If a typical day managing your fitness business includes feeling overwhelmed by your overflowing inbox and missed calls, you're not alone. It's a common reality for business owners who manually manage customer communication.Â
Being available 24/7 may sound like a good thing, but it often means limiting connections with your customers. This can directly impact customer retention and your business growth.
Fortunately, automating your gym management software can quickly resolve this stressful process. Here's how you can use Zaps—Zapier's automated workflows—to improve and strengthen your communication with your members, resulting in a better customer experience.
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To get started with a Zap template—what we call our pre-made workflows—just click on the button. It only takes a few minutes to set up. You can read more about setting up Zaps here.
Why you should automate your gym software
If you're managing your communication all on your own, you're limiting the amount and quality of interactions you have with your members. Not to mention your admin time will only increase as your business grows.
By automatically sending your customer details and contact information to your preferred marketing channels, you can regularly connect with all of your members smoothly and seamlessly.
Setting up automated workflows drastically reduces your administrative tasks and helps you create better relationships with your customers. Your workflows can start when your members perform certain actions in your business, such as signing up for a class, purchasing a new membership, referring their friends, and so on.
With automation, you can skip:
Sending out mass or individual emails for repetitive tasks
Manual confirmations for memberships, payments, and registrations
Which means:
The right right people get the right information with less admin time and stress
Your members know about your services, schedule, new classes, updates, and more without any gaps
More time freed up to focus on building personal connections with your members
Here are the top ways fitness businesses automate their communication with their members.
Add new customers to your mailing list
Start engaging with new members the moment they sign up or purchase a new membership through your newsletter and email marketing. Your members want to hear from you, and sending out regularly scheduled newsletter communication ensures they do so without requiring you to manually send out mass emails.Â
It also helps you segment specific communication for your clients. Rather than adding new members to your email lists one by one, let automation do the job for you and get them on the correct lists.
Whether it's adding a new customer to a specific list when they first sign up or adding them to a different list when they purchase a new package or memberships, these Zaps will ensure your members are in their proper channels.
Subscribe new Trainerize clients to a Mailchimp mailing list
Add or update ActiveCampaign contact when customers are created in TeamUp
Send your customers an SMS
Email is a great way to stay connected with your customers outside of class, but not everyone keeps as close of an eye on their inbox as they do on their phone. This is where automated SMS updates come in handy.
Automated text messages help you communicate information to your members when they perform a routine action, such as signing up for your business, registering for a class, or purchasing a new membership. With a Zap, you can automate the messages your members receive and when they receive them. You'll save time by not manually sending out mass messages to keep your members informed, and you'll also be covered in case a member doesn't check their inbox often.
Send new Trainerize clients a text message from ClickSend with an account setup link
Send SMS to contacts using Clicksend when customer are created in TeamUp
Follow up with your membersÂ
Sometimes you don't have a chance to say goodbye to your members after a class or session. Or you might want to know what they thought about a service you provided. Follow-up emails are a great way to check in, see if they have any questions, and get their thoughts.Â
Follow-ups are invaluable, and automation helps you keep things personal and connect with your members at scale. A "thank you and see you next time" will always be appreciated by your members, even if that message is going out to multiple people at once. You can also make suggestions on other similar services to try.Â
With these Zaps, you can automate follow-up emails to customers who attended a specific class or session or used a certain service.
Add new subscribers to Kit when class attendee is checked off in TeamUp
Send an email in Gmail when a habit is completed in Trainerize
Send an email when a plan is finished on Exercise.com
Send a customer survey
Customer surveys are an excellent resource to gauge how your clients feel about your business and can help you collect customer feedback and recommendations from all of your members at once.Â
You can send one out after a customer has been with you for a certain length, after you launch a new service, or if you're considering adding a new service and want to know what your customers think. You can also send surveys to customers who cancel so you can better understand what led to their decision and if they'd consider returning in the future.Â
Using Zaps to send surveys to your members automatically will help you collect this intel faster and in an organized fashion.Â
Send SurveyMonkey surveys for newly cancelled TeamUp memberships
Send a SurveyMonkey survey when a product ends in Trainerize
Send a survey with SurveyMonkey when a new subscription is downgraded in Exercise.com
Celebrate your members when they achieve their goals
Celebrate all the wins with your members. When your members hit their goals (like their weight goal), achieved a milestone, or referred a new member, you can automate sending a note or gift to congratulate them on their accomplishment or to show your appreciation.
This gesture shows your members how important their successes are to you, and they'll love the personal touch you've added to make their achievements that much more special.Â
Use these Zaps to celebrate your members when they hit their goals.
Send an email with Gmail when a plan is finished in Exercise.com
Send a Printfection giveaway link in Gmail when a referral is created in TeamUp
Send a Printfection giveaway link in Gmail when a weight goal is hit in Trainerize
That's all there is to it! With a little automation, you can enhance your customer experience and improve communication with your members. All you have to do is turn is start building your Zaps.
New to Zapier? It's workflow automation software that lets you focus on what matters. Combine user interfaces, data tables, and logic with thousands of apps to build and automate anything you can imagine. Sign up for free to use this app, and thousands more, with Zapier.
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This was a guest post from Jessica Armstrong, Community and Partnership Manager at TeamUp. TeamUp offers gym management software for gyms, studios, and personal trainers, plus in-person, online, and on-demand services. Sign up for your 30-day free trial. Want to see your work on the Zapier blog? Check out our guidelines.