Digital transformation for a member-centric experience

As we move to a future where technology is increasingly facilitating day-to-day life, it brings to question how this will continue to grow the leisure industry. More and more leisure centres are moving away from a traditional business structure with sales teams with paper forms, cash at the facility, and several staff sitting at the reception desk waiting for calls and to check visiting members in.

So with the industry changing, how can technology help transform leisure businesses in a way that continues to enhance the member experience and put them at the centre?

Propel acquisition

Technology has the power to reach and connect with potential members long before your team members can. Through digital marketing and channels, you can hand potential members the opportunities and tools they need to discover your brand.

Think of where a prospect might start their discovery journey – they could be searching on Google (or TikTok for Gen Zer’s), they could be referred by a friend, scrolling on their socials and come across targeted ads, and so much more. Now their journey might not be linear – in fact, they may visit your website, scroll your socials, find influencers who have shared opinion videos, go back to your website.

Through technology, you can track them (to an extent) and help facilitate their conversion. As soon as they visit your website, you then have an idea through Analytics and tracking tools what this person is interested in and continue to market to them through retargeting.
Once they’re ready to convert, they have the power to self-serve by creating an account via your online portal and booking in a tour and free trial with you.

Technology helps you connect the web of tiny touchpoints together in a way that a sales-person hasn’t traditionally been able to do.

Empower the experience

Once your prospect member has been acquired and arrives for their tour of your centre and start a free trial, technology can facilitate what is still a human-centric experience.

Ideally, a leisure centre could operate with a concierge style experience where when the member arrives, they aren’t greeted by a receptionist at a desk. Instead, they’re greeted by one of your sales team who can sit with them in a lounge area creating a more comfortable and personalised experience to get to understand the member, their motives and goals.

The sales-person can drive the conversation recording all notes they need via a tablet, and later link any relevant notes to the prospects online account.

When the prospect is ready to convert to a paying member after their free trial, they can manage their membership and payments all via their online profile. Your centre can operate as an entirely cashless facility. If your members want to purchase drinks or merch in your centre, all payments can be deducted from their card on file for a cashless checkout experience.

Encourage retention

Once your prospect has converted to a paying member, there’s so much technology can do to help encourage their retention. There’s two areas of focus – the post-attendance follow-up, and in-between courses and seasons follow-up.

For post-attendance, technology can help you collect feedback, share information on things like recovery, workout ideas for upcoming visits, nutrition tips and more. Overall, keeping touch and providing value-add knowledge to your members experience is going to help retain them. Likewise, keeping track of their interactions, like class attendance frequency, will help alert you to changes that might indicate they’re about to cancel their membership.

For the in-between courses and seasons timeframes, for example a netball comp that only runs in the winter time, you can keep in touch with your members so that you’re top of mind when it comes to resigning for the next season. Through digital channels, like email, SMS, and push notifications, you can continue to engage with your member to ensure you retain them long into the future.

Technology cannot replace human experiences and connections, however it can transform the way we conduct business, make our day-to-day more efficient, and enhance the human-centric experience that people visit leisure centres for.