App Community Manager

Our vision GymNation wants to be the world’s most social, community-led gym operator, with the most powerful and recognisable gym brand globally. Brand & Community is a strategic pillar for us, and the aim is a community-led brand that turns members into advocates. We’re putting money behind it: fitness and community events from run clubs and HYROX to members’ parties, the GymNation Foundation, brand partnerships, and an app that brings members together. This role is the one that brings all of that together. Please read this first. This is not a social media community management role. You won’t be running our Instagram or TikTok, replying to comments or making content; we already have a Social Media Manager for that so not suited to a social media manager. You won’t be organising events either; we have Events Managers in the UAE and KSA. This role is about building a community inside the GymNation app and making sure our real-world events and the app work as one. If you’ve built and grown an online community in a product, and not just on social channels, read on. The role Members who train with people they know stay longer. Your job is to make that happen at scale. You’ll launch and grow the community features in the GymNation app, and you’ll make sure every run club, HYROX weekend and members’ party feeds the app. The app, in turn, should keep getting people through the door. You’ll work closely with the Events Managers, the Social Media Manager and the Product and Tech team. None of them report to you, so you’ll need to influence them to get things done. What you’ll do
• Launch and grow the app’s community features: feed and stories, groups and events, finding training partners, leaderboards and streaks, messaging, and share-your-results cards.
• Be the voice of the member to Product and Tech. Write briefs, set priorities, test releases and drive adoption after launch. They build it, and you get members using it.
• Give every event an app layer: a group, sign-ups, a challenge, a leaderboard, results cards and a follow-up. Plan this with the Events Managers from the start, not after the event.
• Grow member-led communities. Recruit and support group leaders, ambassadors and coaches so groups keep going without you.
• Run community safety: guidelines, AI moderation rules, escalation, and privacy-first defaults, set up with Tech.
• Run the buddy referral programme and the community section of the annual member survey.
• Share community stories with the Social Media Manager for “community as the hero” content.
• Set up partner challenges inside the app with brands like Nike, WHOOP, Oura and Red Bull. How you’ll be measured
• Retention and churn of members in the app community compared with members who aren’t.
• % of members in an app group; monthly active community users; challenge participation.
• How many event attendees join the app community, and how many app members turn up to events.
• Referrals from the buddy programme, and community scores in the annual survey. What you’ll bring
• You’ve built an online community inside a product (an app, platform or membership) and grown it from small to genuinely active. Running social channels alone won’t be enough. Think Strava, WHOOP, Peloton, Tonal or Ziina: brands whose community lives inside the product itself.
• You’ve worked hands-on with product and engineering teams: briefs, feature feedback, launches, adoption.
• You’ve linked digital community to real-world activity.
• You’re comfortable with data: you set the metrics, read the dashboards and change course based on them.
• You’ve built moderation and trust-and-safety processes.
• You’ll be visible at events and in the app, and you’re credible with gym-goers.
• Nice to have: Arabic, GCC experience, and a background in run clubs, HYROX or a fitness app. Salary 15
- 20k AED monthly