Your average gym is often an all-in-one health facility consisting of workout equipment, fitness classes, personal training, physical therapy, massages, and even snack bars along with retail. The gym owner must also handle membership sales, publicity and marketing, billing and collections, and maintenance on top of these other service offerings. It is no wonder, then, that many gym managers and owners are looking to outsource various components of their gym operations to reliable third party vendors, including membership billing software, PT experts, and restaurant managers.
How Many Hats Do You Wear?
The initial idea of selling off portions of your business’s revenue streams may cause some owners to balk at bringing in outside vendors. You have put a lot of time, energy, and money into your facility. You found the perfect location. You acquired the latest state-of-the art equipment and staffed your gym with accredited professionals. You promoted your new gym throughout the community and made many sales calls to bring in new memberships.
You can most likely identify a few areas where your efforts and skill sets are lacking. You would like to add a PT service room; however, you don’t have the advanced degree. You would like to streamline your membership billing; however, you don’t have the time to devote to the process. You would like to add a snack and juice bar; however, you don’t have the experience or time to get one up and running. Do you see how the list can go on and on?
Vendors can take over services that you may be too busy to handle. They can even assist in adding new ones you haven’t had time to get off the ground. You also raise the profile of your facility by having experts on staff, which enhance the membership experience.
Make Billing Easy with Membership Billing Software
A common department that facility managers and owners outsource is their billing and collections. Fitness facilities can have a lot of complicated billing to deal with on a daily basis. Whether it is new memberships, guest passes, personal training fees, or Pilates sessions, billing can cause headaches for gym owners, managers, and staff. New membership billing software allows you to outsource your back office staff and collections to handle the complicated numbers and percentages associated with gym billing. You need to be cautious when selecting this third party vendor because they will be interacting with your members on a more personal matter – money. Membership billing software will deal with the numbers; however, you will still need to deal with your members.
You need to consider the short- and long-term effects of outsourcing various services at your gym. Talk with your managers, staff, and members to get feedback. Your members can identify services that are lacking or new benefits they’d like to see added. Your staff can inform you about problem areas in the daily operations of the gym.
