For Episode 052 we're joined by Simon Hall, Principal Consultant at Fitness Business Experts and the General Manager of MYPT App, to show us the strategies needed to leverage technology and social media for generating leads, creating an engaging community experience, and increasing customer retention.
Even in our fast-paced digital world, we still see a serious lag in the adoption of social strategies and new technologies with many of today's clubs and personal trainers. This failure to take advantage of social platforms and new advancements in the fitness space will cause many facilities to suffer as others begin to offer a more exciting and emotionally engaging experience.
Coming up, Simon breaks down the concept of creating a "Club-Within-A-Club." With the recent success of studio and boutique training centers, he shows how larger gyms can create a similar appeal within their existing facilities by transforming the experience around exercise classes. We talk about how many forward thinking club's now have specific ecosystems for their group training programs through using new technologies, upbeat music, and specialized branding.
These features add a custom feel for the members and fosters a community around these segments of the gym that provide their own unique atmosphere apart from the main facility.
We also talk about the shocking statistics of members who aren't aware their gyms are even on Facebook. Simon explains the importance of having someone to be the technology "Champion" in the club, who takes charge of social media interaction, and leads the digital front for customer retention.
It's one thing to have the technology, but implementing and bringing it to the consumer in a seamless way calls for someone who is tech-savvy, enjoys creating content and posting on social platforms, and has a true passion for building a trusted bridge between their customers and technology.
With the high level of competition and rising consumer expectations in our industry, how can clubs and fitness professionals take advantage of new technologies and social platforms to offer a unique experience, build an engaged community, and increase member retention?
The answer to that question and much more takeaways for club owners, operators, and fitness pros in this episode with Simon Hall.
From hotel health club receptionist to respected industry consultant, Simon has held key roles: General Manager of Fitness & Marketing for the New Zealand YMCA, Manager of the Australian & New Zealand Fitness Industry Survey, consultant to many leading independent and popular fitness club chains. He was also Chairman / board member of Fitness New Zealand.
As Principle Consultant at Fitness Business Experts, he assisted all types of fitness businesses and operations to manage their business, improving operational efficiency, setting and managing marketing strategy, membership sales processes and training and anything to improve their bottom line.
Simon is also the General Manager of MYPT App, a mobile app development company. MYPT has created a Personal Training management platform for trainers to manage all aspect of their business from lead generation to accounts tools and client management.
Along with his proven insights on fostering a deep connection between clubs and their members, Simon is also revolutionizing how personal trainers manage their business with MYPT App. This incredible lead generation tool is opening the door to hundreds of new potential clients for qualified fitness professionals in their local areas, as well as offering the payment and accounting systems that trouble so many small business owners.
"Owners and operators need to place a much higher focus on the two biggest challenges we still face in our industry, customer acquisition and retention." - Simon Hall on the Fitness + Technology Podcast
"Whether it's for social media or high-end features, clubs need someone to 'Champion' their technology, get people involved, and ensure a smooth integration with members." - Simon Hall on the Fitness + Technology Podcast
"Clubs who are taking their time to adopt new technologies need to quickly get on board. Consumer expectations are rapidly increasing and businesses who fail to implement new features and foster a community atmosphere though social media will be left behind." - Simon Hall on the Fitness + Technology Podcast
For Episode 51 we are joined by Garrett Marshall, Divisional CEO of Fitness On Demand, to discover how digital video programming is helping facilities enhance personalization, take advantage of underutilized space, and provide a greater variety of exercise formats to the consumer.
We're also exploring how to leverage the consumer fitness groundswell in our space. Fitness On Demand™ is a market-leading delivery platform of virtual fitness. Since 2010, their services have allowed facilities around the world to economically deliver premium fitness programs to their users. With programming and services designed to optimize space, streamline operations, and offer unparalleled variety, their services are a perfect addition to fitness facilities, apartment complexes, hotels, and more.
It's been shown that on average, functional training and studio rooms inside of clubs remain vacant 60-70% of the time. These new technologies are allowing facilities to capitalize on this space and provide a new digital experience to their members. Aside from the traditional gym setting, we also see this feature becoming a powerful amenity at resorts, hotels, and health facilities who want to provide their customers with an effective and engaging workout experience 24 hours a day.
