Category: Blog

Targeting the Golden Ager

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My son recently learned how to ride a bicycle, and the last time I took him to visit my parents, he insisted on bringing his new, bright green set of wheels along. My nearly seventy-year-old father, mostly sedentary and not in the best of health, surprised me by pulling his old bike out of the shed, dusting it off, and declaring that he was going to join in on a ride. He was slow and creaky at first, and he fell off once — with nothing more than hurt pride, thankfully — but he went a full four miles with my son (who streaked along with abandon, delighting in his ability to outpace Grandpa).

We don’t see my parents as often as I’d like, and I don’t want my father waiting around for our quarterly visits to get his exercise. When I told him he should join a gym, he laughed, saying he’d be embarrassed to show his old self among all those young, fit bodies. When I told him there are gyms especially for the elderly, and ones with programs geared just toward that group, he was surprised. He’d had no idea.

What can such gyms do to be sure they’re reaching golden agers like my dad? While advertising in obvious places — AARP magazine, for example — is probably a good idea if you’re a national establishment with branches around the country, many older folks, my dad included, have a more local focus. They want to go someplace right in town, and they like venues that seek their business in personal ways. One effective move might be to visit a senior center near your gym or health club and put up simple flyers — or, better yet, send one of your trainers who is knowledgeable about the older demographic. Have him or her give a presentation, demonstrate easy exercises for seniors, and maybe do one-on-one consultations. And make sure business cards get handed out, perhaps along with membership or class coupons.

Another option might be to sponsor a Walk for Senior Health in your area, something a local paper might write about. You’d not only drum up some business, you’d also raise awareness about the need for seniors to pay attention to their health. I know my dad could use all the reminders he can get.

In general, keep in mind the kinds of places people more advanced in years might go: in addition to senior centers, libraries, clubs like the Elks or Rotary, town halls, and doctors’ offices are all good options. Then head to those places and start talking about your programs that might interest them. If you remind them that working out regularly will help them keep up with their grandchildren, they’re likely to sign on with gusto.

A Fitness Concierge Makes a Difference

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I have a friend in lower Manhattan who joined a gym in August. For a couple of months, she went regularly, and she found herself getting into a routine she liked. And then Hurricane Sandy struck. Her kids were suddenly out of school, and for a couple of weeks life was upended: no electricity, no running water, no public transportation. When things finally returned to normal, she was ready to resume her routine — but somehow she just couldn’t. Having been thrown off course, she found it impossible to pick up where she’d left off, no matter how much she wanted to.
Then, a couple of weeks ago, she received an email from her gym’s fitness concierge. “I didn’t know they had a fitness concierge,” she told me, “or even know what a fitness concierge is.”

The email was short and simple: “It looks like you have not checked into the facility for a little while, so I wanted to touch base and see how everything is going. Please feel free to contact me if you have any questions or concerns regarding your membership.”

The fitness concierge, it turned out, was there to help her establish and stick to a workout routine. She listened as my friend told her she felt blocked about returning to the gym. She strategized with her about how to fit a workout into her complicated routine, around child care duties, school schedules, part-time work, and a volunteer commitment. She picked out classes for my friend to try and even went with her to a spin class, giving her pointers and encouragement as she tried to find her feet again.

This changed everything for my friend. Even the email alone had a big effect. “Just feeling like someone there cared, like they were keeping an eye out for me and they wanted to help me, made a huge difference,” she said. “It’s a giant gym. Hundreds of people belong to it. But the concierge turned her attention to me. She listened to me. That somehow made it possible for me to make the decision to start again.”

It can be easy to forget, when fitness is your bread and butter, that going to the gym is hard for some people. All kinds of psychological, logistical, and emotional factors come in to play. Helping people who are having trouble getting there is sound business practice — those people will come back again and again, and they’ll tell their friends how great your facility is. But it’s also much more than just sound business practice. It’s bringing to the forefront the humanity behind the business. It’s the real reason for getting into this line of work in the first place. Does your facility have a fitness concierge? Is it time to think about hiring one?

Facebook Might Not Get You Members, But It’s Still a Great Tool

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There’s been a lot of talk recently about the fitness industry and social media. At last month’s International Health, Racquet, and Sportsclub Association (IHRSA), for example, Nicholas Cristakas, the keynote speaker, discussed the potential impact of social networks on the industry. Six separate sessions at the conference were devoted to one aspect of social media or another. A Club Industry conference this fall will feature a session entitled “Social Media and the Fitness Industry.” And if you Google those two phrases together —”fitness industry” plus “social media” — you get a quarter of a million pages spouting a whole range of opinions on the topic, everything from “Top Five Ways the Fitness Industry is Screwing Up Social Media” to “Social Media and Fitness Business — A Perfect Fit?”
So which is it? Are we screwing it up or is it a perfect fit? What exactly is the best way to use it?

Christakis, a social scientist and physician who conducts research on social factors that affect health, health care, and longevity, has studied the effectiveness of both real life and online social networks. He found that almost everything seems to be contagious among friends, including, among other things, obesity, emotions, and drinking habits — but that the same is not true of online friends.

During his speech at IHRSA, Christakis said that Facebook friends have a nearly nonexistent effect on one another — their habits and choices do not seem to affect the habits and choices of the friends in their Facebook network. Nevertheless, he said, Facebook (and presumably other, similar media) is still an effective way to share information. So, even if you probably won’t get a person to join your gym because her Facebook friend announced in a status update that he joined your gym, you’ll still be able to share information that in a pre-social media world would have taken more resources to disseminate. Social media makes it easier than it ever has been to inform members and other interested parties about new promotions, classes, or developments.

Moreover, Facebook, Twitter, and other platforms allow you to share information with personality. Gone is the formality of an earlier era. These days, your voice can be as personal as you want it to be — and often the more personal, the better. It all comes down to branding, and though the dream of referral campaigns through social media might never be realized, the impact of solid branding now might be felt for years to come.

So how should you be using social media? Go ahead and post those photos of your family working out on the beach during your last vacation. As long as you can relate them to useful information about your facility, you’re probably doing the right thing. Your clients want to know that there’s a real person behind the business, and social media offers you a chance to prove that there is.

