Tech Tool Recommendations for Fitness and Yoga Studios
As a web designer and marketing strategist for the fitness and wellness industry, I have calls with studio owners every single day. Some are long-term clients, some I’m consulting with on a specific project, and others are just prospects chatting about their next best marketing steps. One topic that times up time and time again is:
“what tech tools should I be using?”
And, it’s a great question! The MINDBODY marketplace is a busy place and that one resource represents just a small portion of the diverse marketing tools available for small businesses. It can be incredibly overwhelming to wade through all of these tools to determine which ones are worth your investment.
The truth is, there’s no one-size-fits-all solution or ‘right’ answer to this question. Your goal as a studio owner is to find the right mix of tools that meet your objectives, budget, and business needs. But below, I’ve compiled a list of tools that I believe offer real value for studios in terms of their ROI (return on investment) and should at least be considered. These are tools that I’ve either used personally and love or have clients who swear by them.
Read on for my top tech tool recommendations for fitness and yoga studios.
1. Best schedulers for boutique fitness studios
A great scheduling software is the foundation of any successful and profitable studio business. Mindbody is the industry leader in scheduling software — it’s by far the most widely-used class-based software on the market and is hard to beat in terms of what it can do. Mindbody makes it easy to manage your team and payroll, offers responsive widgets to allow for booking and purchases right on your website and tracks key business analytics to help you quickly make smart business decisions.
Another thing I respect about Mindbody is the amount of resources they put into education—they truly want their clients to succeed. There’s an entire online resource library full of free trainings on business basics, pricing best practices, marketing and more, as well as live events like Mindbody University (where you can often find me teaching!)
Interested in getting started with MINDBODY? Use this link to book your free demo call and once you become a paid customer, you’ll get a free 1-hour strategy call with me! (yes, that’s an affiliate link. I get a kickback when you sign up via that link—which is why I’m offering the free call.)
Mindbody alternatives:
While the majority of my clients do use Mindbody, there are some other great scheduling tools to consider.
Mariana Tek* is popular with class-based studios such as indoor cycling, rowing and treadmill studios. It has a ‘pick your spot" feature so your clients can choose their equipment when they book, a handy mobile app, website widgets and auto email functionality. Check out this website I designed for chromacore to see this seamless Squarespace and Mariana Tek integration in action.
Walla* is another great option. If you offer livestream or video classes, this is one to look at. Walla was designed from the ground up with these features integrated. It’s a really nice, modern interface as well and they are very responsive to feature requests from their clients. Check out this website for The River Yoga to see Walla integrated on a Squarespace website.
*affiliate links
2. Best website platform for fitness and yoga studios
“What tool should I use to build my website?
This is often one of the first decisions studio owners make when starting up their business: It’s also one of the most important decisions, because with the right functionality your website can become an absolute powerhouse for marketing, conversion and retention. The good news is, even if you’ve chosen a website builder that limits your potential, it’s never too late to switch.
Currently, the two most popular website building tools on the market are Wordpress and Squarespace. While Wordpress is an excellent choice for many businesses, I personally believe Squarespace is the best for studio owners. Here’s why:
Wordpress is a self-hosted platform. Meaning, YOU (or someone you hire or employ) are responsible for everything. Big problems can happen when you aren't even aware of all the things you should know and do OR don't have the time or resources to spend on it.
Meanwhile, a Squarespace website is hosted by a business (with offices in NYC and real employees) whose job it is to take care of a lot of these things that can get you into trouble—like security concerns and updating software. Squarespace websites are also beautiful and easily customizable (they have an easy drag-and-drop interface) have great mobile functionality right out of the box and integrate well with tools like Mindbody. You can learn more about Mindbody integration with Squarespace here.
Squarespace usually also works out to be much cheaper than Wordpress. Yes, the basic Wordpress software is free, but having a Wordpress site is anything but free. Add up a hosting plan, plug-ins, a theme, back-ups, and it’s almost guaranteed you’ll be paying way more than you would with the flat-rate Squarespace subscription. Your Squarespace website costs between $18-$26 per month depending on if you pay monthly or annually (you’ll want the Business plan to integrate your scheduling software.) This includes hosting, site security, templates, customer support, eCommerce functionality and the user interface. The only other expenses to consider are approximately $13 per year for a custom domain name (ie. www.yourstudio.com) and the studio scheduling software you choose to use.
3. Email Marketing Platform
In a time when the social media world is so oversaturated, email marketing is still vital for building trust, connection and loyalty with your studio clients. It allows you to nurture them through your sales process, follow up when you haven’t seen them in a while and keep them updated with any studio news and promotions.
When it comes to email marketing for Mindbody-powered studios, there are two platforms that make my list. Both have great integrations with Mindbody—which allow you to send highly personalized emails to you clients exactly when it makes sense.
