Paying someone to market a gym or studio costs from about $200 a month for a single service, such as review management, to about $4,500 a month for a full agency plan, before ad spend. Doing it yourself with studio software costs from nothing to about $350 a month, plus your own hours. In between sit freelancers, who typically charge $400 to $2,000 a month to run two social channels, and agencies that price each service on its own. Ad budget is paid on top of all of these.
Where we stand: Gigabit sells marketing plans to studios, so we are not neutral. Every price below comes from the seller's own page, read on 10 November 2026, and each one is linked. They are what agencies and software companies publish, not what any particular studio paid. Our own prices are at the end.
The short answer
| Way of buying | Typical monthly cost | What you get | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Do it yourself with studio software | $0 to $349, plus your time | Booking and payments; email and text campaigns on the higher tiers | PushPress, WellnessLiving, Arketa, Mindbody |
| Freelancer | $400 to $2,000 for two social channels | Posts, comments and simple campaigns | Upwork estimate for intermediate US specialists |
| Fitness agency, one service at a time | $197 to $997 per service | Reviews, local SEO or ads management, each priced on its own | Ziwi Marketing price list |
| Fitness agency, full plan | $1,500 to $4,500 | Google profile, local SEO, ads on one or two platforms, email and text follow-up | Enoch Marketing price list |
| General agency, SEO only | $1,500 to $3,500 for a small business | Search work only | WebFX, an agency's own estimate |
| App marketplace | No monthly fee; 20% of a new client's first purchase, capped at $30 | A listing where people search for classes | Mindbody |
Ad spend sits outside every fee in that table. Both fitness agencies we read bill it separately: Enoch's page says "No bundled ad spend" and shows illustrative budgets of about $1,000 to $2,000 a month alongside its plans (Enoch Marketing); Ziwi says ad spend is paid from the gym's own account (Ziwi Marketing). When you compare quotes, add the ad budget to the fee before you compare.
What moves the price
Four things decide most of what you pay. Scope: a Google profile and reviews cost far less than a plan that also runs ads and writes follow-up messages. Channels: each extra ad platform or social account adds work, and agencies price it that way. Locations: most fitness price lists charge per location. Who answers the inquiries: a plan that ends at "leads delivered" is cheaper than one that books them into intro classes, and the difference shows up in how many become members.
Line by line
Website
A site builder is the cheapest route. Squarespace lists $19, $27 and $36 a month paying monthly, and $12, $17 and $25 paying annually (Squarespace). Several booking platforms include a site: Mindbody's Starter plan lists "a business website" (Mindbody), WellnessLiving's Starter lists a free website as a limited-time offer (WellnessLiving), and PushPress Grow, at $329 a month, includes websites (PushPress).
An agency build costs more up front. Ziwi lists $2,500 for a gym site, waived if you keep a plan for 12 months, then $99 a month for hosting, updates and small edits (Ziwi Marketing). Whoever builds it, check that the domain and the site are in your name.
Google Business Profile and local SEO
The profile itself is free. Google's page says "creating a Business Profile and listing your business on Google is free" (Google). What costs money is someone keeping it current, answering reviews and building the pages that help you show up for "reformer Pilates near me".
Ziwi prices local SEO at $297 a month for one location, and $597 or $997 for bigger markets such as a crowded city center (Ziwi Marketing). Enoch's $1,500 Get Found plan bundles Google profile management, local SEO, a review workflow and a monthly strategy call (Enoch Marketing). Outside fitness, WebFX puts small business SEO at $1,500 to $3,500 a month (WebFX), and Ahrefs' survey of 439 SEO providers found $501 to $1,000 the most popular monthly retainer, with freelancers most often charging $75 to $100 an hour (Ahrefs, updated August 2024).
Google and Meta ads
Ads have two costs, and a quote should show them on separate lines. Ad spend goes to Google or Meta. The management fee goes to whoever runs the campaigns.
For ad spend, LocaliQ's 2026 benchmarks put the average cost per click in its Health & Fitness category at $6.17 and the average cost per lead at $67.36 (LocaliQ). That category covers more than gyms, so treat it as a rough guide. A lead is also not a member: someone who fills in a form still has to be answered, booked and sold.
For management, Ziwi charges $297 a month with ad spend up to $1,500, $497 from $1,500 to $3,500 and $797 above that, one fee for Google, Facebook and Instagram (Ziwi Marketing). Enoch's $2,500 Fill the Floor plan adds ads on one platform, a campaign page and email and text replies to new leads on top of Get Found (Enoch Marketing).
Reviews
You can ask for reviews yourself for free, and for a small studio that is often enough. Tools that send the requests for you cost more: NiceJob lists $95 a month for Starter and $135 for Pro, which adds referral campaigns and email (NiceJob). Ziwi's managed reviews service is $197 a month per location, covering requests, replies and monitoring (Ziwi Marketing).
Email and text
Most studios get email and text from their booking platform, so check your tier before paying for a separate tool. Mindbody lists automated email and text campaigns on its Ultimate plan (Mindbody). WellnessLiving lists email and text marketing from its Business plan (WellnessLiving). Arketa lists email and text campaigns from Studio Growth, which is priced on a demo (Arketa). PushPress lists email and SMS on Grow, at $329 a month (PushPress).
