With the recent update for Apple's iOS 11, today on the podcast we're learning about what this means to the fitness industry from the Chief Information Officer & Vice President of Good Life Fitness, Steve Groves. If you're like most of us in the fitness space, you've been hearing rumors for months about how Apple has been gearing up to change the landscape of how we do business, take payments, collect activity data and engage our members using GymKit and opening up the bidirectional NFC reading capabilities, along with so much more.
On episode 047, we're exploring this pivotal subject in depth to uncover the real truth behind how club staff, front desk, trainers, and everyone that compliments a member's journey will now shortly be able to serve at a higher level, and save the member valuable time by using this bidirectional NFC for the creation of a truly "seamless experience" that so many in our industry have been asking for.
This iOS update points the needle of progress in the right direction and opens up a future where using the iPhone to gain access to a club and all of its amenities with a simple fingerprint touch through the mobile device, is a reality.
Apple's NFC functions coming to the Apple Watch with watchOS 4, and iOS 11 might also be handling much more than just Apple Pay transactions and Passbook check-ins.
With over 2700 fitness technology companies listed on Angel List, and with the pivotal new updates for iOS 11, how do we get closer to clarity in a fast-expanding space?
The answer to that question and much more takeaways for club owners, operators, and fitness pros in this episode with Steve Groves.
Steve Groves is the CIO & VP at Goodlife Fitness with over 20 years of success in bridging the logistical and communication gaps between business leaders and their technical teams in order to achieve results. Steve is a industry pro who specializes in collaborating with senior management and company boards to drive the strategic use of technology, both to support employees and to delight customers. Steve is an expert in uncovering "the art of the possible" in terms of using digital technology to personalize the customer experience. He is a creative thinker with an eye towards the technology trends on the horizon and has extensive experience in ICT service management, Internet strategy, digital media strategy, mobile application design, productivity consulting and management of high performance teams.
"I think for many of us, the holy grail of monitoring our health will be automatic tracking of what we ingest." - Steve Groves on the Fitness + Technology Podcast
"If I could take everything that I’ve learned over the past 5 years and apply it to one roll in our company, it would be personal training." - Steve Groves on the Fitness + Technology Podcast
What many of us in the technology space are trying to do is eliminate friction from various transactions that happen within our clubs." - Steve Groves on the Fitness + Technology Podcast
Experimentation comes with failure. For whatever reason, I don’t think the culture of our industry is able to tolerate that very well. I’m hoping we start to see more companies that are willing to experiment with different technologies. Even when they fully know certain tech won’t work properly or be adopted by their members." - Steve Groves on the Fitness + Technology Podcast
"We have to recognize when something isn’t working, and be willing to kill a failed project within 30-60 days at the most." - Steve Groves on the Fitness + Technology Podcast
Members look to us as fitness and wellness experts. We can’t only focus on the 2-3 hours a week they are using the facility. Organizations need to to think about the time their members spend outside of the gym." - Steve Groves on the Fitness + Technology Podcast