Giving Gives Back

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Last week, the New York Times Magazine ran an article about giving. “Is giving the secret to getting ahead?” the article asked, profiling organizational psychology professor Adam Grant. Grant, 31, not only studies the role of giving in motivating workplace productivity, he also serves as his own best example of how selflessness increases efficiency. As the youngest-tenured and highest-rated professor at the Wharton School, Grant has, the article reports, “published more papers in his field’s top-tier journals than colleagues who have won lifetime-achievement awards.” He regularly advises companies on getting the most out of their employees and helping their employees get the most out of their jobs. He sets aside a four-and-a-half-hour chunk of time each week to meet with students, and he writes approximately 100 lengthy letters of recommendation for students each year.

That’s for starters. Grant often finds an inbox of 200 emails waiting for him when he gets home in the evenings. He is dedicated to replying, even to the ones coming from people he’s never met who seek his help. When a student at Warwick Business School in England wrote to ask him how he manages to publish so often, Grant took the time to write back to him and even added, “I’m happy to set up a phone call if you want to discuss!” That’s par for the course for him. You get the idea. As the article puts it, “For Grant, helping is not the enemy of productivity, a time-sapping diversion from the actual work at hand; it is the mother lode, the motivator that spurs increased productivity and creativity.” Did I mention that he’s the guy Google calls when they have “big problems” to solve in the people analytics department?

Grant’s studies about the effectiveness of giving are astonishing. At one university fundraiser call center, bringing in a scholarship recipient for a ten-minute talk about how the scholarship changed his life resulted in workers spending 142 percent more time soliciting donations on the phone and reaping 171 percent more revenue. A follow-up study showed that revenues continued to increase over time, to more than 400 percent. Simply knowing their work was having a profound effect on the lives of others made the callers work harder, Grant concluded.

In another study, Grant put up two different signs at hand-washing stations in a hospital. One read, “Hand hygiene prevents you from catching diseases”; the other read, “Hand hygiene prevents patients from catching diseases.” When he subsequently measured the amount of soap used at each station, he found that doctors and nurses washing their hands at the station with the sign about patients used 45 percent more soap or hand sanitizer. Again, when other people stood to benefit, more effort was made.

So what’s the lesson here for owners and managers of gyms, health clubs, and other sports facilities? In a word: Give. How the principle of giving best applies in your context is up to you, but the numbers prove that, in general, giving gives back. Maybe it’s a matter of opening your door to your employees and providing them with whatever kind of help they need. Maybe it’s about giving more to your clients. Maybe, for you, it means adopting a philosophy like Grant’s: “He virtually never says no to the five-minute favor,” the article says, “something that will help someone out — an introduction, a quick suggestion — but cost him very little, relative to impact.” Whatever it is, you’re likely to see the results — and to gain the benefit of feeling good about what you do.

Kid and Me Classes

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My son’s in first grade, and it’s his spring break. I don’t love traveling during spring break, given how crowded attractions can get and how miserable airports can be. I prefer to save the travel for off months and arrange fun things for us to do near home instead. Because it’s just him and me, and because I want to take advantage of the fact that he’s not yet embarrassed to be seen with me in public (I have another four or five years, right?), we’re pretty much attached at the hip during times like these. It’s all well and good, but what happens when I need a workout? He knows how to run me around in the park, that’s for sure, but sometimes it’s just not enough.

I wish my gym offered a class we could take together—something in between the Mommy and Me classes we used to go to when he was a toddler and the grown-up ones I attend on my own. I know there are creative instructors out there who have the know-how (and the energy) to provide both him and me with the structured exercise we each need, while also making it engaging for both of us. Anything involving a ball would probably work.

Equally appealing would be classes for him that coincides with the ones I want to take. Right now, the gym offers drop-off babysitting, but, as he often reminds me, he’s not a baby. Again, I need something to fill in the space after the toddler years and before he’s old enough to spend a couple hours on his own. A class that drills him in soccer or baseball techniques, teaches healthy habits, or just offers a chance to play a rousing game of dodge ball, gaga, or something he’s never heard of before would be perfect.

On the practical end, arranging just a week-and-a-half’s worth of such classes might not be so easy, but it can be done. Your facility management software program can help you slot the classes in and figure out who would be the best instructors; it could also make targeted marketing to the right demographic a breeze. With three or four long school vacations each year, plus shorter ones and all of summer break, there are a lot of parents out there who would instantly sign up for Kid and Me classes or well-timed kids’ classes. The chance to get in a good work-out while still being on-duty would be irresistible.

fitness incentives

Home Sweet Gym

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I have a confession to make. Sometimes, when I’m too lazy to head to the gym but I know I need to exercise, I pull out my mat, look online for a good workout podcast or video, and start trying to get my heart rate up in my living room. I know that, without proper equipment (all right, without any equipment), without an instructor or personal trainer, and without fellow sweaty bodies, I’m not getting quite the level of exercise I need. But often convenience trumps quality.I’m not alone in this. A friend of mine keeps a stationary bike in her office; another one has an entire weight room in his basement. The fact is that sometimes fitness centers are competing for customers not only with other fitness centers, but also with those customers’ personal spaces. What can be done to pull people — yes, people like me — away from the yoga blocks in their closet or the medicine balls in their bedroom and into the gym

Of course, a health club will never be able to offer the convenience of a living room. But the benefits any exercise facility can offer far outweigh what can be found in the average living room. The key, then, is to focus on those benefits — in business-speak, the core competencies. What can a gym do better than a lone exerciser in her office?

Whatever it is, focus on doing it absolutely as best as you can. Trust that just being better at those things will draw at least some people who might otherwise never get out the door.That said, maybe there is a way for a gym to compete with the convenience of home: offer discounts to people who live locally — within a few blocks or a mile or two of the facility, say. Whatever your location, you’re convenient for at least some people. Make it your business to make sure those people know it.In addition, as with most things, incentives help. My gym offers a good one: Work out 180 days between one birthday and the next, and you get a month’s free membership. The thought of that sometimes entices me from my living room. There are hundreds of possible variations on this: come in a certain number of times and we’ll send ten dollars to your favorite charity, give you a free drink from the cafe, invite you to bring a friend for a free workout, put your name up on a poster announcing the current month’s most dedicated gym-goers, etc.

It’s hard to get us homebodies out of our personal spaces, it’s true, but it’s not impossible. Make it worth our while.

