One of the things that multi-franchise owner Jana Rivers learned in the military was to ask “am I going to work harder or am I going to work smarter?” When she was imagining retirement from a career in law enforcement in California and got the “crazy notion” to open a studio, she faced a number of hurdles that caused her to recall that advice.

Know Your Strengths

While Jana had lot of experience in law enforcement, her background was not as a seller, or as a computer techie. But she did have a passion for fitness. From the beginning, knowing her strengths and location (she was in California while her new clubs were in Texas) she realized that to make the businesses work she’d have to tap into the strengths of others. That started with the first push for memberships. “I originally hired Aurora (now ClubReady Concierge Services) to do my pre-sale. And they did a good job,” she says. “They got us memberships.” At that point, with a new GM hired and onboard, she didn’t see the further need for ClubReady services and moved on.

Opening … and Adjusting

With new members signed up, the studio was off to great start. “We had new employees coming in. We had new prospects coming in. We had a grand opening and everything as well,” says Rivers. Then she lost her GM. “Things were really slow and my sales just basically flatlined,” she remembers. The one thing they did still have were tons and tons of prospects in the system – just not the resources to work them properly.

At about the same time, Rivers was talking to the owner of a CycleBar studio. They were having ClubReady work their old leads. “I called the ClubReady team and asked if they offered those services. They said yes – but Club Pilates doesn’t offer that yet,” says Rivers. That didn’t stop her. “I’m going to make an executive decision,” she recalls. “I’m going to do it.” So she did — and she’s more than pleased with the results. While she has increased sales, it’s also helped her business and staff grow in a collaborative approach.

Pushing the Accelerator

Right away, the ClubReady team started working any prospect older than 30 days. “They called our prospects, reconnected with them, booked them into intro classes. And once they were booked into intro classes, my sales staff took over and picked up where they left off. And we just killed the sale,” says Rivers excitedly. Within one month coming out of the grand opening they had sold 85 new memberships. “It was insane,” recalls Rivers. “I mean we were doing well before, but we just did phenomenal after we brought in ClubReady. There was no way we could have done that on our own.”

Collective Eyes, Ears, and Brains

One of the continued advantages she has seen long after the presale stage is the access to the ClubReady team’s experience. “My GM had big box gym experience but not boutique experience,” explains Jana. “The ClubReady team has general manager experience.” That, coupled with what the ClubReady team heard while calling prospects, has enabled Jana’s team to make market adjustments they wouldn’t have considered otherwise. From changing intro class times to talking points in the sales process they were able to overcome many objections and get prospects booked.

One of those suggestions was adding Sunday classes. “We are in Texas. We were not having classes on Sunday because we didn’t think anybody wanted to go.” Prospects were telling the ClubReady team otherwise. That was just one change that kickstarted the success spiral. “Now we’re not only booking intro classes, but we started selling private training. Not only did we start selling private training, but we also started being able to do grassroots events. There was no way we could have managed those prospects like that,” according to Jana. “There was no way we would’ve known how to look at the data — and we didn’t.”

That education has spanned both the market and how to leverage their ClubReady technology. For example, in one of her conversations with the ClubReady team, she mentioned that her team had sent literally more than 800 text messages in two days. There was no way they could keep up that pace and follow up properly. The ClubReady experts pointed out the mass texting features in the ClubReady system. That enabled the team to better utilize their system, staying better connected to members without neglecting other tasks in the gym or sacrificing their personal time.

The Right Tools for the Job

When asked if she would recommend ClubReady Concierge Services, Jana has a quick answer: “100%” she says. Her perspective calls back to the question, ‘are you going to work smarter or are you going to work harder?’ Part of working smarter means investing now to get a larger return later. “One of the things about me is I have no problem spending money if it’s going to make it easier for my staff, lighten their load, and pay off in the long run. There was no way my staff could have gone back and managed over 2000 prospects. With the help of ClubReady, we did. I think you have to realize that sometimes you may be able to do it, but if another person or entity can do it better you may need to utilize their expertise.” In her experience, tapping into the knowledge of ClubRead helped point her and her GM in the right direction. That in turn enabled them to point their staff in the right direction for long-term success and why they continued to use ClubReady Concierge Service well after their initial launch.

