Optimal Aging

Building Trust in a High-Tech World

• Jay Croft

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AI is everywhere—but it can’t replace human connection. In this solo episode, Jay Croft shares how fitness professionals can thrive by building trust through authentic communication and evergreen content marketing.

Jay walks through his own conversation-based ecosystem—how podcasting, speaking, writing, and Prime Fit Content all work together to generate trust, visibility, and revenue without paid ads. If you're working with clients over 50, this episode gives you a powerful framework to connect and grow.

🧠 What You'll Learn:

💬 Why Conversations Beat AI Every Time

  • Harvard research on trust and customer service 
  • AI can't replicate emotional nuance or relationship-building 

📢 How to Build an Evergreen Marketing Flywheel

  • The role of podcasts, newsletters, blog posts, and guest appearances 
  • Why your message must be consistent, human, and story-driven 

🚀 Real-Life Client Wins

  • Debbie’s story: why trust—not ads—led her to join a gym
  • Presenting at retirement communities, podcasts, and more 

📚 Creating Authority with Content

  • Why Jay wrote Selling Longevity and how you can create a lead magnet too (00:08)
  • Turning trust into revenue with Prime Fit Content 

🧩 Why This Strategy Works

  • Organic, evergreen, compounding, and human-centered content 
  • How it builds long-term client relationships 

✅ 3 Key Takeaways for Gym Owners 

  1. Include clear CTAs in every message
  2. Talk about your offers regularly
  3. Keep everything human and story-driven

🧑‍💼 Host: Jay Croft

Jay Croft is the founder of Prime Fit Content and author of Selling Longevity: Over-50 Fitness Can Transform Lives and Your Business. He helps fitness businesses reach more clients over 50 using proven, trust-based content strategies.

🌐 Website: https://primefitcontent.com

📘 Book: Selling Longevity – https://a.co/d/egDAfwF

📬 Email: jay@primefitcontent.com

📱 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/primefitcontent

🔗 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/croftjay

👍 Enjoyed this episode? Leave a review and share it with a colleague who works with older adults.

Speaker 1:

AI cannot simulate or replace authentic connection, and Harvard research backs this up. People are willing to wait longer for customer service if it means talking to an actual human being. I do that all the time. When I call for help on a customer service line and I get the robot oh, I hate that. I almost immediately press zero.

Speaker 1:

I wanted to talk about that for just a minute as a way to segue into something that I think is really more relevant to what I do and what I can help you do as a gym owner or as the owner of a business in fitness and health and well-being that wants to reach more people over 50. To kind of get over the fear of AI except that it's a part of life now and talk about how the main thing is to use it to your advantage, and in particularly today, I want to talk about how we can use it to create a communication strategy that supports your business. So we've all seen the headlines about AI. It's writing articles and it's generating ads and it's even air quotes talking to customers. We've probably even experienced this as customers on other business websites and other communications with businesses. So AI can do a lot and I'm not afraid of it. I don't think you should be either, but here's what it can't do. Ai cannot replace the trust and the nuance and the connection that only come from real human conversation for fitness, health and well-being professionals who want to grow their businesses by reaching more people over 50.

Speaker 1:

I'm your host, jay Croft of Prime Fit Content and author of a new book called Selling Longevity Over 50. Fitness Can Transform Lives and your Business. Now, content for content's sake is not the point. It's not even about just making a connection. It's about having the right conversations with the right people, and that's a powerful thought. It's an adjustment for some people in how we think about these things, in sending newsletters or putting stuff on the internet or having any kind of marketing out there. Right, because in fitness and I think especially when we're talking about fitness for people over 50, it's the conversation that matters to you and your prospects and your clients.

Speaker 1:

I've seen gyms post AI generated captions like smash your goals and no excuses. Yeah, maybe that works for kids. I don't know, but if you're talking to a 65 year old person who's worried about knee pain or just wants to keep up with their grandkids, those really aggressive, generic AI lines won't do the job. What does A real conversation about how you'll help them feel confident just walking up the stairs again and doing whatever they want to do? That's why I've built my whole business around conversations this podcast, my book Selling Longevity, my guest appearances on other podcasts, even Prime Fit content, which is the core of what I do. They all feed each other and together they form an evergreen engine to grow my business and help more people, because we don't all get messages from one place anymore, so we can't just be sending messages in one place anymore. So and here's the key about what I'm telling you, telling you all of this today it's because I think, by sharing with you what I'm doing, you can learn some things that will work for you as well.