Time to Visit the Doctor

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I sat in a doctor’s waiting room for a long time today. I had accidentally left my book at home, and none of the magazines lying around appealed to me. As I’m currently attempting to renegotiate my relationship with my smartphone (I feel like I need some space but it’s having trouble letting go), I kept the thing tucked firmly in my jacket pocket, and there was nothing to occupy my attention except for a large monitor in the corner that kept cycling through a handful of health-related messages: avoid stress, substitute walnuts for croutons, exercise regularly.

“Ha,” thought the crankier part of me. “How am I supposed to find time to exercise regularly when I’m stuck here in the doctor’s office for three hundred hours?” (Well, it felt like three hundred hours.) But that got the less cranky part of me thinking. What if my doctor’s office helped me exercise regularly — not just by reminding me to do so, but by providing me with concrete incentives for doing so? What if they gave me five dollars off my co-pay if I brought in a form from my personal trainer, or yoga instructor, or gym manager that showed I’d worked out three times a week for the past month? What if, along with my prescription, the doctor’s assistant also handed me a certificate good for one free class at a local Zumba studio or a free session at the gym? What if I was offered a discount on a gym membership if I lower my cholesterol between this visit to the doctor and the next?

In short, I realized, health providers are natural partners for fitness centers and health clubs. They have the authority to convince people to get to the gym, combined with the opportunity to pass along incentives for doing so. Maybe it’s time to start cultivating relationships with doctors’ offices, to approach local ones with an offer they can’t refuse: a way to really encourage their patients to improve their health (because, to be honest, that monitor wasn’t very effective. I tuned out its messages well before my wait was over. Good thing I had my smartphone with me).

BFF: Benefit From Friendships

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I’m reading a great book right now: Friendfluence, by journalist Carlin Flora. As the title suggests, the book examines the ways in which our friends influence us. From our personalities to our choices to our emotions, habits, and self-perceptions, friendship, argues Flora, strongly helps determine who we are.


Unsurprisingly, this holds true for physical fitness too. As Flora puts it, “We seek out health and weight-loss advice, but the most effective plan might be to hang out with fit friends. Not only do they make it easier for us to eat better and work out by setting an example and dragging us along on active outings, but they also provide the human connection that fosters robust physiological characteristics, such as lower blood pressure and increased immunity.”
Pick up almost any women’s magazine and you’ll find an article that offers you advice along those same lines: Want to lose weight? Find a friend! That’s because studies and surveys have shown that people are more likely to achieve their weight-loss goals, or at least to lose more weight, when they work out with others.


Even more significant, perhaps, is how similar to you your workout comrades are. Flora cites an experiment conducted by MIT, which found that people were more likely to start using a diet diary if others using the diary in their online network were similar to them. “That,” she argues, “indicates that having a workout or weight-loss buddy ‘just like you’ will motivate you to adopt better strategies.”


What do these facts mean for health clubs and fitness centers? Start thinking about how you can capitalize on friendship. Can you offer special “friendship deals”: classes half off for members and their friends, if they bring them? Or membership drives in which anyone who becomes a member by a certain date wins a month’s free membership for a friend? Or maybe a “Friday is Friend Day” initiative: bring a friend to the gym for free on Fridays. The possibilities are limited only by your imagination. And the potential results? Members or clients who lose the weight they want to lose, or who meet other fitness goals, are likely to be happy, long-term members or clients. Plus, you might find yourself on the receiving end of a two-for-one deal: Your member’s friend might well decide to join herself. This, as Flora explains, is the power of friendfluence. It’s a power you can tap into.

Continue reading “BFF: Benefit From Friendships” →

Fitness for a Cause

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Gyms, fitness centers, health clubs, and other similar facilities do a lot for their members and clients. They help transform bodies into leaner, healthier shapes. They push individuals to meet personal goals and overcome limitations (the self-imposed sort and other kinds). They boost confidence, provide fun social settings, and introduce new modes of movement. But one of the best things about such organizations, to my mind, is that they can produce large-scale change that benefits whole groups of people.


Take, for example, the recent Cycle for Survival initiative at Equinox. Designed to raise money for cancer research, Cycle for Survival events in February and early March at Equinox clubs in 10 cities around the country drew 13,000 people who raised $13.8 million. That money will fund clinical trials and research studies led by the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York. Since Cycle for Survival started in 2006, the event has raised more than $31 million. There’s no counting how many people have been helped, and how many will continue to benefit as findings emerge from the funded trials and studies


But you don’t have to be a mammoth operation like Equinox to make a difference. Last fall, Pearl’s Fitness Studio in North Bergen, New Jersey, held a Zumba party to raise money for a local shelter that serves victims of domestic violence. In January, Carozza Fitness in Stamford, Connecticut, raised funds to benefit the families of Newtown who suffered from the horrific killings at Sandy Hook Elementary School. Last month, the Student Fitness Center at Illinois State University hosted a volleyball tournament to support the American Heart Association. Whatever a health club’s size and scale, there’s a way to serve local or larger communities.


As for the participants who work up a sweat to raise the money, they benefit too. First, of course, they reap physical perks. Also, they gain from the emotional and mental rewards that come with working hard on behalf of others.

Reward Your Clients to Reward Yourself

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A recent Mayo Clinic study found that, probably unsurprisingly, giving people financial incentives to work out helps them lose more weight. Researchers paid some study participants $20 every time they hit a monthly weight-loss goal and charged them the same amount if they failed to hit the goal. The result? Participants receiving the financial incentive — or trying to avoid having to pay — lost 6.74 more pounds than participants receiving no financial incentive.

For gyms, sports clubs, fitness centers, and the like, this is good news. Now, obviously, you can’t stand at the door handing out money to each member who meets his or her weight-loss goals each month, but maybe you can consider using other kinds of incentives. No doubt you already have some in place — have a friend sign up for a class and receive a free class yourself, or work out a certain number of times over the course of six months and receive one month’s membership free. Whatever you might be offering, great. In addition to that, can you offer something in exchange for members meeting stated weight-loss goals? A free class, a gift certificate for a health drink in the cafe, a free or reduced-cost session with a personal trainer?

Granted, the Mayo Clinic study looked only at cash incentives, so it’s not clear whether other types of incentives would have the same effect. But it’s worth a shot. If members meet their weight-loss goals because you helped them get there by providing small rewards, they’re probably more likely to stay members. They’re probably also more likely to get their friends and families to become members as well, or to sign up for classes, or whatever makes the most sense at your facility.

