Hirondo x EGYM Wellpass

Hirondo supported EGYM Wellpass with its SEO and GEO strategy in Germany. In less than three months, its average non-branded ranking improved from 21 to 10.

Context

EGYM Wellpass, the leader in corporate fitness in Germany, generated ~98% of its organic traffic from brand-related search queries: growth that was entirely dependent on brand awareness, with a website that Google had reduced to almost nothing but its homepage. In seven months, Hirondo conducted an SEO and GEO audit of the German market, corrected a competitor analysis with inaccurate search volume data, defined five content areas (employer branding, employee retention, workplace health, corporate wellness programs, and corporate fitness), and delivered the editorial calendar, author pages, and conversion banners that enable the in-house team to continue on their own.

Less than three months after the first pillar pages went live: the average non-branded ranking improved from 21 to 10, 36 keywords ranked in the top 3, 26 of the 44 keywords ranked in the top 10—driven by 16 pages other than the homepage—and, most importantly, 33 mentions in the top position in Google’s AI-powered answers, including “firmenfitness” and “hansefit alternative.”

About EGYM Wellpass

EGYM Wellpass is the corporate fitness offering from the Munich-based EGYM Group: a single, employer-sponsored membership that provides access to an entire network of gyms, swimming pools, yoga studios, and climbing gyms—rather than just a single partner. In Germany and Austria, this represents more than 16,000 partner locations, 21,000 corporate clients, and approximately 690,000 employee users. In France, the brand was created following the acquisition of Gymlib.

Its market, Firmenfitness, is rapidly taking shape across the Rhine: EGYM Wellpass competes there against Hansefit, Urban Sports Club, Wellhub, and Machtfit—players some of whom have a head start in organic growth.

Wellpass

The challenge

Meet the team

An almost total dependence on the brand

~98% of EGYM Wellpass’s organic traffic comes from branded search queries (2.3k branded keywords → ~105k visits, compared to 13.5k non-branded keywords for only ~2k visits). At Hansefit, the ratio is 52%. If brand awareness stagnates, organic growth stops—and by the time you realize it, it’s already too late.

A strong position, but limited to a single territory

EGYM Wellpass ranks first for “firmenfitness” and for search queries such as “alternative to Hansefit.” But beyond this core target audience, the site is nowhere to be found: neither in the long tail of HR-related informational searches (employee retention, workplace health, psychological stress at work) nor in high-volume short-tail search queries. The same is true for corporate fitness topics related to SMEs and the Mittelstand, even though there is a huge market in Germany.

Local business search queries left to competitors

Local search queries such as “firmenfitness + city”—which are not captured by AI Overviews and are therefore still highly profitable in terms of clicks—are not covered, while competitors are ranking for these terms, including local competitors and big names like Urban Sports Club.

A content architecture that prevents control

B2B blog pages don’t have “/blog” in their URLs: it’s impossible to organize or track them properly. The content exists, but it can’t be measured or leveraged (the top page, “Benefits in Kind and Tax Deductions,” targets two keywords at once without ranking for a single one).

The Right Expert, at the Right Time

A successful assignment starts, above all, with a good match: at Hirondo, we pay just as much attention to skill compatibility as we do to interpersonal fit.

Louis Pruvost

Expert SEO,
Hirondo collective

The audit that was implemented

Competitive Analysis: Separating the Wheat from the Chaff

Initial screening: Of the five players identified, only Hansefit, Machtfit, and Wellhub are true B2B competitors. Urban Sports Club remains largely B2C, and a large portion of its “weak” keywords are actually local search queries such as “gym name + city,” which have no value for a B2B strategy.

Simply copying our competitors’ keyword portfolio as-is would have led us to invest in the wrong areas. However, I did keep an eye on their strategy.

Actual Site Performance — What Search Console Says

Cross-referencing Google Search Console and SEMrush to measure the gap between brand awareness and organic performance:

~98% branded traffic, a single non-branded keyword (“firmenfitness”) ranked 113th among queries leading to the homepage, and SEMrush recognizing almost exclusively the homepage.

Conversely, the few blog posts related to money generate sustained traffic: proof that topics involving financial stakes work over the long term for an HR audience.

Review of a Previous Study & Development of a Pillar Page Strategy

EGYM Wellpass already had a recommendation for pillar pages based on an external study by a French SEO agency, which provided promising results but did not appear to be familiar with the German market. A review of search volumes revealed that a significant portion of the selected keywords had no actual search volume.

Following a thorough review of competitors’ keyword strategies and a semantic analysis, it was decided to set a clear SEO direction through a strategy of five pillar pages integrated under an “Expertise” section on the homepage.

  • Employer Attractiveness
  • Employee Retention
  • Employee Health
  • Workplace Health Management
  • Corporate Fitness

The principle is simple: each pillar page serves as a showcase for a broad topic, and blog posts that address more specific issues contribute to it. The “Mitarbeitergesundheit” (employee health) page is thus linked to content on “Krankenstand” (sick leave) or “Fehlzeiten” (absenteeism). Each of these articles captures a specific search query and passes some of its credibility to the pillar page, which gradually gains more authority in Google’s eyes across the entire topic.

