who respond to a heavy offer leave sooner, so the cost of acquisition has to be carried by fewer retained members, and the gap between the two figures is frequently large.
How should promotions be evaluated?
By cohort, tracking how each promotion's members behave over the following months rather than counting joins. A promotion producing many joins that churn is worse than one producing fewer members who stay.
Are referred members better?
On both measures: they convert better and retain longer, since they arrive with a connection to someone already attending. That makes referral mechanisms the cheapest acquisition available and worth building deliberately.
The formula
acquisition cost = (marketing + sales cost) / guests won
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How to use this calculator
- Marketing spend per month ($). Enter your own figure; the page starts at $3,200.
- Sales time and tools ($). Quoting time, CRM, call answering.
- Leads per month. Enter your own figure; the page starts at 70.
- Share that become guests (%). Enter your own figure; the page starts at 32%.
- First appointment value ($). Enter your own figure; the page starts at $92.
- Gross margin (%). Enter your own figure; the page starts at 52%.
The result updates as you type, so you can try a figure, see what it does to cost to win one guest, and change it back. Nothing you enter is sent anywhere or saved.
A worked example
These are the figures the calculator opens with. Every number in the results column below is produced by the same calculation the page runs, so you can follow it through before putting your own figures in.
What goes in
| Input | Value |
|---|---|
| Marketing spend per month | $3,200 |
| Sales time and tools | $900 |
| Leads per month | 70 |
| Share that become guests | 32% |
| First appointment value | $92 |
| Gross margin | 52% |
What comes out
| Result | Value |
|---|---|
| Cost to win one guest main result | $183.04 |
| Cost per lead | $58.57 |
| Guests per month | 22 |
| Gross profit on the first appointment | $47.84 |
| Recovered on the first appointment | 26.1% |
Each customer costs $183.04 to win, and the first job returns $47.84 of gross profit, 26.1% of the acquisition cost. The rest has to come from repeat work.
How sensitive the answer is
Holding everything else steady and changing only marketing spend per month, this is what happens to cost to win one guest. It is worth knowing which of your inputs the answer actually hinges on, and which barely move it.
| Marketing spend per month ($) | Cost to win one guest |
|---|---|
| $1,600 | $111.61 |
| $2,400 | $147.32 |
| $3,200 example above | $183.04 |
| $4,800 | $254.46 |
| $6,400 | $325.89 |
Every other input is held at the example value while this one changes, which is not how a real job behaves. Treat it as a guide to which number matters most, not as five separate quotes.
What each figure means
- Marketing spend per month ($)
- A money amount, starting at $3,200.
- Sales time and tools ($)
- Quoting time, CRM, call answering.
- Leads per month
- A number, between 0 and 20000, starting at 70.
- Share that become guests (%)
- A percentage, between 0 and 100, starting at 32%.
- First appointment value ($)
- A money amount, starting at $92.
- Gross margin (%)
- A percentage, between 0 and 95, starting at 52%.
What the results tell you
| Result | What it is |
|---|---|
| Cost to win one guest | The headline result. A money figure. |
| Cost per lead | A money figure. |
| Guests per month | A number. |
| Gross profit on the first appointment | A money figure. |
| Recovered on the first appointment | A percentage. |
Estimating is the easy part
The jobs you never hear about cost more than the ones you mis-measure. BDEVY builds the marketing, systems and automation that bring them in.