With the groundswell of consumer health and fitness awareness on the rise, how can we leverage these cloud hosted technologies to take advantage of underutilized space, reduce operating costs, and provide members with unique and engaging workouts?
The answer to that question and much more takeaways for club owners, operators, and fitness pros in this episode with Garrett Marshall.
Garrett Marshall is the Divisional CEO of Fitness On Demand™, a market-leading developer of fitness delivery products for media and programming. Garrett combines a breadth of experience with an industry-specific, laser-focused, career path. Investing himself fully in each opportunity along the way, Garrett has been fortunate to play a role in several successful fitness businesses. His achievements span a variety of employment positions in small and large organizational settings.
In the past, he served as a consultant to the commercial division of Snap Fitness, the Chanhassen, Minnesota-based franchisor of compact, state-of-the-art, 24/7 fitness centers, and as the manager of business development for Fitness on Request, based in North Maple Grove, Minnesota, which also markets video-based group fitness workouts. His first foray into the industry was as a membership sales associate with Life Time Fitness, Inc., a chain of large, full-service clubs based in Chanhassen, Minnesota.
"In order to personalize your products and services, you have to intimately know the behaviors and preferences of the target consumer." - Garrett Marshall on the Fitness + Technology Podcast
"Data collection needs to be at the forefront for all aspects of how the member interacts with the facility." - Garrett Marshall on the Fitness + Technology Podcast
"As much as our product is designed to be an on-demand and self-service tool, it's a feature that really requires ongoing implementation; not just installation." - Garrett Marshall on the Fitness + Technology Podcast
As we fast-approach the one year anniversary next month for the fitness + technology podcast, today we're guided through some of 2017's most critical insights at the bleeding edge of trends and forecasts in our industry with the president of the Fitness Industry Technology Council, Bryan O'Rourke.
In this special 50th episode, we cover so much ground and discuss the pivotal fitness and wellness devices for the cloud so that our club operators, owners, and trainers can embrace the meaningful technologies and avoid falling behind the competition. We learn from Bryan about his take on the the way our 3 basic models in the commercial fitness space are being disrupted, how technology makes you the CEO of your own health, why more people die today from overeating than from famine, and the social and economic forces at play that have a direct impact on how all of us will do business in fitness in 2018 and beyond.
If you've been listening to the show for a while and have received value from one or many of our expert guests, simply leave us a five star review for the podcast. Your voice helps the show reach more leaders and savvy fitness-tech minded professionals like you find the show, and gives our industry what it needs most right now: the credible, trustable, and tactical information to thrive in this digital era.
Over the past 50 shows, we've made a big focus on simplifying a sometimes cumbersome job of finding the reliable and detailed information about the trends occurring in the industry so your business can make informed technology decisions, and in this powerful conversation, we also uncover with Bryan how the rising level of consumer expectation will impact the need for club owners and operators to both embrace and implement the key technologies that will make a difference.
With legacy technology systems in the United States driving risk aversion and slowing technology adoption in the fitness industry, what can we do as a fitness technology community to close the gap and serve more clients than ever before?
The answer to that question and much more takeaways for club owners, operators, and fitness pros in this episode with Bryan O'Rourke.
Bryan O'Rourke is an experienced CEO, strategist, investor and advisor who helps organizations and professionals realize their full potential and solve their biggest challenges.
With a track record of building teams and growing global brands, his network of associates and partners have served organizations large and small. His present focus is on fitness, wellness, health clubs, technology, innovation, finance, marketing and business development, but his expertise and consultancy extends to a number of disciplines and industries. As an executive and owner in multiple companies he is also President of the non-profit Fitness Industry Technology Council, driving innovation and collaboration the fitness space.
He is considered a leading expert on technology, consumer and business trends and his views have been published in periodicals like the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times, Inc. Magazine, CBI and many others. IHRSA named him one of 13 to watch in 2013. Bryan has contributed to two significant books on Innovation in the fitness sector. He delivers engaging customized keynotes and strategic working sessions and is a highly sought after speaker and facilitator who has delivered his message at industry conferences and organizational events on four continents.