Your management software can help you keep track of who is taking part in an incentive program you offer, how close they are to meeting their goals, what incentives you’ve offered, and which ones you’ve paid out. As an organization devoted to your clients’ health, it makes sense to do what you can to help those clients get to where they need to be — while also solidifying a loyal customer base for yourself, not to mention a reputation for being a facility that really cares about its clients’ wellbeing.

FIRE DRILL! Get 100 NEW Clients FAST!

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The following guest post is by Sean Greeley, President of NPE, an organization dedicated to supporting coaches and fitness business owners in mastering the “business” of fitness. We are excited to have one of our most supportive partners share some amazing business tips and strategies.
Good questions lead to good thinking. One of my favorite quotes I share when teaching sales training is that “The income you make in your lifetime will be directly related to the quality and quantity of the questions you ask.” It’s from a book called […]
Continue reading “FIRE DRILL! Get 100 NEW Clients FAST!” →

Childhood Obesity Awareness Month

What Are We Doing to Our Kids?

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Recently, Highmark Blue Cross Blue Shield awarded $125,000 to nine schools in Western Pennsylvania to help fight childhood obesity. This got me thinking. Childhood obesity, according to the U.S. Center for Disease Control and Prevention, has more than doubled in children and tripled in adolescents in the past thirty years. The percentage of children aged 6 to 11 years in the United States who were obese increased from 7 percent in 1980 to nearly 18 percent in 2010. In 2010, more than one third of American children and adolescents were overweight or obese.

What are we doing to our kids? With the effects of childhood obesity ranging from, in the short-term, increased likelihood of suffering risk factors for cardiovascular disease, having prediabetes, and being at greater risk for bone and joint problems, sleep apnea, and poor self-esteem to, in the long-term, being at risk for adult-onset heart disease, type 2 diabetes, stroke, cancer, and osteoarthritis, we owe it to our youth to help turn things around.

Which is why Highmark Blue Cross Blue Shield’s action is laudable. The executive director of the Highmark Caring Foundation, Charlie LaVallee, was quoted as saying, “Our goal with funding additional schools is to ensure that even more children will begin to learn early in life the benefits of being active and healthy.” We should all be working together to teach as many children as possible those lessons, in whatever way is available to us. It’s great to see a health insurance company step up to the plate. Of course, parents, schools, and medical professionals also need to play a role.And what can sports clubs, health facilities, fitness centers, and gyms do?

As organizations dedicated to helping individuals meet their physical potential, push themselves past preconceived boundaries, and achieve greater awareness of their own health and their ability to control it, sports facilities of all kinds might be uniquely positioned to fight childhood obesity.

Take a look at your scheduling software: Can you fit in an extra class or two that will get kids moving? Can you host healthy-eating information sessions for parents? Can you even send personal trainers or other staff out to schools, maybe in underprivileged areas, where their expertise (and enthusiasm!) could inspire whole classes full of kids?

It’s worth thinking about, anyway.

Safety Training First

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A few weeks ago, at a 24 Hour Fitness club in Costa Mesa, California, a 67-year-old man exercising on a stationary bike keeled over, apparently suffering a heart attack. What did the club staff do? They kicked into high gear. One employee called 911. The service manager alerted other staff members to the medical emergency. A team raced to the man’s side. While a personal trainer began to administer chest compressions, the fitness manager grabbed an automated external defibrillator (AED) and applied it one time. Then, the paramedics arrived. Under their guidance, the personal trainer continued with chest compressions and assisted with cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) and the AED.

The man’s life was saved, and he is in stable condition. After delivering him safely to the hospital, the paramedics returned to the club and thanked the staff for its good work. If they hadn’t thought on their feet, acted quickly and selflessly, and worked as a team, the paramedics told them, the man would be dead.

How did the staff know what to do? Preparation and training. How can you ensure that your own fitness center employees will know what to do if a similar emergency arises under their watch? Preparation and training. Everyone on staff in your facility should be certified in CPR. If they’re not, arrange for a group training as soon as possible. Contact the American Heart Association, American Red Cross, American Safety and Health Institute, or your local Department of Health for information on how to arrange for proper instruction and certification of your employees.
Do you have an AED on hand, as 24 Hour Fitness does? And do you have enough people on staff who know how to use it? If not, time to get one, and time to train. Same goes for first aid practices. Your fitness managers, instructors, personal trainers, service managers, desk staff — pretty much everyone — should be schooled in the basics. All should know to pick up the phone and call 911 before doing anything else. These things might seem pretty elementary, but don’t take for granted that your employees know what to do. Make it your responsibility to train them.

It’s only through preparation during nonemergency times that emergencies can become averted crises. Then your staff, like the staff at 24 Hour Fitness, will be celebrated and hailed as heroes too.

Spring Break: Be There or Be Square

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This month, most colleges, universities, and schools around the country have at least a week off. Not everyone goes to Cancun, and parents of small children are likely tearing their hair out, trying to figure out how to keep their energetic young ones entertained. So now is the time for you to be asking yourself: What can my fitness facility or sports center do to help? If you don’t already think of spring break as an event that you should be planning for each year, it’s time to start. Here are a few ideas:

  1. If you already offer programs for children, consider creating a special, week-long camp that follows school hours and gets kids moving. Soccer, basketball, baseball, hockey, dance, and swimming camps are popular options; if your facility allows for any these, working parents are bound to be grateful and kids will join in with gusto. Plan time for snack and lunch, and alternate activity and rest in hour-and-a-half-long chunks: for example, for a basketball camp: an hour and a half of drills followed by snack, followed by an hour and a half of games, followed by a viewing of a documentary about basketball stars. Also, mix it up: an intense study of basketball in the morning goes well with a relaxed game of dodgeball in the afternoon.
  2. If your facility isn’t set up for camp, consider offering new classes that kids (and their parents, who might be taking the week off) and college students are not likely to have tried before. The sheer novelty might draw them to you — and once there, who knows? Maybe they’ll stay. Also, you can think of the classes you offer as trial runs. If they’re popular, you might have discovered a new niche for yourself. Options include Kangoo, surfing workouts, barre classes, rockwall climbing— even quidditch!
  3. Bring Cancun to them. Maybe you have a pool. Sure, it runs on a tight schedule, but can you carve out a few hours one day to turn it into a beach? Let people use their imaginations to fill in the sand. You supply umbrellas, lounge chairs, cabana music, and health drinks. Maybe you can get a beach volleyball game going in one area of the club (again, no sand required — just have players wear bathing suits). It’ll be a party — and it’ll draw prospective clients to you.
  4. Offer a special membership deal for the week. Existing members can bring a friend to a few classes for free; new members who sign up during spring break get two free weeks tacked on to their membership. Other ideas include offering a free session with a personal trainer or a discount at a local sporting goods store or on the gear you might sell at your own facility. Be imaginative here — there are endless incentives you can offer, with spring break as your excuse.
  5. Get your gym management software or fitness center software involved. Be sure to enter the names of clients who have never been to you before; so that you can fine-tune these offerings in the future, you want to keep a record of who your audience is. For existing clients who participate in your spring break offerings, make a note of their participation in their profiles — most health club software allows for this. That way, you’ll keep tabs on their interests and be able to target the right crowd for future events.

