Marketing Tips for Yoga Teachers: Digital Marketing

The world of digital marketing for yoga teachers can seem daunting to those unfamiliar with it. They certainly don't teach you these things in your 200-hour teacher training course, but they're all pretty important to building a business these days.

How to create a yoga website:

Let's start with the basics; Creating a website for your yoga business. Not only will this make you appear more professional as a yoga teacher, but it will also show potential students that you are credible. This doesn't have to be a content-heavy, content-heavy, all-singing, all-dancing website. It can be as simple as having a landing page with a brief summary of who you are, what you do, when your classes are, and how to get in touch with you - similar to an online poster. The call to action is the most important. You want everyone who lands on your website to be able to contact you. Therefore, make sure this is clearly visible throughout the site.

There are many website hosting platforms to choose from. I have personally used both Wix and WordPress and particularly similar to these due to the variety of drag and drop page templates as well as the easy-to-use tools they offer, like basic SEO help. If you're fairly new to all this, I recommend finding a hosting platform that offers as much support as possible. This way you should be able to set up a simple website yourself without having to pay anyone.

Both platforms are free, but add some of their own banner ads to grant this privilege. You can have these removed for a small annual fee.

Creating a Domain Name for a Yoga Business:

Yes, you probably need a specific domain name to look more professional. Website hosting platforms also give you a URL (web address) to redirect people to. However, this URL is probably quite lengthy and unprofessional, e.g. E.g.: https://sarahdean84.wixsite.com/yoga.

A proper URL like sarahdeanmarketing.com helps your business look more credible and inspire trust in your brand. It's also much easier to remember and looks more professional when written online or on printed materials. Your website hosting platform provides options and instructions for purchasing a domain name. However, a quick Google search will provide you with numerous other websites where you can purchase one. Remember, the more unique the name is to you, the cheaper it will be.

SEO Basics for a Yoga Website:

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is the free process of improving your website so Google and other search engines can find it. There are a number of factors, but one of the easiest to implement is the use of keywords in the titles and copy on your website.

The Google Keyword Planner can help you find the most relevant words for your website. In its simplest form, think of some phrases your target market might type into Google, such as: E.g. “Yoga Classes in Tiverton”. The keyword planner then gives you a list of potential words related to that search, selects the most relevant ones and inserts them into your website.

As mentioned earlier, many website hosting platforms offer some free basic SEO tools that will walk you through some things you can implement on your website. These are pretty quick and easy to use without requiring you to gain a deeper understanding of how they work. So I recommend you use these if you feel confident.

Creating a Yoga Blog:

Of course, as you become more confident and perhaps add a navigation menu to your landing page, you can expand your web content and take advantage of SEO opportunities. A great way to do this is to add a yoga blog to your website. Most website hosting platforms allow this and already have easy-to-use templates and even images for you to choose from.

Writing blog articles can be time-consuming, but it's also free and exists forever. Choose a few specific and relevant topics that your audience is likely to be interested in and therefore search online and write away! You can use Google Keyword Planner to figure out which keywords to include in articles to increase the likelihood of them showing up in a Google search. Unlike paid digital advertising, a well-optimized blog can drive visits to your website for years.

Blog articles are also a great way to share your personal content with your students. You can post them to your social channels and include links in your email marketing if you set that up (more on that later).

Email Marketing for Yoga Teachers:

After teaching for a while, it's very likely that you've built a small database of student email addresses. Companies like Mail Chimp offer email marketing services that help you create professional-looking e-newsletters from set templates.

Email marketing can be a very effective way to connect and engage with your students, but only if it's done well. People don't like being spam, so only send emails when you have something interesting to say. Less is definitely more here, so it's better to send 4 really interesting and content-rich emails a year than one a month just to feel like you're being proactive.

Try not to be too salesy. You may just want to talk about your new workshops and courses, but a softer approach that includes interesting blog articles or other inspirational content will help balance the news.

The subject line of the email, as it appears in the recipient's inbox, is actually the most important part. This is often the deciding factor as to whether they open it or not. Keep it as short as possible as not all long headers may be read in a smaller phone email feed.

Please remember that you must get your students' permission to use their email for marketing purposes. You must specifically register for this. The recent GDPR legislation puts a lot of pressure on consumers Data protection and there are fines for companies that do not comply with these rules. At the most basic level, this includes consent to how their data is used and how you store it.

Google My Business for Yoga Teachers:

Even if you decide not to use a website, there is another really valuable tool that you can use for free Google My Business. It's easy to set up and once you create your account, your business can appear on a map in local Google searches, similar to an online directory.

For example, if someone searches for “yoga classes in Tooting”, a map of all local teachers and studios registered in Google My Business, including their contact details, will appear at the top of Google. You can't afford to miss out on this free advertising, especially when paying Google to appear in searches via pay-per-click (PPC) advertising can get quite expensive.