How To Get Sponsored By Gymshark

Is it a dream of yours to get sponsored by big fitness brands?

It's a dream of many…

I mean, could you imagine being featured on Gymshark's Instagram page? And then being sent free supplements by your absolute favorite supplement company like Ghost Lifestyle or Cellucor?

On top of this you build a recognizable personal brand, you have hundreds of people commenting on your Instagram posts, your Instagram following grows, and even more companies start reaching out to you for sponsored posts. I mean, who doesn't want these these days? Becoming sponsored by large fitness brands and becoming what some what call a "fitness influencer" can truly be a career for you.

Social media has become the key to landing a big fitness sponsorship these days as it seems like all you really need is a big following. Well, having a big following will help but it's not everything (and no, you don't need thousands or millions of followers to be sponsored by big fitness brands). Social media, and especially Instagram is so extremely crowded as everyone and their mother (like, literally) is trying to become the next big thing on Instagram and land a sponsorship. It's extremely difficult to differentiate yourself on social media and catch the eyes of some of the biggest fitness brands.

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So how do I get sponsored by my favorite fitness brand? Well, in this article i am going to go over 5 steps to increase your chances of getting your dream sponsorship. Do you want to be sponsored by your favorite fitness apparel line and supplement company? Start reading and let's get you there!

1. Build a Strong Personal Brand

Personal branding is everything these days, and your personal brand is essentially what people say about you when you're not around or what people can observe by simply going through your social media accounts. It comes down to how your name resonates with others. When you hear someone talk about "branding" do you generally think of logos and colors? Well, if so you're wrong.

Branding comes down to 3 things:

Understanding why you exist and communicating this to your audience in an efficient and effective manner.
Differentiating yourself (or your products/service) from your competitors even if you are all the exact same
Creating the perception in your audiences' mind that there is no other product/service/person like you

Below are some things to be aware of with regard to personal branding and some tips as well:

Be a specialist, you need to be an expert at 1-2 things and focus your efforts on this
Be authentic, genuine, and open about your life (read more here)
Highlight the highs' and lows' of your life on social media (social media is not your highlight reel)
Utilize video content to open up and show your personality, give your content a human touch
Become a story teller
Create your own content that is unique to you and your personal brand only
Build a differentiated and recognizable name
Avoid being generic, you need to find a way to stand out

Are you doing any of these?

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The bottom line is that large fitness brands want athletes that have differentiated brands and bring a unique skill set to their brand and represent their brand positively. Some fitness influencers that have built incredible personal brands that I really like are Steve Cook, Karina Elle, Russ Orhii, Heidi Somers, and Maxx Chewning. Be sure to take a look at their brands on social media, but DO NOT copy their brands. What makes your personal brand unique is that it is personal, it's based off of you and it's unique to you. A strong personal brand will better your chances to get sponsored by Gymshark, Alphalete, Ghost Lifestyle and many other big fitness brands.

2. Create High Quality, Value-Driven Content

Yes, content is key and you have probably heard this from so many people in the fitness industry and on social media…but they aren't wrong. The second step to getting sponsored by your dream fitness brand is to simply create high quality, value-driven content.

Whenever someone asks me what the key to social media growth is, that is my answer…

High quality, value-driven content.

But what is that even?

"High quality, value-driven content is content that is perceived as high quality, is unique to the individual and either educates, entertains, or inspires efficiently."

Is your content doing this?

However, the funny thing is that when people think of "content', they generally think of just photos and videos but it's actually so much more! Your photos and videos on social media need be high quality, but brands simply want more than just an athlete with a big Instagram following and great Instagram photos. Content is much more, and here are some content ideas that you should look into creating that need to also be "high quality":

Social media graphics
Social media photos
Social media copy/messaging
YouTube Videos
Blog Content
Podcasts
IGTV Videos
Instagram stories
Tweets
Infographics

High quality content requires a lot of effort! You need to have high quality social media captions with elaborate writing that portrays your unique personality, you need to have high quality photos/videos with your own editing style and feel, and so much more. Content is truly key to growing on social media and large fitness brands look to have athletes that create high quality, value-driven content as much as they can. Then hey, maybe they'll do photo shoots with you when you're sponsored by them 😉

Additionally, here's 3 Instagram content tips to generate higher engagement:

instagram content tips

3. Build a highly engaged online community

Fitness brands like GymShark, Alphalete, Ghost, Cellucor, and others want athletes that have high engagement… and surprisingly followers don't matter as much as you think.