Speaker 1:

Okay, so let's talk about this conversation ecosystem. I hate it when people use that ecosystem to talk about their business strategies or or infrastructure or systems, but I think in this case, I'm going to allow myself to use it. The conversation ecosystem cannot be given to you by ChatGPT, so let me walk you through what I do, my system, and, as I do think about how you can apply the same idea in your own gym or business. So there's this podcast, and for me, this podcast builds trust and it personalizes me and my messages. People can hear my voice. They can see me talking about it on YouTube. They can hear my stories, get my perspective. Over time, they feel like they know me. They can decide if I'm credible or not. If they like me, what have you For you? Maybe it's not a podcast, maybe it's regular emails sent consistently. Maybe it's having short Facebook Live events, maybe it's a weekly blog post. The point is to be consistent in getting your message out there so that when people see you showing up with real useful information, they start to feel like they know you before they even walk in the door of your business.

Speaker 1:

And I'll give you an example of a customer that backs this up. Her name is Debbie. She's here in Atlanta. She's 67. She joined the Legends program at a gym here in my neighborhood and she told me that she didn't join because of an ad that she saw. She joined because she met the people after she saw the ad and she liked them and trusted them. And it was that trust, not the initial promotion, that was the deciding factor for her and she's their biggest fan now. She's been there for years. I don't think she'll ever leave. She loves it that much.

Speaker 1:

Okay, I mentioned these other guest spots that I do on podcasts, and so when I go on a show like Rick Mayo, his Alloy podcast, I meet a whole new audience. Some Alloy owners first heard of me that way and then later became clients of mine. For you, a guest spot might mean giving a talk at a local church group. It doesn't have to be on a podcast. You go to your church or your JCC or what have you. Maybe you presented a rotary or you partner with a chiropractic practice for a wellness night. It's just about reaching new audiences who might never have seen your AI-generated Facebook ads. One studio owner told me that they gave a simple presentation at a retirement community and two people signed up the very next week. It was because they actually went and showed up in person. It wasn't just something in social media.

Speaker 1:

Now I have this book Selling Longevity and I wrote it to be my authority piece Plants a flag. It says hey, I know what I'm doing. I know what I'm talking about in helping you market fitness to active agers. A book isn't just consistent, it's permanent. Again, this might not be right for you, but maybe there's a resource like 10 days to kickstart your health after 50 that you can put together. I'd be happy to help you put together that you can use as a lead magnet to give away in exchange for emails, to grow your email list. Or maybe you develop some sort of a branded program like the Legends program that Debbie's in here at Oxford in Atlanta, something that people can hold on to revisit, talk about right. That's how you build authority in your market, and I have Prime Fit content, which is the cornerstone of my business, and this is where the trust that I'm accumulating in all these other channels becomes revenue. I've had gym owners tell me that they've been listening to this podcast for months, that they've been on my email list for years and then finally realized that they can be saving hours each week by letting me send my prime fit content out on their behalf to engage their audience for them. So for you, this is when a prospect who's been following your newsletter or watching your social media posts, hearing your client testimonials, finally says okay, I trust you, I'm ready to join your gym. It happens, trust me, happens all the time. It's just a slow burn.

Speaker 1:

A lot of us grew up thinking that advertising two-for-one coupons is the way to go, because then you can get that immediate return. Well, there's a lot of reasons why that may or may not be a good idea anymore, but it's not content. Content isn't paid advertising for one. It's a lot more effective, I believe, particularly with people who are a little bit older, and it's a slow burn, you know. It's the kind of thing you have to invest some time in and be willing to do that with, because you're building a relationship, not making an instant customer out of someone the first time you talk to them. There's a content marketing expert I really like named Ann Handley, and she summed it up perfectly when she said technology can start the conversation, but it takes human interaction to build the relationship and why this lasts longer than ads. Now, let's be real. Ads can help, of course, but they stop working when you stop paying. They don't build relationships on an ongoing basis. Here's what makes this ecosystem idea different. It's evergreen, which means it goes on and on. It lasts right.

Speaker 1:

A podcast episode I recorded two years ago still gets new listeners. A testimonial video at your gym will still be relevant years from now. Also, it's organic. I interviewed a nutritionist named Nikki Raymond for the podcast about supplements after 50. People shared that episode with their friends. I wrote about it in Prime Fit Content and that's the kind of sharing that you can't get through advertising, I believe Maybe you can, but you got to pay a lot of money for it.

Speaker 1:

So you do this organically, it gets out there. So you do this organically, it gets out there. And when you share a client's story about regaining their balance or their confidence or their ability to travel without pain, they forward that on no-transcript. And another benefit of all this is that it's compounding. By that I mean each piece that you put out strengthens the rest. For instance, my book points to the podcast, which points to Prime Fit content. And for you, one client story points to your gym, which leads to a trial session, which leads to another success story that you can share. And finally, this ecosystem is human.