It’s never too late to start planning for Spring Break 2013, and it’s never too early to think about next year. Make it an annual offering. As a fitness center, health club, or sports facility, you’re in a unique position to keep people active and entertained when regular routines are on hold. Take advantage of it — and have fun!

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Sports Team Communication Challenges

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The following guest blog post is by Jim Woodman, President of PlayerGrid. PlayerGrid is a powerful new team communication and sharing service that we’ve fully integrated with EZLeagues. We are very excited to have another partner offer our clients some great insights on how to help streamline operations!

Mobile Apps are Delivering Smart Solutions

Getting timely messages to all members of a sports team becomes very important when games are canceled, practice is rained out or tournament information is updated at the last minute. In the old days – and we’re only talking about 15-20 years ago – telephoning everybody on a team with schedule updates was common practice.

But the telephone call – especially before cell-phones – was extremely inefficient and time-consuming for coaches and team managers.  Along came the Internet and by the late ‘90s, as more people starting getting e-mail accounts, team managers soon adopted e-mail as the preferred method of updating a group.

E-mail has Limitations

While e-mail and team websites represented a significant advance over telephone dialing everybody on a team and hoping to get an answer, e-mail has its problems and limitations. For starters, not everybody has a smartphone and, for those that do, they’re not constantly checking their e-mail accounts. Even worse, there are many coaches and managers not familiar with how to create email groups or send group text messages. What ends up happening is an important update – such as where and when a game is to be played – ends up in a reply to all message that has nothing to with the subject of that e-mail.

On weekend mornings, parents find themselves scouring their inbox for that one reply to all message that has the important “where and when” details at the top of the message. And depending on the content and origin of an e-mail, some spam filters may have dropped that all-important update into a junk folder. This is obviously very frustrating for coaches who assume their emails are being delivered.

And for those teams with websites, nobody is ever sure the website has been updated with a last minute schedule change. In many cases, those team websites stay stagnant for weeks, even months and can be unreliable.

Smart Phone Proliferation, Few Apps

Today, with the proliferation of smartphones and apps for just about everything one can conceive, it’s been surprising that very few apps have tackled the sports team communication issues and, for those that tried, the implementation has been poor at best.

To address this problem, EZFacility has teamed with Iconic Sports Technology to introduce PlayerGrid to facilities that have installed EZLeagues. PlayerGrid’s interactive iPhone and Android applications let parents keep track of multiple sports team schedules and events. Simply stated, with one PlayerGrid account, parents and athletes are notified instantly, in the manner they choose (text, email or push notification), the moment a coach or manager adds, updates or cancels any event.  The days of dialing people via telephone and sorting through your inbox for the right message are quickly giving way to these new, sophisticated applications that deliver data in whatever method the recipient chooses.

Besides its interactive calendar, PlayerGrid features a team specific message center, photo gallery, roster, custom team merchandise, and latest notifications panel. And everything in PlayerGrid’s iPhone and Android apps syncs seamlessly with its popular web application available at www.playergrid.com [website no longer in service – 3/30/2020].

Check out the previous blog post for more information on how EZFacility and PlayerGrid have come together. For more information on how to get your facility up and running with EZLeagues and PlayerGrid, give us EZFacility a call at 866-498-3279.

How To Make 2013 Your BEST YEAR EVER and Build a Business That Supports Your Dreams

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As we begin 2013 we’re pleased to announce exciting NEW content and guest blog posts we’re adding to better support all our customers in growing their businesses this year.

The following guest post is by Sean Greeley, President of NPE, an organization dedicated to supporting coaches and fitness business owners in mastering the “business” of fitness. We are excited to have one of our most supportive partners share some amazing business tips and strategies.

I LOVE the New Year.

It’s the best time to review and assess the previous year while planning for the year ahead. You get the opportunity to list out and remember all the things you did that worked out well. And take another look back at the things that didn’t work out so you can learn from your experiences and get better for challenges you’ll face again in the future.
One of the MOST important things I recommend to all our clients is to take some time to reconnect with the reason why you started your business in the first place.

When you’re caught up in all the “hustle” of day-to-day operations that go on in every company, it’s easy to get bogged down and forget why you went into business.

Why Did You Start Your Business?

At some point in time you got the crazy idea to begin working for yourself and thought it was a good idea to start your own business. You thought you could do what you do better than others in the marketplace. And you were passionate about making a difference, having fun, and enjoying the freedom and the success that come from being your own boss. Well…sometimes come from being your own boss.
In the early days, or when you’re in a fast growth mode, or when staff leaves, it sure doesn’t feel like freedom; when you’re running around wearing multiple hats in your company! It can sometimes feel more like you’re in prison!

Remember Your Dream

That’s why it’s so important to reconnect with your dream. Running a business is hard. And you need a LOT of fuel to persevere, overcome, and grow bigger than the obstacles and challenges in front of you. Because without that fuel… it’s easy to become overwhelmed, tired and fatigued, and want to give up on things when the going gets tough! THAT’S WHEN YOUR DREAM MATTERS MOST! Your DREAM holds the power to catapult you through anything that stands in your way. It must be STRONG and you must hold on tight in order to steer your company through the storms that everyone faces on their entrepreneurial journey.

