How many of you have a technology engagement plan for your club to support your gym members? How many of you understanding what technology choices you should be considering for your club? Jeffrey Cooper, Senior Manager, Business Development for Samsung may have the answers you need.
Mr. Cooper’s Level I approach is a first step that is designed to help clubs “start simple” and addresses a number of challenges clubs face today, including:
- Check-in is manual
- Members have limited or no interaction with their club when they check-in
- Clubs have no data on their members once they check-in
- Once checked in, members are on their own and the club has scattered information on usage statistics
- Member experience is isolated
“I recommend club start simple. Nearly everyone has a smartphone which is a logical starting point. Then it’s about adding a simple contextual element to unlock a number of opportunities to more richly interact with your members regardless of phone type,” noted Mr. Cooper who explained that context is about combing who, what, where, and when together to allow a more personalized experience. recommended in his Club Industry CEO Summit presentation that club
The goal is to create context-enabled applications.
Mr. Cooper recommends starting with a club’s mobile app and then adding a small contextual element to your mobile app plus a beacon near the entrance of a club to facilitate personalization and create operational efficiencies and in doing so.
What are beacons? Beacons are small inexpensive emitters used indoors. IBeaconInsider has a comprehensive article on beacons but for now, think of beacons as a way to identify the presence of your members and the ability to syndicate your members’ presence at your club and when they are no longer present at your facility to your club management software.
What’s the benefit of beacons?
Frictionless check-in is just the start. Mr. Cooper’s Level I club with a phone app component, beacon and cloud connectivity gives the club the power to run instant promotions too. Imagine during check-in, a pop-up notice on the member’s phone let’s them know a group fitness class is about to start or alerts a member to new equipment offerings. Beacons can also be incorporated into personal training with notification messaging triggered by the member’s arrival at the club. In addition, connecting to on-device health databases and cloud sources allows the trainer to see a member’s external exercise activities.
Mr. Cooper is a Senior Business Development Manager at Samsung. He has worked in the mobile space for nearly 20 years and is focused on fitness and health, especially in the area of wearables, sensors, and IoT. Before there were tracking apps, Jeff was quantifying his workouts and diet using Excel spreadsheets and a Garmin Forerunner. Today’s world is a dream world of machines, apps and devices that track anything you want. But they don’t all work together. Jeff now spends his time working with the industry to bring the data together and help users have a more cohesive picture of their health.
