Do The Dip With Your Credit Card Chip How are you doing with taking credit cards at your gym or studio these days? The term is "dip"; you dip your chip card to pay now. That is, of course, if your gym is using the EMV chip card slot on the merchant terminal, rather than still swiping the magnetic strip. As a quick reminder, magnetic strips are "bad" because they carry your account number and information in the open, for anyone to read. And that is what criminals have been doing; they are reading the unscrambled account information on magnetic [...]
Read more...
I recently finished reading Walter Isaacson's biography of Steve Jobs, which I thought was a fascinating life story. There are so many things about this guy that pertain to any business that it's an irresistible topic to tackle on the Gym Insight Blog. But I promise to visit the subject only one time, unless there is a call for an encore in the comments of course. Steve Jobs, the co-founder of Apple computers, Next, and Pixar Entertainment was a complicated person to be sure. On one hand, he had a genius for design and business. Jobs had an amazing eye [...]
Read more...
The Virtuous Circle Of Improved Retention Since the topic of membership retention is still fresh on the pages of the Gym Insight Blog, let's talk about the strategic points to hold on to your customers a little longer. No doubt, you have some idea of what you are doing well and what can be improved, and there are uncounted sources of ideas for retention on the Web, but it never hurts to have an over-arching strategy in place, right? The Upside Of Improved Gym Member Retention As an example, if you can increase your retention rate from ninety-two to ninety-five [...]
Read more...
Think About What Each Customer Means To You Individually, unless you have a specialized studio that caters to an elite clientele, each customer is just a marginal element of your monthly revenue. Not that you should ever think of them that way literally. Instead, you should look at the big picture: The total value of a customer is quantifiable, and once you've measured it, you can systematically improve it. Who cares about lifetime value? If you own a gym, or you manage the operations of a small gym for someone else, you need to care about such things. Customer lifetime [...]
Read more...
Fitness Trends For 2016 It's about time once again to review the trends that are in the ascendant and what has changed in the last year or two in the fitness industry. Fortunately, we don't have to guess or dig too deeply. The American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM) produces a survey of the top twenty trending issues in the minds of fitness professionals. If you haven't done so already, you really should view the results of this year's survey at this ACSM link. We have looked at trends before, and it's a fascinating pastime to watch how the market [...]
Read more...
Back To Basics Yet Again Even in this digital-first era, when it comes to operating a business, it still all boils down to the basics. By this, I mean a few specific skills and functions that we have addressed in some detail over the years, here on the Gym Insight Blog. But being basics, they never suffer for a little repetition. Of these, membership retention stands out as one of the most critical factors. Small progressive improvements can take you from a struggling small business owner, sleeping in the back office, to the top of your local marketplace. The economy [...]
Read more...
Facing The Day You Decide To Hire Managers When it comes to hiring new people for critical positions in a growing business, gym owners often find that it's a tricky affair; the needs are many, and so are the hazards. It's one of the things that can have a lasting impact on your company and your ability to scale your outfit up to enterprise scale. When your gym membership grows, and you have a small hourly or commission-based team that needs more direction than you can manage on your own, it is time to start considering the possibilities of bringing [...]
Read more...
If Humans Use It The Internet Of Things Will Connect It The world is changing around us all, and we here at Gym Insight are working to track the new trends, and attempting to relate them back to gym business ownership. If you can start a fitness business with a laptop or tablet, the right membership management software and a rack full of kettle bells, congratulations! You are probably on to a good thing. That accessibility comes from the power of your hard work, people skills and Gym Insight software. We would certainly love to help you find your success. [...]
Read more...
More Swag From Our Golden Age Of Television The New Year is always a good time for reflection and taking stock of where we are and where we ultimately wish to be. About eighteen months ago I wrote a post inspired by the reality TV show Bar Rescue and how you can do your own business makeover or rescue program. I think that it's time to draw from reality TV, and to look for lessons once again. Everything I propose here I intend to apply myself, so hopefully, it makes sense without sounding condescending. This time, I am thinking more [...]
Read more...
Apart From Your Club Members That Is Sometimes, when you are a fitness industry small business owner you feel like your gym is a boxing ring with your office right in the middle of it. You might even feel like you are the punching bag from time to time. Owning a small business is hard work and not something to take lightly. Of all the things that will give you stress and worry the one that you must deal with most effectively is financial pressure. That pressure is the question of profitability or the net income that your business brings [...]
Read more...
The Reason For Reporting Numbers Don't let the numbers distract you; owning a small gym business is still all about relationships. I know that I have spent a lot of time and digital ink over the last few years saying that it's about the experience. But that is really just the same thing isn't it? The experience that gym members seek is a positive training experience or a friendly environment to work out in, with all the benefits of improved fitness. For anyone who takes on the premium membership the price might easily cover the cost of setting up a [...]
Read more...
Picking Up The Pace Of Fitness Business Marketing Having a website is pretty much a fundamental part of marketing for any business these days. In the gym business there are numerous ways that having a digital home helps you communicate and connect. But there are different levels of presence of effort that are completely disconnected from one another. First, it's now a standard that your website has to be equally readable from computer screens and mobile devices, so anything you publish must be readily accessible to each. Second, like anything else in business, you get a return out of it [...]
Read more...
A Simple Social Solution For Gym Marketing When you have a business where you've put everything into it and you spend every waking hour of the day trying to get it going, when you're always on call to respond to daily crises, you owe it to yourself to get every advantage possible. A humble gym hashtag might just be the thing to help you do that. Do you have a social media hashtag for shout-outs about your gym? The hashtag has become such a simple branding tool so quickly that it's easy to overlook. These little tags can get you [...]
Read more...
There was a time when I would have thought that creating a brand was as simple as having an idea and commissioning a graphic designer to put my imaginings into visual form. I have learned a simple and harsh lesson over time: You have to work very hard to get recognized in your marketplace, as a business and as a brand. Be The Brand You can create your brand as an extension of your own personality but you have to make sure that it is the right image for your market and membership. Test your results and take measurements wherever [...]
Read more...
The Value Is Real If You Respect It Yourself One of the things that you learn when you're working as a freelance contractor in the software business (bare with me here) is that you get more respect and more clients if you set a price that represents real value and a living wage for yourself. As a case in point, a friend of mine recently qualified for a certification in network engineering. He now works as a contractor and recently raised his hourly rate by a factor of four. An amazing thing happened when he did it: Customers and prospects, [...]
Read more...