Know Why You’re Here and What’s Important

Have you defined your core values? Core values are the guiding principles that define what you stand for. I like to refer to them as your “stars in the sky.” When the great explorers sailed out across the ocean in search of new lands, they had no idea where they were going. There weren’t any maps. And they certainly didn’t have any GPS systems! All they had to navigate their journey was a compass and the stars. By looking up at their position in relation to the stars, they could adjust course, plot their way, and eventually return home. Being an entrepreneur or business owner is very similar to being a great explorer. When you decided to start your own business you embarked on a big journey, full of risk. And if you’re like most folks, you didn’t leave with a clear map of where you were going! That’s why you have to have something to look up to when you’re feeling lost.

Core values serve that purpose in your company. They also become the guiding principles by which you can evaluate who is a good fit for your organization and who isn’t. Core values are first and foremost in creating alignment with yourself and your team. In addition to core values, you must also know your purpose. Why do you do what you do? What gets you out of bed in the morning to go to work? Why do you love your customers?
And I hope you love your customers, because if you don’t then you’re going to continuously struggle. Sure you can make money, but building a great company that lasts for generations and transcends YOU only comes out of a real love, passion, and guiding principles that become larger than life.

Get Clear On Your Vision and Targets

Once you’ve reconnected with your dream (your fuel), you’ve defined what’s important and why you’re here (core values and purpose) it’s time to get clear on your mission, vision, and targets. Without a destination, you’ve just got a ship drifting at sea. In working with the clients we coach and mentor, we help business owners get clear on a vision for the next 1, 3, 5 years. Once that’s accomplished, we can effectively develop a strategic plan that gets you where you want to go. The big problem here is most business owners have no plan and have no vision at all! They’ve simply worked themselves into a job. They don’t have an exit strategy. They have no plans to hit a target or a certain capacity in their business. They are only looking out a few months at a time.

As the leader in your company, it’s your responsibility to look out farther down the road. You must continuously work on and develop the vision for your company and team. Only YOU can do this work. No one else can do it for you.

Define Your Priorities and Get After It!

When you’ve completed all the groundwork to this point, you can now clearly define priorities for your work. Most business owners spend their days and weeks in what I call, “random acts of business development.” Doing a little bit of this one day, a little bit of that the next, then running to put out another fire next week. This is not only unproductive… it’s exhausting! For 2013, make a pledge to do things differently. Define 3 priorities for the next 90 days in context of your core values, purpose, mission, and vision… and then ONLY focus on those priorities. First things first… second things never.

Summary

As we begin the New Year, find some quiet time to review and assess 2012. Then engage in strategic planning to make 2013 your BEST year EVER in business. As a good friend of mine often says, “The strategist always wins!”
 
Sean Greeley is President of NPE, an organization dedicated to supporting coaches and fitness business owners in mastering the “business” of fitness. Check out NPE’s new 3x Telly award-winning documentary The American Dream: Freedom, Prosperity, and Success in the Fitness Industry, featuring 17 industry leaders who share their STEP-BY-STEP strategies, systems, and secrets for building highly profitable fitness businesses and show you how you can do the same at: www.AmericanDreamMovie.com

Perkville

Activate Perkville on EZFacility and Gamify Exercise this Year

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For this blog post we’ve asked Sophia Wong, Marketing Manager for Perkville, to share some insights on how to best use Perkville for your business!

To survive in the competitive health and fitness industry, club operators must focus on what differentiates their club from their peers.  Did you know that an EZFacility user can customize a rewards program by activating Perkville?

Perkville provides health and fitness businesses with a competitive advantage — giving businesses a platform to drive lifestyle changes by providing gamification tools to boost retention, referrals, and social media.
Gyms and studios have the ability to log into Perkville and customize their reward program to reward class attendance, personal training sessions, and more.  The reward program can be updated at any time to accommodate new behaviors, classes or services that the staff determine they would like to incentivize.  Staff can easily modify the list of point-generating activities in just a few clicks.

Redeemable rewards are viewed as tangible tokens of achievement in the fitness game.  While nothing can substitute for a great workout, redeemable rewards are motivational factors and help retain clients.  For many clients, rewards provide a goal they can strive to achieve.   Based on our discussions with gyms using Perkville, we recommend a 40 to 1 ratio where 40 works outs or activities equate to a retail, service, or discount reward.
“Perkville has created a buzz in our gym as well as on social media and has helped us perform better in comparison to last year.  Our annual memberships grew by 6.6% this past September (2012) compared to 3.0% in September 2011.  We saw an improved trend in October as well, and November is looking good too.  I get really excited by annual membership growth,” said Anne Co-Owner of Royal Fitness Gym.

For more details here is the link to Perkville’s Gamification White Paper.

EZFacility Partners With Playergrid to Enhance League Management Features!

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Dear EZFacility Customers,

We’re thrilled to introduce PlayerGrid, a powerful new team communication and sharing service that we’ve fully integrated with EZLeagues.

PlayerGrid enhances communication and photo sharing between all sports team members through its web and mobile apps. If a practice or game is postponed or canceled, team members are automatically notified in the manner they choose: e-mail, text or push notifications.

What makes this even more exciting for EZLeagues customers is that all your scheduling data and roster information is automatically synchronized with each PlayerGrid team account. If your facility makes a schedule change, it’s automatically updated in each relevant team’s mobile app. So coaches, parents and athletes will always have the most updated schedules in their mobile devices or web accounts. And coaches will be pleased to find all their roster information from EZLeagues already populated into PlayerGrid.

Coaches also have the option to add recurring practices, or team meetings, in just minutes and invite parents to their private PlayerGrid team accounts with a few mouse clicks on the web or finger taps on their smart phones.
PlayerGrid’s mobile app delivers powerful functions to iPhone and Android devices: activity calendar, group messaging, photo sharing and schedule updates are all free. If team members don’t have a smart phone, text-messaging and e-mail notifications will keep them informed.

Certified by TrustE, PlayerGrid ensures team information and schedules are only accessible to invited team members.  PlayerGrid also works with any existing team or league website, whether it uses EZLeagues or not, and can be used to manage multiple teams simultaneously. This makes it ideal for parents of children with multiple activities or multiple children with numerous activities.

As an introductory offer, PlayerGrid will produce professional digital photo books, absolutely free, for any team that uploads at least 100 photos. These photo books are also available as soft or hard-cover printed commemorative keepsakes. And PlayerGrid will also produce a free hard cover promotional photo book for any facility that signs up by December 31, 2012.