Brandbot has the deepest integration with Mindbody of any email platform on the market right now. You have nearly endless options on how to segment your audience based on their purchases and participation at your studio so you can create exactly the automated messages you want. If you’re looking for the most robust email marketing platform available for Mindbody-powered businesses, Brandbot is for you.
NamasteLight is a less costly alternative, and starting at just $20 per month it’s the most affordable way to get an email platform that’s powerfully integrated with Mindbody. With NamasteLight you have access to 40+ data points that sync over from Mindbody nightly, which is more than enough to send smart, targeted, automated emails. If you’re thinking it may be time to upgrade from your old Constant Contact account but don’t want to add a new expense, this is the email platform for you.
Want to give NamasteLight a try?
Sign-up for a 14-day free trial account here
and when you go to upgrade to a paid account enter “Pixality” in the “how did you hear about us” section and you’ll get another month FREE! (this one’s also not an affiliate link. I just like the platform so I asked if they’d give you guys a little perk!
4. Texting Tool
I know that in marketing, texting can be a touchy subject. It’s definitely effective (the data doesn’t lie: people DO open texts!) but it's also a more personal means of communication and most people have strong boundaries in place around it. In many ways, texting has replaced actual client support phone calls—a shift that both business owners and clients seem to be on board with. But although texts are a happy spot for support, in my book, it is NOT a replacement for marketing campaigns. Let me explain...
As a business, texting needs to be done with care. Abuse the texting consent relationship with clients and you'll quickly lose that privilege — or worse yet, turn them off from your business altogether! Texting should be conversational... it's a 2-way (not automated) form of communication, so choose your texting tool appropriately.
Personally, I really like Zipwhip for texting, especially for MINDBODY-powered studios. They get what texting should be and what it shouldn't be. They integrate with MINDBODY and automatically keep texting notes in your contact log for each client. They also have a nice click-to-text widget for your website, and can be used in some pretty smart ways for your next Facebook ad campaign. You can learn more about what they do in their excellent free guide for studios.
Of course, a tool is only as good as its master, and it’s important to refine your approach. Here are my top 3 rules of texting etiquette for small businesses:
Texts should be short, relevant and personal
Do NOT send mass or automated marketing texts
You should be immediately available to respond to a text you sent. Never text and run!
5. Retention Management Tool
Most studio owners know that customer retention is crucial for growing their studio business. But, let’s be honest, keeping track of all your clients would be a full-time job in itself! A retention management tool can do a lot of that hard work for you — reminding you when it’s time to follow up and automating outreach for you while still adding a personalized touch.
My retention management tool of choice is FitGrid. It has powerful capabilities for improving the relationships and communication in your studio across the board—between the studio and clients, between clients and instructors and between the studio and instructors. It allows you to get valuable feedback on instructors from clients, so you can identify opportunities for mentorship and growth. It also helps you keep track of at-risk clients and determines when and how to follow up to re-engage them. All of this adds up to an improved sense of community in your studio, better retention rates and increased membership revenue.
Curious about FitGrid?
Snag a 30 day free trial + 15% off services with FitGrid by using the form on this page to schedule your free demo. (affiliate link)
6. Virtual Studio Platforms
COVID-19 generated a lot of urgency and interest around taking your in-studio classes on-line. While short-term strategies can be done with your regular booking software + live streaming classes (see my how-to on that here), if you want to build an online component for your studio for the long-term, there are a couple platforms I recommend:
Memberspace is a lightweight alternative that allows you to add unique login capabilities over the top of select pages on your existing website. It works with Squarespace, Wix, Wordpress and more. (affiliate link)
Uscreen is my pick for a next-level video-on-demand platform. As a customer in a few uscreen membership areas, I personally love how easy it is to use + the app is great too. Their customer support is top-notch as well.
Take a look at Teachable or Podia if your brand has a strong educational element and you want more traditional course-like features - with an easy set-up on a trusted platform.
For a full breakdown of my Video Platform recommendations, check out this post.
7. Miscellaneous Favorites
Here are some bonus tools that I find are incredibly helpful for running any kind of business:
Todoist app. This is the only productivity tool I've used personally for years. Its superpower is its simplicity. It syncs between my phone and desktop and lets me keep a flexible to-do list and focused on appointments and top priority tasks. It happens to be free, too!
Canva. From social media graphics to banners for your Facebook page, you need branded visuals for your business. Canva is a great, free (or very low-cost) tool for making assets that look polished and professional. Get started and give your facebook account a makeover with these great templates.
Animoto. There’s no denying video is hot right now, but professional video can be expensive. If you're regularly posting on social media or creating content for your studio (and, you should be!) Animoto can help you turn phone-shot video clips into something branded and impressive. I grabbed an Animoto subscription during their Black Friday sale and have been having fun playing around with it.
Now it’s your turn! What software, tech tools or apps do you love? What makes your life easier and your business run smoothly. Let me know in the comments, I’d love to hear your picks.