The result: instead of a collection of isolated articles competing with one another, there are five distinct areas where each new piece of content strengthens the whole.

A bimonthly follow-up

Every two weeks, each pillar page is reviewed for its rankings and GA4 metrics (engagement rate, traffic sources, conversion). This frequency has allowed us to measure the actual impact of publishing the pillar pages and to make ongoing adjustments rather than waiting six months.

What has been implemented

An editorial calendar that empowers the team

The first deliverable following the audit is an editorial calendar that lists the topics to be covered in the coming months, each linked to its pillar page, with the target keyword, search volume, and intent behind the query (to learn, to compare, to buy) specified for each topic.

Its true value lies elsewhere: it bridges two approaches that often operate in isolation. On one hand, the rational criteria of SEO (what people are actually searching for, in what volume, and at what stage of their decision-making process); on the other, the brand’s priorities (the messages EGYM Wellpass wants to convey, key events, and product launches). The marketing team no longer asks, “What should we talk about this month?” Instead, it makes decisions based on facts while maintaining control over what matters to the brand.

GEO Optimization of Pages

In addition to traditional SEO, each strategic page has been optimized to be read, understood, and cited by response engines (ChatGPT, Perplexity, Google AI Overviews). Specifically:

information presented in plain text rather than buried in visuals or tabs
valid structured data so that the AI can unambiguously identify the nature of the page
internal linking that places key pages within three clicks of the homepage
answers phrased in a way that makes them directly quotable.

The stakes are high: when an HR manager asks an AI, “Who are the Firmenfitness providers in Bavaria?”, EGYM Wellpass must be included in the answer. A bimonthly tracking system for these mentions has been implemented, just as it has for Google rankings.

An Author Page to Demonstrate Expertise (EEAT)

Google and generative search engines evaluate the credibility of content just as much as the content itself: who is writing it, with what legitimacy, and on behalf of which organization. This is the principle behind EEAT (Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, Trustworthiness).

In a market like corporate health—where topics include absenteeism, prevention, and the taxation of employee benefits—an article signed “the team” carries less weight than one signed by an identifiable individual whose background can be verified. Creating author pages linked to the content adds that human touch, transforming anonymous articles into expert opinions—and, of course, aligning the blog with Johannes’s personal branding strategy.

Banners to Turn Reading into Conversation

A well-optimized article that doesn’t lead anywhere is still a cost. To connect the content to commerce, thirteen CTA banners were designed and integrated into the articles, at a rate of one to two per pillar.

The concept: each banner identifies a specific problem faced by HR readers and then invites them to discuss it. The banner leads to scheduling an appointment, since white papers are already promoted via pop-ups on the site.

Each headline is based on a cited data source (Gallup, Future Fit Employer) or a tangible product benefit: the 10,000 partners in Germany, or the end of Excel spreadsheets and manual sign-ups. The banners are placed high in the article, where the problem is identified, with an optional second placement further down, and link to the offer page.

In terms of methodology, they are stored in Drupal’s Content Library under a strict naming convention (Banner_Painpoint_Thema): the in-house team can reuse them, create new ones, and maintain a consistent approach without having to start from scratch or rely on an external vendor.

Results

Visibility in search engines—where the next battle will be foughte bataille

This is the most striking result: EGYM Wellpass now appears in Google’s AI Overview for 33 search queries—and ranks first every time. Among them are some of the most competitive search terms in the market: “firmenfitness” (1,300 searches/month), “firmenfitness anbieter” (590), “hansefit” (competitor) alternative, “krankenstand senken,” and “corporate fitness.”

In practical terms: when an HR manager asks Google or an AI about corporate fitness, EGYM Wellpass is cited as the go-to reference.

The End of the Homepage Monopoly

In February, the evidence was clear: SEMrush recognized almost exclusively the homepage. Today, of the 44 keywords ranked in the top 10, 26 are driven by 16 different pages on the site.

The brand no longer relies on a single entry point. This is a direct result of the pillar strategy: each region operates independently.

Scope: German website (de.egym-wellpass.com), 234 tracked keywords. Measurement period: June 10 – September 1, 2026, less than three months after the pillar pages went live.
33 mentions in the #1 position in Google’s AI-generated answers
36 keywords in the top 3, including 34 in the #1 position
12 keywords ranked from scratch in three months

What Remains to Be Done

Branded traffic, however, has not yet changed: rebuilding unbranded acquisition takes twelve to eighteen months, not three. Of the 234 keywords tracked, 33 are gaining ground and 24 are losing ground.

This is precisely the purpose of the biweekly reporting: these trends are visible and documented, and the in-house team now has the methodology to address them on its own.

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