The booking software you already pay for
Booking software is an operating cost, but its tier decides which marketing tools you get, so it belongs in the budget conversation. Prices as published on 10 November 2026:
| Platform | Published price | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Mindbody | From $99 a month per location | The same page's FAQ says the entry plan starts at $79 in North America and Asia; ask which applies. Card processing adds a rate plus $0.10 to $0.30 per transaction |
| Arketa | $49 a month, billed annually, for one instructor | 3% transaction fee plus Stripe fees. Studio plans are priced on a demo |
| PushPress | Free, $159 or $229 a month | Card processing falls from 4.99% + 30¢ on Free to 2.75% + 30¢ on Max. Grow, with email, SMS and websites, is $329 |
| WellnessLiving | $69, $199 or $349 a month, paying monthly | Business was shown at $39 for the first two months as an offer |
| Glofox, Mariana Tek, Momence | Not published | Each asks for a quote or a demo |
Sources: Mindbody, Arketa, PushPress, WellnessLiving. Prices change, and several platforms discount yearly billing, so check the page on the day you decide.
Answering inquiries
This is the line item most budgets leave out, and it may matter most. When KeepMe tested 45 North American fitness brands, 58% of membership inquiries sent by email and 61% sent on Facebook got no response at all (KeepMe). Paying for ads while inquiries go unanswered buys leads you then lose.
Options run from free to a few hundred dollars a month. A missed-call text from your phone or booking system costs little. Mindbody's Ultimate plan lists "24/7 AI front desk support to turn missed calls into bookings" (Mindbody). A staffed answering service such as Smith.ai lists $300 a month for 30 calls, $810 for 90 and $2,100 for 300 (Smith.ai).
App marketplaces
Mindbody's consumer app works more like a lead marketplace than a retainer. The listing is free, and Mindbody charges a fee only when the app brings a client who is new to you: 20% of their first purchase, capped at $30. Bookings after the first carry no fee (Mindbody). That makes it easy to measure: you know exactly what each new client cost.
A worked example: one studio, one month
Here is how the line items add up for an example Pilates studio that pays a freelancer for social posts, buys local SEO and ads management from a fitness agency's price list, and spends $1,000 on ads. Booking software is left out because the studio would pay for it anyway. Every input is an example: swap in your own quotes.
| Example: freelancer, two social channels | $600 |
| Example: local SEO, one location | $297 |
| Example: ads management fee | $297 |
| Example: ad spend, paid to Google and Meta | $1,000 |
| Total marketing spend | $2,194 |
| Example: new members from marketing | 8 |
| Cost per new member | $274 |
| Example member: $200 a month, 5% leave each month | $4,000 |
In this example the studio pays about $274 for each new member, and each member is worth about $4,000 in dues over their stay. That gap is healthy. If the same spend brought two new members instead of eight, it would not be. The fee alone tells you neither.
What Gigabit charges
Our plans for gyms and studios are flat monthly fees, month to month, with no setup fee and no charge per new member. Prices from our pricing page:
| Plan | Price | What it covers |
|---|---|---|
| Growth Package | $100 a month, or $1,000 a year | Your site, Google profile, posts and listings run for you. The first 300 businesses keep $100 a month for as long as they stay; after that it is $149 a month or $1,490 a year |
| Studio | $449 a month | One location that wants every inquiry answered and booked. Google profile and reviews, booking platform automations, missed-call text-back and fast replies to inquiries |
| Scale | $899 a month | A studio or club that needs its own site to win local searches. Everything in Studio, plus a website you own and local SEO |
| Multi-site | $1,599 a month, for the first location, plus $450 a month for each extra one, quoted on a call | Two to ten locations, or a club with a big personal training line. Google and Meta ads, with ad spend paid by you straight to Google or Meta |
What is not included matters as much. The Growth Package does not cover ad spend and ads management, and only Multi-site runs ads. So for a studio comparing us with an agency that includes ads management, the fair comparison is Multi-site, or one of our smaller plans alongside whoever runs your ads. The Growth Package page lists its full scope, and the pricing page lists every plan's.
How to tell if the money is working
Judge marketing by cost per new member, not cost per click or cost per lead. Clicks and leads are steps on the way; members pay dues. Once a month:
- Add up every marketing cost for the month: fees, ad spend and tools bought only for marketing
- Count new members who joined from marketing, not leads or intro bookings
- Divide the total by new members to get cost per new member
- Work out what a member is worth: monthly dues divided by your monthly churn rate
- Compare the two, and look at each channel on its own where you can
- Time your replies to a test inquiry before you raise any budget
If the cost per new member is a small share of what a member is worth, keep going and consider spending more. If it is close to or above it, fix replies and booking before adding budget. To see what slow replies cost your studio, use the missed-inquiry calculator with your own numbers, or ask for our free reply-time audit.
Questions to ask before you sign
- Is ad spend included, and who pays it? Get the fee and the budget on separate lines.
- Who owns the website, domain and ad accounts? They should be in your name, so you keep them if you leave.
- How long is the contract? Both fitness agencies we read offer month-to-month terms; a build fee waived for a 12-month stay is still a commitment.
- Is there a setup or build fee? Ask for it in writing.
- What does the monthly report count? Ask for new members, not just leads or clicks.
- Who answers the inquiries the ads bring in? If the answer is "your front desk", plan for that first.
For low-cost ideas to try before paying anyone, read 25 gym marketing ideas, ordered by what they cost to try. For how this works by format, see Pilates studio marketing and personal training studio marketing.
