Why Working Smart From the Start Pays Off

Thinking and working smart from the start is the best way to set your small business up for long-term success. 

Is your business ready to launch?

Launching a business involves more than coming up with a great brand name. Successful businesses that look effortless have owners who spent time and effort getting things right from the start.

Mindbody has the power to integrate with other apps and software to help you get the most out of your business. To maximize your company’s success, here’s how to work smarter from the start.

Who’s your market?

Who do you want to attract to your business?

Say you run a new gym. Although your market might be ‘anyone who wants to get fit,’ it’s in your best interest to create a marketing profile for each of your target demographics.

For example, maybe you see a local opportunity to target new moms who want to get fit. Create a marketing profile for ‘post child-birth women’ and build a picture of this group. Give them a persona like ‘Emma, the new mom.’

Next time you want to attract more new moms through your marketing, remember Emma and you’ll be more likely to reach your target audience. 

If you are using cloud-based software to gather your data (for instance waiver or competition forms filled in on a tablet, additional demographic questions on client information forms, etc.), use your software’s reporting system to find out who your customers actually are. You’ll then better reach them going forward. 

Streamline your software

Would you rather photocopy receipts or scan them with an app? Have staff type up forms or use paperless software? The more you automate, the more time you’ll have.

A small expenditure on an admin-based cloud software will repay you many times over, in ways you might not consider. Saving $50 monthly by sticking to manual methods is a few hours of staff time. Will that cost-saving pay you back, or will it cost $500 in admin days to get staff to do the repetitive tasks you could have automated?

Consider the benefits:

• You will save staff time and money.
• Staff are freer to talk to customers and to upsell.
• Staff are happier and will stay longer.
• You will attract higher calibre staff. 
• Data protection is built in to good systems.

Great systems attract great staff

Put yourself in a job-seeker’s shoes.

You find two vacancies in two yoga studios and go for trials. The staff at Sam’s Studio are happy and driven. Sam shows you all the automated systems and the iPad for waiver submissions. Al’s Attic is different. Staff are stressed and clipboards and paperwork are everywhere. Good staff go to Sam’s.

Look at your staff and admin budgets and play out some scenarios.

Is it better to take phone bookings and save a few dollars on an online system? Better to ignore digital documentation but then wear great staff down with repetitive tasks?

Mindbody's app has incredible solutions for these challenges. Once you automate and digitize, you’ll wonder how you operated before.

Your plan of action

• Consider the big picture. In the excitement of starting up, it’s tempting to save money on tech, but this rarely saves time or money, long-term. Map out the cost of fitness software versus staff time to do the task to make better decisions.  
• Take advantage of free trials. Take free advice and trials to choose the right software for you. The more you digitize and automate, the more time you’ll have to nurture your business.
• Use the teams around you. You are not alone. When you choose new software through Mindbody, you’ll also meet the expert teams behind it. Take their advice. That, along with your own smarter choices, will see your business succeed from the start.