Speaker 1:

Those AI interactions can get you started, but you need the human follow-up to bring it together and make a sale, to make it really happen. There's a therapist, elizabeth Keowin, who puts it like this. There's a therapist, elizabeth Keowin, who puts it like this AI can be a great tool, but not a replacement. Without human professionalism, grounding the practice, ai cannot simulate or replace authentic connection. People are willing to wait longer for customer service if it means talking to an actual human being. I do that all the time. When I call for help on a customer service line and I get the robot oh, I hate that. I almost immediately press zero. I want to talk to an actual person. Hey, are you a fitness professional trying to grow your business with people over 50? If you are, then you need to know how to communicate with them, how to market to them and how to get them to trust you with their fitness, well-being and money.

Speaker 1:

We're talking about millions of people who are a little older than the typical market that the fitness industry usually pursues. They have more money, more time and better motivation to make the best long-term fitness consumers you'll find anywhere. If you're not focusing on them, you should be. Prime Fit Content is the only content marketing company designed specifically to help you engage people in this group and to help you distinguish yourself from competitors in your community. It's effective, affordable and super easy to use. Check it out at primefitcontentcom. That's prime like prime of your life fitcontentcom Back to the show.

Speaker 1:

So think about that in the context of your gym or your business. People don't want just the fastest, perhaps even most efficient interaction. They want to feel like they're talking to somebody who understands them and cares about them. So real stories, it's the key to connecting everything. And let me give you a real example. Studio owner in the Midwest saw me a while ago on a webinar put on by the Functional Aging Institute and that led him to find my podcast and listen to a few episodes. Short time later he subscribed to Prime Fit Content and then, a few months after that, he told me he heard from one of his clients who said I joined your gym because I saw that article you wrote about traveling pain-free. Now that article came straight from me, didn't come from the gym owner, which is how it's supposed to appear to the end user, of course but the client's story became more podcast content for me. Here I am talking about it. And the cycle kept going, and this was even before I published Selling Longevity.

Speaker 1:

So think about your gym. Think about how this same flywheel approach applies to you. Someone hears you present at a community event or gathering, they sign up for your newsletter, they get to know you and, like you and trust you, they finally join your active aging or functional fitness program. Their story becomes a Facebook post or something for your email newsletter and that story brings in another client. You see, it's evergreen, it's organic, it's compounding. It's much better than just buying an ad and running that same ad over and over. It's much better than just buying an ad and running that same ad over and over. And it's exactly what the content marketing guru, joe Polizzi, means when he says content marketing is a long game. You're building loyalty and trust. You're not chasing quick wins and I know we all want those quick wins and there are other ways to get them. But this ecosystem is better because it brings these conversations that are going to bring greater, longer return for you.

Speaker 1:

Here are three takeaways for gym owners. If you're running a gym or studio, here are three things to remember. Number one always have a clear call to action. Don't leave people confused by what do you want me to do? You sent me this email, or you made this podcast, or you came to my temple and spoke, and what is it that you want me to do? Everything you do has to mention what you want them to do. It has to tell them that you want them to book a trial, schedule, a call, sign up for your newsletter. What have you? You have to be clear and direct about it. Sign up for your newsletter. What have you? You have to be clear and direct about it. Number two talk about your offers.

Speaker 1:

Often I don't mean you're selling all the time or that you're being pushy all the time, but people need to know what you're doing that can help them. They need to know that you can help them solve their problem. I've seen gyms that mention their small group program in every weekly email. It works because repetition builds awareness. Finally, the third takeaway is to keep it human. The best marketing is often just showing up, telling stories and being real. That's doubly true when you're serving people who are a little bit older. A simple story about a client gardening again because of what you did for them, or lifting their grandkids on the playground because of how you helped them, is more powerful than the fanciest AI-generated ad that you can put out.

Speaker 1:

I want to give you a closing takeaway. I've created a special free PDF of simple tips to building your own evergreen marketing flywheel. If you'd like to have that, just shoot me an email at jay at primefitcontentcom, and I'll get it right to you. Contentcom, and I'll get it right to you. But here's the bottom line Conversations build trust. Trust builds business. Business built on trust lasts, if you want to learn more about helping people over 50, start by grabbing my book Selling Longevity on Amazon. If you're ready to reach more clients without paid ads, then check out what we're doing at Prime Fit Content. It could be right for your business. It's all designed to help you focus on those conversations that lead to trust and to sales. So skip the shiny tech, stop chasing squirrel every time something new comes along, and focus on letting people get to know you and like you and trust you. Those are the kinds of marketing techniques that never go out of style. Thanks for listening. I'll be back next week.

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Jay Croft

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