From Start-Up to Scale-Up

ClubReady is committed to helping fitness business owners everywhere achieve their dreams, whatever they are. With the leading integrated solution in the industry, paired with expert knowledge and services, ClubReady provides the foundation and tools businesses need to succeed. Learn more about ClubReady Concierge Services or hear other customer stories.

Customer Spotlight Stats

Name: Jana Rivers
Studio(s):

• • ClubPilates – Weatherford, TX
  • CycleBar –  North Fort Worth, TX

Solution: ClubReady Concierge Services
Post Launch Success: 2,000 + old leads worked, 85 New Members in 30 days

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“We were able to come out of that and we’ve started working on growing and getting the systems in place to make sure that we’re servicing the volume of members that we need to be profitable and sustainable.”
Rachel Hilton, Owner

Staying Alive

With business models built on class capacity, times were clearly tough. “There was a lot of just grin and bear it,” says Hilton. “There was nothing we could do, so we just had to figure out how to be creative about selling memberships. We tried to do as many in-person things as we could that were outside, like, ‘Hey, we’re going to pop up a table outside in a park, come meet us.’” Sometimes those efforts were successful. Other times not. But they kept soldiering on and came out the other side stronger. 

“We were able to come out of that and we’ve started working on growing and getting the systems in place to make sure that we’re servicing the volume of members that we need to be profitable and sustainable,” she says.  

Building Tech Connections

When you have one studio sometimes the choice of platforms can be almost inconsequential if it does what you need. But as you add more studios, standardizing on one solution becomes critical. That is also when additional functionality becomes important. That’s what Rachel found with their texting provider. “Originally, we were using our studio phones to text, which was fine, but it wasn’t integrated obviously into Club Ready. It was really hard to keep track of everything.” That’s when a program that’s built to scale such as ClubReady  and ClubReady Connect come into play. “I like the integration into ClubReady,” said Hilton. That saves time and provides clarity for the sales team because they can do everything in one platform – send it, call people, call the leads, do what they need to do and then move on to the next person within one platform. “I’m excited for that to be seamless and real-time,” says Hilton, “when a lead can come into the system, we’re already working it to call them and then we can go straight to texting them. That’ll be really nice.” 

Measuring and reporting are critical to successfully grow any business. You have to know where you are to know where you need to go. That’s where Hilton takes a very disciplined approach. “I like the reporting side of it,” she says. “I have goal sheets with each of our studios that we update daily based on reports we pull from ClubReady. We know how many memberships we’ve sold, our revenue per unit, how many first-time visits we have coming, all of those critical things. I compile all of those important reports into one interface for our team so they know exactly how they’re tracking for the month.” 

“I like the integration into ClubReady.”
Rachel Hilton, Owner 

Creating Connections

Because fitness studios are continuously working to balance new members with those that leave, communications are critical. That means having the right message at the right time. “I like that we can schedule text messages because we do that a lot,” says Hilton. “We schedule our messages for people who are new to the studio like, ‘Hey reminder you have this class coming up, here’s your waiver.’” 

Getting people into the habit of going to the studio in those first months after they sign up is critical. If they don’t build that habit, they are much more likely to churn. To overcome that, they’ve built in challenges for the first month to make sure that members utilize their classes. Through a combination of automated text messages, hand-written notes, and personal letters at different points in their fitness journey, they work to build strong lines of communication.  Add in the other methods of milestone recognition for member achievements – signed bars, decorated bikes and other swag – and they’re creating personal relationships and loyalty that lead to member fitness and business success.  

Grow Your Fitness Business

Having the right technology in place isn’t just critical for businesses to scale as quickly as Rachel has, it’s part of the reason they’re able to scale. Check out more examples of businesses using ClubReady to scale their operations or get a consultation to learn what it can do for your operations.  

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