Wait what?

I don't need 100k + followers to become sponsored by a large fitness brand? That is correct! What large brands want are athletes that generate high engagement and have an engaged community. One of the biggest turn-offs from big fitness brands is someone that has a large following but very low engagement. Why? It shows that you may have a lot of fake followers and you need to avoid this at all costs.

Change your focus from followers to engagement because this matters more.

So, the real question is how do I build an engaged community on social media? Well, it is a result of the first two things we went over: a strong personal brand and high quality, content.

Additionally, to build an engaged community you should be going the extra mile to build relationships. This means that you should be responding to messages and comments promptly, and you should be going out of your way to engage with your fans on social media. This means the world to them, and all it takes is a little effort. If you don't support your fans, why should they support you?

Big fitness brands leverage influencers and sponsored athletes to sell their products and their brand, and if your audience aligns with theirs and is highly engaged already then you are setting yourself up for success. You need to build an engaged community on social media to get sponsored by Gymshark and other large fitness brands.

4. Become a Storyteller

The fourth thing you can do to better your chances of landing a large fitness sponsorship is to simply become a story teller on social media, whether it's Instagram or on YouTube. What exactly does mean, becoming a story teller? Well, use social media as an outlet to communicate your life to your followers and audience.

Below are a few things you can do to become a story teller on social media:

Utilize video content to communicate your story
Vlog/utilize video content to show your daily routine and show an inside look of your life
Be transparent and show the high's and low's of your life (social media is not your highlight reel)
Open up about what you struggle with
Post consistent content
Become a better copywriter and write better captions for social media
Be inspirational in your content
Show your journey in life

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Becoming a story teller on social media is essential to not just social media growth but can be huge with regard to increasing your chances of becoming a sponsored athlete of a large fitness brand. If your story inspires others and even aligns with others, your brand will grow on social media and this will for sure help your chances of becoming sponsored.

5. Expand Beyond Instagram

Instagram is the hottest platform out right now and according to Hootsuite, 1 billion people use Instagram every single month and 95 million posts are posted every single day as well. That's a lot, but I would recommend expanding beyond Instagram and by this I mean look into becoming a YouTube influencer and starting to put out content on YouTube. YouTube is an incredible social media platform that is also the second biggest search engine in the world and the second most visited website in the world (yes, you read that right).

However, YouTube influencers are becoming more and more popular and actually drive as much revenue for brands as Instagram. Therefore, I recommend getting into YouTube. Have you noticed that most fitness influencers these days actually have a YouTube channel? It's no coincidence, and brands want athletes that are well rounded and are active on more than one social media platform. YouTube is the second biggest social media platform in the fitness industry in my opinion and can be huge for your brand.

Some other platforms to look into and expand your efforts is Facebook (no, Facebook isn't dead…yet), LinkedIn, and TikTok!

Also, ask yourself this…

"If Instagram disappeared today, would your brand disappear as well?"

For most "fitness influencers" the answer to this question is "yes, absolutely".

Don't be that person!

Building a large Instagram following is not the same as building your brand. You need to bring more to the table and having a large following on another platform makes you more appealing to fitness brands. Expand beyond Instagram to better your chances of landing your dream fitness sponsorship.

The Bottom Line

The bottom line is that yes, it probably is difficult to get sponsored by Gymshark, Alphalete, Ghost, 1stPhorm, and your other favorite fitness brands. However, by implementing these five tips you will truly better your chances. Take a look at some of the biggest names in the industries that are sponsored by these big brands, they have implemented all five of these. If you are interested in more fitness marketing articles, check out the Just Fitness Marketing blog where new fitness marketing articles are posted weekly to help you strengthen your fitness brand.

Sam Wells

Sam Wells is the founder of Just Fitness Marketing and is a social media marketer in the fitness industry. He created Just Fitness Marketing to serve, give, and equip those in the fitness industry with proper marketing knowledge and expertise to elevate their fitness brands and build the fitness brand of their dreams.