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4 reasons why your yoga community isn’t growing

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Are you feeling stuck right now because you seem to be working day in, day out on your yoga business, yet your audience numbers are at a standstill and you’re not seeing any new students coming into your offering?

If that’s the case, there are probably small things that you’re most likely NOT doing, or perhaps you are doing them but not consistently.

Consistent is always the keyword!

So this blog is going to share with you the four reasons why your community isn’t growing.

Reason #1: You’re not clear on who you’re serving.

If you’re a regular to our blog, podcast or Facebook Community you probably guessed this – I talk about it all the time!

The number one reason why your yoga community isn’t growing is because you’re not clear on who you’re serving,  you’re not clear on who this community is actually for. You’re not niching down and narrowing in on a specific type of person with a specific problem or need. When you don’t know how you are serving, you feel stuck.

There will be no such thing as writer’s block when you know who you’re serving, you know the topics that they’re interested in, so you don’t feel stuck when it comes to creating content and messaging. When you know who you’re serving, you can dial in on your messaging – it becomes clear who you serve and how you serve them.  You’re no longer general  – your message becomes more specific.

Why is this important?

When you’re general, for example, you’re saying things in your marketing like “do yoga to feel calm and relaxed”.

The majority of yoga teachers are saying that – how do you stand out if the majority of yoga teachers are saying the exact same thing?

Let’s look at the WHY.

WHY does your student need to feel calm and relaxed? What is it about their life specifically that is causing them to not feel calm and relaxed?

How can you go deeper into the specifics of your ideal student to narrow in on their problems and desires?

By doing this, your messaging becomes more refined and specific – specific to a person who can relate to it, because it’s their story. This is so important so that your audience can find you and connect to you. If you don’t do this, if you’re messaging is not dialed in, your marketing won’t work and you won’t make any sales and therefore you don’t have a business. That’s how crucial this is.

Yet it’s a mistake that most teachers are making and then they wonder why their community isn’t growing. What is unique about you and the audience that you serve? Lean in on that, start there the rest will follow.

Still honing in on your niche? Start here: How to Find a Profitable Niche?

So if you haven’t done that niche work, then you won’t be able to promote yourself effectively which in turn means you’ll struggle to grow your community. It’s reason number 1 why your community isn’t growing.

It’s the reason why all of our programs start with this work – and if you’re just getting started with growing your community, you want to go and get yourself inside Yogipreneur Launchpad. It’s a 16 week journey to growing your online community and you can start today.

Reason #2: You are relying on social media

Reason number 2 why your community isn’t growing is because relying on social media to grow it, not focussing on growing an email list. Essentially you don’t have a freebie that requires an email address to sign up for.

Do you believe that growing a community means growing your Instagram following?

That is not growing your community, growing an email list is growing your community so if you don’t have a freebie to grow your list, you’re not growing your community.

You might have heard this called a freebie, lead magnet , opt in, or opt-in freebie. Do you already have one?

If not, check out this post to get you started: How to create an email opt-in your yoga students will love.

If you do, what is it?

Your freebie might be a video series, an audio meditation or  an online challenge.  If you have one, you want to share it everywhere so that it will get some traction. If you’re not sharing that freebie, it’s another reason why your community isn’t growing.

I see this all the time – teachers have a freebie but they are not sharing it everywhere. There’s a belief that people will tune out if you mention is everywhere but here’s the thing – if you don’t feel you are sounding like a broken record, you are not sharing your freebie enough.

If you don’t feel you are sounding like a broken record, you are not sharing your freebie enough.

There are clever ways to continue sharing your freebie, there are ways to create content that naturally leads to you talking about how someone can find out more through your freebie so these posts are more subtle. They might start out with a story or a tip or insight and you mention your freebie after you add value.

Of course, you can also make it completely obvious that you’re promoting your freebie, because it leads your audience directly to an opt–in page.  You can say “Hey, I’ve got a freebie. This is what it’s about. Go get it.”, but you don’t want to be doing that all of the time

Have a think about all the places that it would make sense to mention your freebie. Some examples from my list would include

  • Instagram
  • Instagram Stories
  • Instagram Reels
  • Instagram News Feed
  • Facebook, on my business page;
  • Facebook Live and Instagram Live;
  • On my podcast;
  • At the bottom of my email signature
  • When I’m featured or a guest on somebody else’s content, if they give me the okay.

So really ask yourself the question today: Are you focusing more on social or email? 

If it’s just social that’s the reason you’re not growing your community, because your community is on your email list.

Social is borrowed land, email you own. Nurture your email list by building a relationship and trust.

Reason #3: You’re not being visible enough online.

Reason 3 is that you’re not being visible enough online. This could be through the content you’re sharing, or rather that you’re not sharing enough content and perhaps that’s because of reason number 1 – because you haven’t niched and you don’t have a refined message. 

If you’re not visibly showing up consistently with your content, your community won’t grow. I’m not saying that to discourage you, I  say that to get you to commit to creating consistent content. You may have heard me say this before and it’s 100% true – content must be a non-negotiable part of your day.

You might be creating a blog podcast, perhaps you’ve started a podcast or you do a weekly facebook or instagram live. It might be lives with partners in your space – this is a fantastic way to be visible and reach new audiences in order to grow your own.

What’s important is that every week you’re building that credibility and dependability for new and loyal followers and showing up visibly online – they can see your face and this helps you to build that much needed trust. Consistently matters.

Think of it this way: If you are just starting out, showing up once in a blue moon isn’t going to capture attention. Your ideal students aren’t going to easily find you if you don’t commit to showing up consistently with the content that they’re interested in – the content that they’re searching for. Even if they do discover you, they’re not necessarily going to magically jump on your email list either.

You have to be consistent. You have to show up again and again and keep being visible so that they keep discovering you and you’ve captured their attention enough with your specific message for them to really start to connect with you. That might sound long winded – but that’s the reality and that’s why you must do the work to know who you’re speaking to so that when you do share your content it’s for a specific type of person with a specific need or interest.

If you need help getting visible, check out our podcast: How to be more visible in your yoga business.

Reason #4: You’re trying to do all of this on your own

Reason number four is that you’re trying to do all of this on your own. You’re not spending any time whatsoever, creating partnerships in your space. And by this I mean looking at who else is in your niche space and finding ways to partner with other experts who are also serving your ideal students. So this is really about partnerships collaborations, finding those win wins, where you can really tap into someone else’s audience.

Ready to partner up? Check out our guide: How to create partnerships in the yoga community.

Ready to dive in and grow your community?

If you want to learn more, if you are in the beginning of your journey and just starting to grow your community, perhaps from zero, or you’re starting with a very small community, then I invite you to go and take a look at Yogipreneur Launchpad. It’s a 16 week online programme you can start straight away. Ask yourself: “Do I need support with this?”. If you do, go ahead and take a look at Yogipreneur Launchpad as everything you need is right there.

If you have any questions about the programme at all, reach out to me, I’m here to help you.

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