Our Gym Insight Sales Guru© software is changing for the better this season as we unveil our newest version of Insight. Soon, users will have the choice to create a membership that will auto add a scheduled payment to the new account. This will eliminate common mistakes made from entering a yearly enhancement fee by hand after the sale is complete. Enhancement fees, sometimes also called maintenance fees, often act as a financial buffer for owners, providing that extra cushion needed between rock-bottom pricing and a well-managed gym. The money has to come from somewhere, right? But adding those annual [...]
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As a gym owner, customer service may be one of those catchphrases you don’t think about much. To stay competitive and keep costs down, you’ve leaned into online sign-ups, digital keytags, and reducing employee payrolls. It’s working, too. With an emphasis on cost reduction and adapting services to customer needs, small gyms have stopped disappearing from the landscape. Truthfully, if you’re a gym owner reading this blog, you’ve survived quite a clean-out. In 2019, gym ownership hit record levels, with more than 41,370 gyms in the United States, according to Statista’s research. Today, that number hovers at about 31,000 clubs. Congratulations on being among the fittest [...]
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Welcome to our newest series within our blog. Here we profile employees from throughout our company to both introduce them to you, our valued clients, and spotlight their unique contributions to Gym Insight. We believe each employee offers a special blend of talents that together create the robust set of gym management software tools our fitness club owners enjoy. Dancing with Natalia Natalia Schulte, our newest sales manager, brings a sprightly enthusiasm to her job with Gym Insight. We’ve asked her to support our Head of Sales, Anthony Pasquale, in our critical mission to grow Gym Insight’s core customer base [...]
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Sales can be a numbers game. The more people walking through your gym door, the more likely you are to close a few of them. That’s true, but it’s a tough way to make a living. A better idea is maximize each sales prospect by following a specific sales protocol and applying it to every person who visits your gym. First — Conduct a Proper Tour Don't leave membership sales up to chance. Here are five steps to an awesome tour: Introduce yourself and ask their name. Slow down. Find a quiet spot. Ask them a few questions, cover the [...]
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Read About Our Updated Task List Feature Recently, in response to customer requests, the software team at Gym Insight updated our tasks application. The newly redesigned Task List is robust and easy to use, resulting in increased employee initiative and fewer lost opportunities. Here are five ways the Task List feature saves you money. 1. Encourages employees to begin working before you arrive. The truth is, many employees don’t start doing stuff until the owner walks through the door. To get them moving on time, our new “assign task” feature allows owners/managers to do just that — assign tasks. This way, when an [...]
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So, let’s talk about January gym membership sales. Too early? No, not really. The January bump in sales is too often just a hangover remedy from a slow fall sign-up season. True, January is the month to become fit. After all, 12% of all new members join at year’s start. That’s easily 40% more than on an average month, when about 8% of your new members come on board. However, many of those new members might have said yes sooner -- if you had just asked them. November and December are traditionally tough months for the health club industry. In [...]
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It is not a daily increase, but a daily decrease. Hack away at the inessential. This quote from martial arts legend Bruce Lee is so simple, yet it says so much of what success is all about, in gym ownership, in business and life in general. You can spend hours doing little things or find the big things that matter; they may look the same at first. But when all the other things drop away you can still take the essential factors and use them to achieve the final outcomes you desire. This is what sculptors do when they carve [...]
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Starting a gym can be complicated. Instinctively, launching a health club seems simple: equipment + passion = success, right? True, but gyms also involve people, liability, capital investments, promotions, regulations, and expenses. Juggling all this is where success is achieved. The following blog is a short overview of four of the most significant responsibilities affecting your new company. Below the blog, we’ve included helpful links for research and assistance. Four tasks every gym owner faces: Insurance coverageCapital equipment purchasesMarketing expensesEmployee management 1. Required insurance coverage: General liability Commercial propertyProfessional liabilityWorkers’ Comp Although the cost of insurance varies widely based on the size [...]
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Growth This summer, drive gym membership for college students by offering them a great deal on your awesome club. Last year, we wrote a blog urging gym owners to reach out to cooped-up college students tired of learning online and alone. Your gym would become their oasis – a place to meet friends, expend some energy, and prepare for a new year on campus. A refuge from a rough, COVID-crazy year. This year, the kids are back home for the summer and ready to hit an exercise class or two. Let’s look at some reasons it’s the perfect time to target this [...]
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Powerlifter at Celli's Fitness Center is ready for next move Ryan Celli founded Celli’s Fitness Center in 2007 catering to strength athletes and power lifters. Since then, his privately owned gym has relocated, expanded, and added automated membership sign-up. Like many small gyms, he relies on technology to keep costs down. As he grew, he added cameras, a door controller, programable music, and a self-serve drink station along with a better gym management system. The investments allowed him to scale back hours and employ a staff of only his wife and son. However, he soon found well-placed technology returned more than [...]
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2GHsKOL5wZk Reduce paperwork this New Year by implementing a gym management software system. How Does It Look? What Does It Mean? What Needs To Be Done? It's a great time to draw a line under the past year by looking at what was good, what was bad and what looks to be changing. I'm not talking about Taylor Swift or politics here, but specifically in the marketplace that you serve as a small gym owner. I've been writing about a lot of different topics this year and it's worth a review to remind readers of what's been covered and some [...]
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Opening a new gym can be really stressful. You’ve put a ton of money into this new business and now it’s time to switch on the lights and hope members sign up fast enough to cover mounting bills. But it does not have to be that way. Established gyms know the best way to promote a new location is Pre-sales. This simple idea takes the pressure off opening day and provides much-needed cash for final construction snafus. What are gym membership pre-sales? These are sold prior to your fitness center’s opening. Marketed through social media or an advertising campaign, this [...]
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There are lots of interesting ways to do promotions. Once again, with the holidays upon us, I think it's time to take another look. One of the most accessible is selling gift cards as part of your retail operation. Even if it means just a desktop display at your reception you can boost your return on investment by offering this popular, high margin product to your membership and the general public. Promotions With Gift Cards Sell gift cards in your gymSell gift cards at the local sporting goods storeDistribute them through your trainers There is a reason that you see [...]
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After students leave for college and the costly fall shopping season starts, many health clubs experience a surge in gym membership freezes. But these short-term fixes can be costly to a gym owner. With a little planning, though, your fitness center can avoid this seasonal ritual and come out ahead — with happier customers and, maybe, even more personal training clients. Why do members freeze their gym membership? Customers are on the defensive when they're ready to cancel or freeze memberships. Often, freezing a membership is just a polite way of saying “cancel my membership.” The customer wants out but is looking [...]
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Asking for (More) Business After the gym membership sale, what comes next? A fist bump and a calendar check? Excited smiles and vow to “see you tomorrow!” Or, perhaps, just one more ask? Leaping past the traditional goodbyes after a sale and staying in place to ask for referral business is the difference between a good close and a great one. According to consumer research group Nielsen, 92% of people trust referrals from people they know. So why would you not use this moment to secure a name or two of someone who might also benefit from exercising at your gym? [...]
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