Planet Fitness, one of South Africa’s leading gym chains, is expanding steadily within a consolidating market. To keep a growing member base feeling personally looked after – without growing its marketing team at the same pace – the brand made email work at two levels:
-tailored, automated journeys for individual members, and
-high-volume campaigns for the wider base.
Working with Netcore CEE, Planet Fitness built both on a single platform. The results showed up across both.
53%+ average open rate across a fully automated 12-week challenge programme
250K+ emails delivered across a single multi-city event series
63%+ open rates on personalised, per-athlete event communications
43% overall average unique open rate across the full event series
Planet Fitness is one of South Africa’s leading high-value, mid-market gym chains. Founded in 1994 and based in Cape Town, it runs 51 clubs nationwide, offering quality facilities, group classes, and personal training at an accessible price. Beyond the gym floor, the brand is known for an inclusive, community-led culture – built through challenge programmes like DadBod and community sports events like HYROX, and supported by a strong digital presence and a growing email subscriber base.
South Africa’s fitness market is consolidating, and scale alone no longer guarantees relevance – the brands that do well are the ones that turn membership into community. That has moved much of the relationship into the inbox: members increasingly expect their gym to recognise where they are in a programme and reach out at the right moment. For Planet Fitness, with three decades of community-led culture behind it, this was familiar ground. The task was making the digital experience keep pace with a growing club network.
For a brand built on personal connection, growth brings a trade-off. More members, clubs, and programmes mean more communication – but a one-size-fits-all message loses the personal feel that members value.
Planet Fitness had two clear goals:
One system of record, but no engagement layer.
Planet Fitness managed its membership on Itensity, its internal gym management platform and the main record of all member data.
Itensity handled membership, billing, and access well. But as a core management system, it wasn’t designed to serve as a dynamic marketing engagement layer.
To unlock advanced communication, Planet Fitness needed a dedicated engagement layer on top – one that could support multi-step automated journeys, deeper segmentation, high-volume sends with reliable inbox placement, and clear campaign tracking. It also needed to do all this without a large internal technical team.
Planet Fitness adopted Netcore CEE to add that engagement layer – connecting to member data in Itensity and building on top of it. The programme came together in four steps, supported throughout by a dedicated Netcore CSM who helped a lean team run an ambitious schedule.
1. Foundation – Campaign infrastructure
Migrated the email programme onto Netcore CEE; set up sender reputation, segmentation by membership status, and reusable broadcast templates.
2. Automation – The DadBod journey
Built the DadBod Challenge as an automated journey across three tracks – Melt, Muscle, and Move – triggered on sign-up, with weekly content sent automatically across the 12-week programme. A programme that once needed weekly manual sends now ran on its own.
3. Scale – HYROX & mass campaigns
Powered the full event cycle for the multi-city HYROX series – registrations, heat assignments, results, and finalist notices, each personalised per athlete – alongside high-volume broadcasts for seasonal moments and product launches.
4. Referral – The Buddy Tag programme
Activated member referrals (refer a friend for a free month), with email as the main channel for activation and tracking – extending email’s role into acquisition.
DadBod Challenge – precision at work. A fully automated 12-week programme that ran itself while keeping engagement high:
HYROX Simulation Series – scale at work. A multi-city event series showing the same platform could deliver at volume:
For context, automated emails in the fitness industry average around a 42% open rate, versus roughly 25% for manual campaigns (Omnisend fitness email benchmark). Planet Fitness comfortably cleared that bar on its broadest sends, and pushed well past it on its most personal ones.
Beyond the numbers
As the club network grows, the marketing setup is ready to grow with it. The DadBod automation is now a template for future challenges, and the HYROX communication cycle a blueprint for future sports and community activations. Email has become an always-on channel that nurtures members and powers events – while keeping the brand’s sense of community intact.
Nadine Naidoo
Digital Communications Manager, Planet Fitness“In just over a year of working with Netcore, we've seen a significant improvement in our lead conversion. We're now able to nurture and convert prospects into members far more effectively. What stands out most is the visibility we get from the detailed performance metrics - especially click-through rates and engagement insights - which help us understand what truly resonates with our audience and continuously optimise our campaigns. The platform is intuitive, and the ability to track, test, and refine our communication has made a real difference. Netcore has become a valuable part of our CRM ecosystem, helping us drive smarter decisions and stronger results.”