With PlayerGrid’s web and mobile apps you can:

  • Manage multiple teams
  • Update multiple calendars
  • Message entire team
  • Share photos & videos
  • Invite other team members
  • Create custom merchandise
  • Purchase prints and photo books
  • Fundraise for any team
  • Manage notification settings
  • Designate team admins

We hope you enjoy PlayerGrid, our latest feature enhancement to ensure you continue getting the most from your EZLeagues software. Please contact your account representative for more details on how to get PlayerGrid activated on your team registration pages.

Sincerely,
The EZFacility Team

Glowing sphere from color application icons

Staying Engaged With Customers Wherever They Are

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Building good relationships with your customers is less complicated when they’re right in front of you.  Sharing helpful tips and providing encouragement with a friendly smile are easy ways to build a personal connection with your clients.  What is more challenging is maintaining this connection when they are not in your presence.  Keeping your customers engaged and eager to come back requires a good plan, solid effort and commitment to your relationship.

Be Prolific

The more information you have about your customers, the more opportunities you have to engage them.  Everyone has an email address these days, so make sure that your registration form includes this critical detail.  Email announcements and newsletters are inexpensive to produce, and are a non-intrusive way to let your customers know what’s going on at your facility.  They’re also a great way to build interest from prospective clients – the more you can highlight programs that they want to attend, the more likely they are to become customers.

Be Social

Today, maintaining your facility’s presence on Social Networks (such as Facebook and Twitter) is just as important as having a website.  The key to an ambitious social media strategy is to provide a good incentive for your customers to like and follow you on a regular basis.  A good start is to make a strong Call To Action that gets your customers engaged if they haven’t already done so on their own; for example, running online-only promotions or rewarding social media mentions with Perks.  Not everything has to be as serious as a solicitation – posting regular “casual but relevant” messages of inspiration or humor will keep your customers interested in what you have to say without burning them out.  Finding your voice and the right mix of content for your audience is as much an art as a science, so experiment and find out what your customers want to hear.

Be Mobile

Many of your customers probably have a smartphone in their pocket right now.  If they have an App like MemberMe installed on their phone, you can send them instant Push Notifications about news, offers, and updates about your facility wherever they are.  With MemberMe, you can schedule announcements ahead of time, or send out a quick alert immediately after an opening becomes available.  That simple engagement can be the push they need to register for a session and keep your roster filled.  You should plan for regular updates with tips and advice, star performer recognition, and special offers to keep your customers interested and checking your app regularly.

Be Engaged

Thanks to Email, Social Networking, and Smartphone Apps like MemberMe, maintaining that important relationship with your customers is made easier than ever.  As with any relationship, commitment and dedication is the key.  If you are diligent and work hard to stay engaged with your customers, they will return the favor.

Helping Your Customers Adapt to Change

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One of the most challenging aspects of managing your relationship with customers is when you have to help them adapt to change.  Change can come in many forms.  Sometimes it’s positive, such as when you open a new sports facility location, add a new class to your gym schedule, or hire new staff for your personal training studio.  And sometimes…it’s not. Regardless of the “why”, there are a few things you can do to make the transition a positive one.

The Boy Scouts motto says it best: Be prepared.  A well thought-out plan of action is the best tool you can have.  Spend the time now to brainstorm about what changes you may encounter, both good and bad, and how you will need to deal with each.  Remember that adapting to change is a team effort, so make sure that everyone on your team knows their part in the plan.  Being prepared will give you and your team the confidence to guide your customers through the process.

Once you have a plan, open the lines of communication with your customers.  Don’t wait until the last minute to let them in on the news!  Dealing with change can be stressful, so the more time they have to prepare, the better their experience will be.  This is your chance to set and manage their expectations, so be proactive and follow up with reminders often.  It’s also important to remember that when speaking with customers about change, you want to stay positive but be realistic and prepare for some pushback.  Even if it’s a positive change, a customer’s first reaction might be to fight against it.  Be prepared to help them accept the change as necessary and how it will ultimately benefit them in the long run.  Here, a little empathy goes a long way.

Finally, fight the urge to turn back time.  Once there is an established routine, any change to that routine requires effort.  Adapting to change is your opportunity to improve your gym or sports facility, so just trying to go back to “the way it was” for the sake of avoiding change wastes both that effort and the opportunity.  Moving forward with confidence will send the message to your customers that you have the situation under control and will ease their uncertainty.

Because every sports or fitness business will eventually encounter the need to deal with change, it’s important to tackle those challenges head on.  If you prepare early, communicate effectively, and stay committed to your goals, you can lead customers to success no matter what comes your way.

Revenue Categories and Why They Are Important

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A lot of times clients will ask me, “Why is my revenue listed under ‘No Category’?” Or “How can I see the total amount of revenue for a specific service?” The answer is actually very simple – use our Revenue Categories feature.
Revenue Categories will help you group revenue streams and can be assigned to Reservation Types, Membership Types, and Groups – or even manually added to individually billed items. They should be similar to the general ledger codes in QuickBooks and when properly assigned, categories of your services will give you more detailed reporting by separating your sales on the Revenue Report.

Something to keep in mind when creating revenue categories is naming them the same as your services. This will be useful in knowing where your revenue is coming from when viewing the report. If you are running any other accounting reports that use revenue categories such as QuickBooks and you have a general ledger code called “Personal Training,” you should use the same name in EZFacility.
To start setting up your Revenue Categories click here.

  • Login to your EZFacility account
  • Click on Administration –> Revenue Categories
  • Enter a Code & Label
  • Click on Add Category when you’re finished
  • Use this User Guide to help you set up you Revenue Categories

Check back soon for more news and tips from EZFacility!

Make Every Phone Call An Opportunity

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A phone call is not like an email that you can read at your convenience, proofread and spell check before responding.  It’s not as personal as a face-to-face conversation, where body language and eye contact can mean as much as the words spoken.  Fight the urge to hesitate – every phone call is an opportunity, so make it a positive one.
The first step to making every phone call a good experience is to answer with confidence.  Have your introduction memorized and nailed down, so that you speak it clearly and concisely. “Thanks for calling ‘My Business’, this is ‘My Name’, what can I do for you today?”  Try to avoid long, drawn out scripts that come off as corny, make your customers wait, and can become inconvenient tongue twisters.

