Fitness marketing to midlife women, that works Five years ago she was ignored. Today she’s not ignored but she’s stereotyped. Midlife woman trying too hard to look younger, a face frozen and plumped with Botox, wearing clothes she can share (but look slightly “off”) with her daughter. A midlife woman who’s operating on the 1980s metabolism science she learned. Relies on calories, steps, heart rate, and data, that ignore the state of her hormones.  A midlife woman who enjoys at least a glass and maybe three of wine most days, starts with coffee and flirts with fasting but has no idea what a “healthy diet” is for her today. A midlife woman who thinks exercise is about burning… calories, off fat… so she can “fix” what she doesn’t love about her body. She’s all these and more. If she gets a compliment it’s veiled in a disclaimer. You look great for your age.   Body shape motives are not the only thing that gets her going. Promoting weight loss may be detrimental to her participation. Don’t forget the women who don’t need to lose weight but who have experienced a relocation of body weight, those with disease risk factors, who want more energy, want to be proactive in aging, or gain bone density. Women control an incredible amount of buying power. Even before women were in the workplace equally they influenced 80% of household decisions. They still do now that they are in the workplace. They are diverse. Even marketing to the niche of women post menopause is unique. ICAA categorizes them as “athletic” if they regularly exercise 3 or more times a week. For some this is running, biking, lifting and swimming, but for others it’s a walk or yoga. So, clearly you can’t treat them all the same. Naturally, though, it’s easy to think you know her. You may be her. Your mom, aunts, or prior clients are her. Therearecommon denominators. But the things that make them unique are what make their program and the way you attract them and serve them unique.  If you miss them, you’ll lose her. Barriers to marketing to midlife women:   “For active, athletic, middle-aged women there is just nothing. A 22-year old doesn’t get it and I’m not in wheel chair, there isn’t much for us between.” Even if you offer something between the gap described above by a Flipping 50 program participant, you may not be getting the message across. You want to reach her: 1) Where she is 2) With a message created for her 2) In a way she hears it 3) Without offending her The Biggest Mistakes Fitness Marketers Make (and we’re all fitness marketers) Thinking they are all the same: How do you think of them? Do you imagine they’re frail, stiff, in pain, lack energy, did aerobics with Jane Fonda or Jackie Sorensen, are empty-nesters, have grandchildren, have belly fat, cellulite, want weight loss, want belly fat loss… Did you know? Some of them are doing their first triathlons, learning to swim so they don’t drown in open water, going to training camps to ride bikes in mountains, skiing downhill at 50 miles an hour, wearing bikinis, learning to weight lifts and have kindergarteners? And starting their entire lives over by themselves or with someone new, starting businesses… so they’re not afraid of a little grind.  Thinking you know their goal: If the title of your program isn’t a coffee table book you’d happily display at your home, rethink it. No 50-something, 60-something, and there’s a strong chance 70-something wants to “own” needing a fall risk reduction class. She doesn’t want to buy the fear she wants to buy the transformation. Don’t think you know what she wants. Don’t put it into words what she needs with your titles. Describe what she wants.  It might be performance – golf, running, starting triathlon, (or anything else after retirement). It might be to avoid cognitive decline, depression, anxiety, or muscle or bone density losses. More positively though, it is hope.  This year, to commemorate the 50th anniversary of her controversial debut, Switzer ran the Boston Marath