Don’t Fear The Automation

The fitness industry has long been at the forefront of innovation, from new workout routines and streamed classes to advanced equipment. However, one area that has been slow to catch on is the use of automation technology. While many of you are excited by its potential, there is still hesitancy among some to implement it in your clubs. In this article, we explore why that is and how automation is the missing piece of the puzzle for fitness operators.

First things first. Are you a fitness operator looking to stay ahead of the curve by increasing lead conversion and keeping more of your hard-earned members? Have you considered the benefits of automation technology but are nervous to implement it in your club? Great, stick with me and I'll cover why automation is key to staying competitive in the ever-evolving fitness industry and not something to be feared.?

Gym operators have long been excited by the potential of AI

...specifically automation technology that will enhance their sales and marketing operations, yet despite the buzz around the topic and well publicised advantages, overhead-savings among them, many are slow to implement it in their clubs. And I say slow on purpose because this is a traction issue. Let’s be honest, there are plenty of clubs that jumped on the bus a long time ago and have been reaping the rewards ever since, it’s the fearful outliers holding up the show here.

One common reason for this is the fear of job losses. This fear, around AI in particular, is a tale as old as time. Well not quite, obviously it hasn’t been around that long, but let’s break it down.

There has always been a belief that rapid advancements in robotics and artificial intelligence will lead us to a future without jobs. This is compounded by the likes of Elon Musk, so sure in his conviction this jobless future is imminent, and because of people like MIT researchers Erik Brynjolfsson and Andrew McAfee who described automation as a ‘second machine age’ that will replace routine tasks such as bookkeeping, food preparation and manufacturing as well as a technological take-over of complex analytical jobs like legal and medical diagnostics.

Thanks to social media and growing media coverage it’s very easy to get swept up in the compelling hysteria, but truth be told there isn’t much evidence to support that job losses are happening as a result. When once we feared the reliability of automated flight control systems in aviation, their commonplace implementation certainly hasn’t reduced employment in that industry (no, we can thank Covid for that instead) but what it has done is lead to well documented improvements in safety and reduced costs. Short hop flights for less than a 4-course meal is testament to that.

Now, let’s bring it back to sales and marketing.

Automation won’t kill off those jobs. Evolve them? Yes. Optimize them for productivity and profitability? Yes! In fact, automating traditionally labor-intensive tasks in those fields will vastly improve your revenue-generating team’s efficacy by freeing them up to work on indispensable human interactions. They’ll have more time, energy and enthusiasm for providing better events, in-person customer service and more personalized experiences for your members. With the right technology at the helm what sales and marketing can achieve (and generate) will increase at the same time as improving member satisfaction. This all adds up to more revenue for your club.

Sounds easy, right? And it is.

There are countless ways to optimize your fitness club’s operations

...but the problem lies in the fact we insist on relying on humans to perform tasks that they are not proficient in. When we consider the tasks we perform, it involves a chain of activities that require manual labor, or at least very repetitive actions, strategy, creativity, communication, and empathy. While we excel at empathy, creativity, and communication, we tend to allocate most of our time on what we are least effective at – the repetitive, manual tasks. It’s a brain drain and a resource pit.

To illustrate this, I’m going to summarize an example we used in a recent Keepme.ai blog article. Let's take the example of monitoring club attendance and reaching out to members who don't regularly use the club in an effort to engage them into higher attendance. Typically executed via email campaign, it involves various manual steps, such as running a report for all members in the membership management system, filtering for members based on attendance, cleaning the report, uploading it to an email service, creating and uploading the content, then scheduling the email, and monitoring the results. I’m exhausted just writing that.

Now, be honest with yourself…how much of that process requires the exclusively human capability of applying empathy? Next to none.

In fact, the bulk of the work involves the least efficient, least effective, and most time-consuming processes possible, making it challenging to implement any new process, and very little time left in the day for the face-to-face human interactions. To quote the article directly, “there’s no economy of scale. At all. If I have one process that takes 4 hours and I create another similar process, I’m not spending 8 hours, and if I do another it takes 12, and so on and so on. It’s a losing battle.”

I am setting you a challenge right now.

Sit down and think of other sales and marketing processes in your club that do not require human empathy or genuine creativity. Now, ask yourself what you would automate if you could. Then, imagine what new activities you would assign to the teams responsible for the original process, with the hours you have released for them. What might your club achieve?

You can learn (and probably feel excited anew) from our examples and the ones you are about to think up. And you know what the best part is? That technology already exists and aside from the initial outlay to acquire it, you’re likely to make those overhead savings I mentioned at the very beginning of this article. In short, the long-term benefits far outweigh the initial costs and the way it could impact the runway of your club is nothing short of transformative.

In conclusion, automation technology is the missing link for health clubs, gyms, boutique studios, whatever you consider yourself to be. By embracing this technology, you can enjoy a transformative rate of profitability in this hugely competitive industry, but only if you’re brave enough to take your seat at the table.

Ready to take your seat at the table? Want to learn more about how Keepme is using AI, Machine Learning and Automation? Book your custom demo today.