Slowing down to grow; how placing greater value on time can help personal balance whilst driving business efficiencies.
Pre-covid ‘hustle’ culture was at an all time high where late night and caffeine-fueled mornings with work were often prioritised over social events, family and our own mental and physical wellbeing. Not only was this accepted, it was often celebrated.
Post covid we’ve seen a cultural shift, with a growing promotion that work/life balance is not only important but sacrosanct. This topic has been captured in over 260,000 related posts on TikTok and recent resistance to the removal of work from home or hybrid working options at large corporations also reflects this new normal.
What does slow living mean?
The concept of slow living is where you decide to live a more balanced, meaningful life through slowing things down and appreciating both the world around you and what you have. Whether that is having a slower morning to ease you into the working day rather than getting up, downing a coffee and running out the door or restructuring your business to allow for more time to be present. The balance is not just around what you spend your time on, but also how, with the idea that if you’re more present at work or at home, you’ll ultimately be more productive too.
So why am I writing about this?
Well, this evolved understanding of time’s value, makes investing in solutions and processes that save it all the more valuable. A little upfront work can create huge time savings over weeks, months and years. Automating as much as you can in your business can not only free up precious time in your day, but also in your mind, allowing you to focus on what really matters to you.
Saving time through automation is at the heart of what we do at Gymcatch, and there’s some very specific ways we can help:
Receive bookings anywhere, anytime
Removing the admin from receiving bookings is the first port of call for automating your business. Empower your customers to book their own sessions on Gymcatch without needing to contact you allowing them to instantly receive confirmation that their space has been reserved no matter what time of day it is or what you’re doing.
Payment on booking
Do you ever feel like you’re constantly sending out invoices and chasing payments? Receiving payment on booking avoids the need to keep logging into your accounting software, manually sending out invoices and having that awkward conversation when a customer is late paying.
Simply create a Stripe account, connect it to your Gymcatch account and start receiving payment on booking – It’s that easy to start securing revenue, reducing no shows since customers have paid in advance and reducing admin time!
Collect customer information on first booking
We’ve all been there, manually sending out waivers or questionnaires, waiting for customers to complete them and then having piles of paperwork to store. With Gymcatch, you can enable our Participation information bolt-on feature so that customers are asked to complete all the necessary forms before they are able to book and pay for their first class with you.
No more chasing customers to complete their forms and no more drowning in paperwork – Win win!
Automated waitlists
No more back and forth confirming if someone’s on or off a waitlist. Our automated waitlists feature is not only included within our base plan, but also allows you to keep your sessions fully booked without the need to lift a finger.
If a customer cancels their space on a fully booked session, those customers who are on the waitlist will automatically be notified via email that a space has become available and then it’s first come first serve as to who books and pays for this space first.
Auto-refund
You can save hours each week by having a well-defined cancellation policy that your clients understand and have agreed to so that you can avoid last minute cancellations, refunds or reschedules.
Automating refund credits with Gymcatch’s Auto-refund bolt-on feature is also a great way to allow clients to reschedule their sessions if cancelled in line with your cancellation policy and keep the money in the business without you ever having to get involved. Reducing those awkward conversations, reducing admin and reducing stress.
If you’re wanting to adopt a slower approach to life as a fitness professional without sacrificing your business’ success, then introducing a booking and management software to automate as many processes as you can is a decision you’ve probably been toying with. Let us help you make an informed decision, book a call with us here or register your Gymcatch business account today!