"From a recent survey, two-thirds of businesses use digital marketing platforms, and one-third of those companies admit they don't know how to use it." - Bryan O'Rourke on the Fitness + Technology Podcast
"In today's modern world, fitness is evolving into the larger space of overall physical and mental betterment." - Bryan O'Rourke on the Fitness + Technology Podcast
"The greatest products and services of our fitness space have not been created yet." - Bryan O'Rourke on the Fitness + Technology Podcast
"Being proactive as the CEO of your own health is really important to both the quality of anyone's life in the long run and in the cost of maintaining your quality of life in a sustainable way. That dynamic is not going to go away, in fact it's going to become even more pronounced." - Bryan O'Rourke on the Fitness + Technology Podcast
We're exploring fitness devices, data, and ecosystems that matter with the CEO of Michael Wood Fitness and the CFO of Koko FitClub, Michael Wood. In this podcast, Michael uncovers what he believes is the recipe for success in merging the digital experience with in-person training.
Michael is widely recognized as one the nation’s top strength & conditioning experts. Through his leadership, Koko FitClub started as a integrated software company back in 2005. Not long after, they developed a strength training product with the goal of creating a unique turn-key coaching facility where the need for on-site trainers was to be obsolete. They saw moderate success with this new style of automated coaching, and soon realized that a critical component was missing:
Human connection.
When Koko FitClub realized their digital experience needed to be upleveled to provide their members with both the technology and human connection they were looking for, they innovated a unique way to blend their tech with traditional training and semi-private exercise classes. From these pivotal changes, the members had a one-of-a-kind experience of tracking, coaching, and programming that provided a new and exciting way of working out.
Listen in as Michael also speaks to technology and its role in taking a proactive and holistic approach to our wellness and shares the essential nutrition and mindfulness apps that support monitoring to make lasting changes in health behaviors.
This all-encompassing wellness approach that Koko delivers, inside and outside of the club, shows the true value of providing members with a unique blend of digital coaching, in-person training, and the online tools and resources to transform their nutrition and mindset.
But with the almost endless ocean of new technology, apps, devices, and platforms emerging in fitness and wellness, what are the integral parts of the optimal ecosystem in 2018?
The answer to that question and much more takeaways for club owners, operators, and fitness pros in this episode with Michael.
Michael Wood, CSCS, is widely recognized as one the nation’s top strength & conditioning experts. He serves as CEO of Michael Wood Fitness, formerly the Sports Performance Group, founded in 1988. The award-winning fitness-consulting company calls some of the biggest names in the athletic, academic, and entertainment industries their clients. The company has completed more than 35,000 training sessions to date under Michael’s guidance. Michael is also the Chief Fitness Officer at Koko FitClub, LLC, which develops interactive software and hardware for the $60B worldwide fitness and wellness industry. Koko FitClub is a national franchise with currently more than 100 locations throughout the United States and Canada.
Michael’s honors have included receiving the coveted Boston Magazine “Best of Boston” award and in both 2004 and 2005 Men’s Journal named Wood one of the top 100 trainers in the United States. In the December 2004 issue, the magazine also included Michael on their trainer “Dream Team,” comprised of the nine best trainers in the U.S. He is also a member of the Fitness Industry Technology Council and works with clients via the Wellness Roundtable. He is also a former member of Power Bar Team Elite. Michael has also raised money for two scholarship funds when he reached the summit of Africa’s highest peak, Mt. Kilimanjaro (19,340′), in 2008 with Thompson Safaris.
His professional experience includes director of business development and business director at two Velocity Sports Performance franchise locations, and director of strength and conditioning at New England Sports Academy. In addition, he had the great fortune of working as assistant strength and conditioning coach at the University of Connecticut and senior exercise physiologist at the Nutrition, Exercise Physiology and Sarcopenia Laboratory at the USDA-HNRC on Aging at Tufts University. Michael has also consulted for Sage Strategies, LLC, a premier management consulting firm specializing in the health and fitness, as their corporate fitness expert.
"In addition to our digital coaching, the in-person trainer is key for helping members learn our technology and get results in a safe, quick, and effective manner." - Michael Wood on the Fitness + Technology Podcast
"Once we were able to pair our digital experience with a good knowledgeable coach, Koko's success was taken to a new level." - Michael Wood on the Fitness + Technology Podcast
"The best exercise program in the world isn't going to change someone if you can't adjust their mindset and behavior." - Michael Wood on the Fitness + Technology Podcast