Another good idea that works surprisingly well is to smile when you answer the phone.  This not only serves as a subconscious reminder to make the call a positive one, but it comes across in the tone of your voice and establishes a friendly rapport with the caller.

Next is to pause and listen to the customer identify themselves and the purpose of their call.  It really helps to keep a notepad handy to note these details, especially if the call ends up lasting longer than a minute or two.  Remembering the customer’s name and addressing them by it during the call makes the experience more personal and shows that you’re paying attention and care about their needs.  Furthermore, by keeping track of the types of calls you receive, you can identify ways to make your business more efficient.  For example, if you notice that you’re getting a lot of calls about your hours or location, having a solution like a mobile app for your business that answers these simple questions can save both you and your customers a lot of time.

You also need to be prepared for times when a call will be less than pleasant.  Managing a difficult call above all else requires two things: patience and empathy.  Think about a time when you’ve made a phone call while upset – perhaps an unknown charge appeared on a credit card statement or your cable went out right before a big game.  The person on the other end of the line wasn’t directly responsible for these events, but the urge to take it out on them is still there.  In this case, that person is now you.

Stay calm and let the customer speak.  It might be something as simple as a misunderstanding, or it might be a legitimate problem that will need to be worked out.  When speaking, talk calmly and slowly – we have an unconscious tendency to raise the pitch of our voice and speak faster when we get upset, and that comes across even more over the phone.  Remember to take notes, and if it’s a larger issue that can’t be handled in a minute or two, reassure the customer that you will deal with it after the call is over and get a call back number for where they can be reached. Last but not least, follow up afterwards, even if you are not the last person to deal with their situation.  Their feelings towards you and your business will be based on the last contact they have with you, so end on a high note and they’ll remember that more than whatever upset them in the first place.

Another useful tip is to end each call by asking if there’s anything else you can do for them.   It shows that you’re not rushing them off the phone, and can save a customer the inconvenience of making a second call because they might have forgotten to ask a follow-up question.  Before hanging up, you might even want to remind the customer about any upcoming programs or events they might be interested in.

So don’t be afraid when the phone rings – get excited!  If you’re prepared, maintain a positive attitude, and treat your customers with sincerity and respect, you can make every phone call an opportunity.

Hiring the Right People in order to Create the Perfect Team

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The average staff turnover rate is 50% or more for many businesses in the US, which means staff turnover can be expensive due to the time and resources spent training replacement personnel. The truth is traditional hiring doesn’t always work well, so we recommend you try a different tactic to lower the turnover rate for employees in your business.
Behavioral Interviewing                
While traditional interviewing focuses on education and career goals, behavioral interviewing asks candidates to tell and show you how they would apply their past performance, job skills and life experiences to challenges they will face in your business. This technique will help you pick new employees based on their demonstrated success in taking on situations required by the position you’re filling.
Sample Questions

  • Ask potential sales managers to explain how they have handled performance issues with reps.
  • Ask wellness coaches to tell you how they worked with an especially challenging client.
  • Have billing clerks tell you about the worst customer experience they have had and how they were able to handle the situation.

Example Demonstrations

  • Request that trainers show you how they would explain the same technique to different level of skill players.
  • Ask yoga instructors to show you how they would instruct a client to properly perform a specific pose.
  • Have fitness instructors show you how they would modify a class for attendees with ROM (range-of-motion) limitations.

By asking the right questions during the hiring process, you’ll find your business will run with ease because you have the right people working for you. These simple questions and techniques can make the difference in creating the perfect team to help you run your fitness or sports business successfully.

Increase your sales and client retention by using F.A.B.

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Here at EZFacility, we frequently speak with businesses that struggle to increase revenue and clients.  In many scenarios, one big problem is a failure to adequately communicate the services they offer to their clients and prospects.  This can range anywhere from failing to communicate what differentiates their business from the competition, all the way to (and I’m not making this up) not advertising their company’s offerings at all.

Among the many sales and marketing strategies that exist, there is one that has stood the test of time across many industries – F.A.B.  More specifically, Feature Advantage Benefit, a simple concept to guide the way you and your staff communicate your services to, and earn more business from customers.  Your Feature will be easiest to find in your differentiators- unique courses, more courses, pro athletes on staff, newest equipment, 24 hour access.  The Advantage involves explaining why the feature is unique to your business, so the client isn’t playing any guessing games.  The Benefit is expressing the value proposition clearly for the client.  This process encourages you to teach your clients about your business by walking them through what you offer to why they need it in their lives.

As a simple example, let’s draw clientele to XYZ Gym using the FAB framework to promote their unique suspension training classes:

“XYZ Gym’s offers the only suspension training classes in town.  The advantage of XYZ’s suspension training is a total body work out that will increase your strength, flexibility, and core.  What this means to you are more significant fitness results, faster than you would receive elsewhere.”

Obviously, a conversation with an actual prospect or member may require more dynamic dialogue, but the goal should remain the same:  to constantly communicate the value of your offerings to the client.  Give them the story of why you are different and why they should spend their money and time with at business.   Using this methodology becomes even more impactful when you use it to reinforce all of the features that differentiate you from your competition, not just for prospects, but existing clients too (read: retention).

Stay tuned for more tips and information to help with client retention and make your business the best it can be.

The key to achieving excellent customer success results

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No matter what your particular field of expertise, your primary focus as a business owner/manager should always be to help customers successfully achieve their goals. While this may seem fairly obvious, full workloads and hectic schedules can often lead to falling into a potentially harmful routine, especially when it comes to handling customers. This could lead to missed opportunities to help boost your client’s chances of success.

Every client is unique. Although many will be looking for similar results, they all have their own reasons and motivations for giving you their business. The more you know about their personal goals, the better chance you have of helping them succeed. Take the time to ask them questions, and be sure to listen carefully to their answers. Do your best to understand the impact the work you do with them will have on their lives, and be sure to follow up with them as they progress to be sure they remain committed to achieving their goals.

If a customer feels like a cog in a wheel or just another dollar in your pocket, the chances of them reaching their goals with you will decline dramatically. Be a partner in their progress, listen and understand their expectations, and you’ll be in a much better position to help them find success – and to help you keep them as a customer for the long-term.