I train jiu-jitsu. Have for a while. So when I look at a gym's website, I'm looking at it from both sides - as someone who might actually sign up, and as someone who builds websites for a living.
Last week I went down a rabbit hole. Clicked through maybe thirty BJJ and martial arts gym sites across Australia and overseas. I was looking for the good ones. The ones that made you want to walk through the door.
I found about three.
The Timetable Problem
Here's the most common failure: I can't find the timetable. The single most important piece of information for someone considering your gym - when can I actually show up? - is buried three clicks deep, hidden behind a 'Members' dropdown, or worse, it's a PDF that downloads to my phone.
A PDF. In 2026.
If someone lands on your site and can't find your schedule within five seconds, you've lost them. They're already googling the gym down the road.
The Stock Photo Epidemic
The second thing that kills me: stock photography. You run a combat sport gym - a place where real humans do extraordinary physical things every single day - and you're using a stock photo of a guy in a gi who's clearly never been choked in his life.
Your gym has atmosphere. It has texture. The mats are worn in certain spots. The walls have character. Your members have faces. Use them. A single honest photo of your 6am class mid-roll will outperform any polished stock image, because it's real, and people can feel that.
That's not aggressive marketing. That's just good design. You're removing friction between someone's curiosity and their first class.
The Conversion Gap
Most gym sites I looked at had no clear path from 'I'm interested' to 'I'm booked in for a trial.' There's a contact form - maybe. There's a phone number. But there's no 'Book Your Free Trial' button sitting front and centre, impossible to miss.
The best gym sites I found - and there were genuinely only a handful - had one button that did one thing: get you on the mat. Everything else was secondary. Timetable, coaches, pricing - all in service of that one action.
What the Good Ones Do
The gyms that get it right share a few things:
Real photography. Action shots, community shots, the space itself. Not posed, not perfect - real.
Visible timetable. On the homepage or one click away. Filterable by class type. Updated.
One clear CTA. 'Book a Free Trial' or 'Start Today' - not five competing buttons, not a wall of text about your lineage.
Mobile-first thinking. Because most people finding your gym are doing it on their phone, probably standing in a car park wondering whether to walk in.
Social proof that isn't buried. Google reviews, member testimonials, community photos - visible within the first scroll, not tucked away on a testimonials page nobody visits.
Why This Matters Beyond Gyms
Everything I've just described applies to any service business. The timetable is your menu, your pricing page, your service list - whatever the visitor actually came for. The stock photos are your generic 'About Us' copy. The missing CTA is the gap between interest and action.
Most small business websites are brochures. The good ones are sales pages that happen to look beautiful.
Nic Gallardo
Strategic Creative - Perth, WA