There are now a plethora of options when choosing a platform to broadcast on-demand and live classes, from generic platforms like Zoom, facebook Live and YouTube to highly customised and fully integrated purpose built, fitness focused, platforms. How do you decide which option to choose?
Making the right choice now will create a robust, flexible product that will evolve and grow with your business. Here we look at key factors you should consider to help you choose the right platform for you, your fitness business and most importantly, your members.
CAN THE PLATFORM BE CUSTOMISED?
Creating a remote offer that perfectly reflects the look and feel of your physical brand is hugely important. Most members affiliate themselves to your club, gym or studio because they buy into your ethos. This needs to be carried through in your on demand and streamed services, creating a wraparound experience that oozes a sense of community and belonging. Whether your on-demand content is created by you or imported, the overall impression should be that it is bespoke to your offer and that members would not be able to access it should they decide to leave your community.
IS THE PLATFORM SET UP TO ACCEPT SEAMLESS BOOKINGS AND PAYMENTS?
Creating a quality on-demand and/or live stream experience is an opportunity to generate new revenue. Therefore, it is important that when you choose your platform you ensure that the payment functionality is slick and efficient. Providing the best content in the world will not make up for frustrations created by a clunky payment mechanic.
DOES THE PLATFORM DELIVER A PERSONAL EXPERIENCE?
In today’s world where Netflix and Amazon set the standard in the delivery of a highly personalised experience, people expect their fitness experience to follow suit.
Any on-demand and/or live streamed platform must have the intelligence to be able to present content based on the individual users likes and preferences. Functions like class previews or sneak peaks and content filtration based on factors like mood, duration, instructor, ability or equipment required all help to create a totally bespoke experience that makes the user feel the service exactly matches their needs.
SHOULD THE PLATFORM BE WEB OR APP BASED?
Great question and the answer depends on the type of content and the format you want it delivered in. For example if you are going to create content in a tabata time based format that users could take with them into the gym or do outside, then a mobile app works very well. If you are delivering pre-filmed classes and users will only ever view these on a laptop, then a web interface may suffice. In an ideal world, users will be able to have access to both of these options.
DOES THE PLATFORM UTILISE DATA TO HELP YOU GROW YOUR REVENUES?
Collecting intelligence regarding how users are accessing and engaging with your platform will help to refine the product to ensure you keep providing a service in line with market needs. Choosing a platform that enables the automated creation of customised data dashboards will not only help you gain a deeper understanding of how your business is performing, it will also remove hours of manual data analysis from your diary, freeing you up to spend time elsewhere – either in or out of the business.
CONCLUSION
The time when a digital offer was viewed as a nice-to-have, bolt-on service is long gone. Consumers baseline expectation is now that they will be able to access quality on-demand and live streamed content as part of their wraparound fitness and wellbeing experience. As a result, fitness facility operators need to ensure they invest adequate time and resource into selecting the platform that best suit their needs and the needs of their members, taking into consideration the factors above.
Fisikal provides fitness operators around the world with on-demand and live stream hosting options. Whatever the budget, whatever the need, we probably have a solution to suit.
Our advice, before you make your decision, get in touch and we will talk you through how we can help.
