What is fitness reporting and why do you need it?

The basic principles of sales, marketing, and operations apply to most businesses. Whether you’re running a niche boutique gym or multi-location fitness franchise, leveraging fitness reporting and data analytics are essential to growth and success. Understanding the thinking and behavior of your customers allows you to make decisions that can have a greater impact. 

Making smart data-driven decisions is key to putting your time, energy, and resources into the most effective strategy for a greater return. Through fitness reporting, you can identify patterns and even predict problems before they arise. Although you can collect numbers from a range of sources, it’s about how you interpret those numbers that count. That’s where fitness reporting comes in; it helps you to make sense of data points. 

In this article, we try to better understand fitness reporting, what numbers you need to track, and why it’s important. 

Skip ahead to:

• What is fitness reporting? 
• How does technology impact the fitness industry?
• 7 most important numbers in fitness reporting 
• 6 reasons your business needs fitness reporting 

What is fitness reporting?  

Fitness reports are basically a culmination of data that provide you with insights to make better decisions and optimize your business. You can collect and gather a lot of data. Your website, social media channels, point of sales, payments, and memberships all produce data. But you need to be able to communicate that data. Reports deliver data-driven insights into member spending and behaviors as well as predict future business performance. 

Reports take all the data you have and consolidate it into one place so that it makes sense. From these reports, you can make business decisions that can have a greater impact on your customer experience, sales funnel, marketing, and more. Fitness data can empower your business and allow you to make data-driven decisions that have a greater financial reward. 

How does technology impact the fitness industry?

Technology is transforming the fitness industry. Like a lot of industries, technology drives change. It disrupts the way we work and live. Thanks to increasing innovation in fitness technology, companies are inundated with data that can help them understand their members. 

Wearables, smart technology, fitness bands, and mobile apps provide a ton of data that businesses can utilize. Alongside your fitness management software, you have a lot of data at your fingertips. Let’s take a look at how technology is impacting the fitness industry and the opportunities it could uncover. 

Data analytics 

Advanced fitness analytics solutions have allowed fitness businesses to transform entirely by providing valuable data sets. You can now handle and interpret enormous amounts of customer data. Data analytics leverages social media, wearables, fitness equipment, customer feedback, payments, and more. Data science allows for personalized fitness training programs, more reliable decision-making, and provides more effective member results. 

Machine-learning and AI 

More fitness businesses are using machine learning and AI to provide personalized cardio workouts, and nutrition plans to build muscle and physical fitness. On top of using data analytics and machine learning to improve the overall customer experience and provide increasingly personalized recommendations, it also has a role to play in marketing and sales. Chatbots and digital marketing can benefit from machine learning by identifying potential leads and optimizing communication channels.

Smart technology and devices 

The global fitness tracker wearables market is predicted to reach USD 105110 Million by 2027. While smartwatches and fitness trackers like Apple, Fitbit, and Samsung are commonplace, smart clothing and other innovative devices could continue to change the way members work out and experience health benefits. Following the pandemic, it’s clear that more people are taking an interest in their own health. 

Technology has a role to play in fitness, on both the consumer side and the way wellness companies operate. Fitness solutions and businesses that don’t leverage data will fall behind as they will struggle to gain a competitive edge in a crowded marketplace. 

For expert insight, listen to Bryan O’Rourke talk about how technology is shaping the future of the fitness industry in an episode on The Fitness Founders Podcast. Bryan is the President of the Fitness Industry Technology Council and discusses the growing influence of technology in the fitness industry and what businesses need to do to stay competitive. 

7 most important numbers in fitness reporting 

So, what numbers are important in fitness reporting? Well, the best way to explain this is to break down your fitness reporting into sections. When you access your fitness reports, it tends to be with a particular purpose in mind. To give you an idea of the most important numbers in your business, here are seven of the most critical fitness reports you can run to gain access to the right insights. 

1. Invoices and payments

The invoices and payments report allows you to have a quick glance at your payment activity. You can track and monitor payments and find out everything you need to know about your member activity. An invoices report also allows you to stay on top of your finances without having to dive deep into spreadsheet after spreadsheet. When you can consolidate detailed information into one place, you can effectively view and interpret data. 

2. Class and gym attendance

Nowadays, there’s a huge focus on fitness classes and group-based activities. The rise of SoulCycle, Barry’s Bootcamp, and CycleBar mean that many businesses are looking to capitalize on the popularity of group training. Tracking class and gym attendance allow you to find out who attends, how often they go, how many members don’t show up, and the number of people on the waitlist. From this information, you could optimize your timetable for better attendance, gain insights into your most popular classes, and improve your communication to better fill your classes. 

3. Memberships 

For businesses that offer multiple types of memberships, it’s important that you can view all the data you need. For example, fitness reports that break down membership type, customer, payments, and more, are valuable in determining which membership plan is the most popular. In today’s fitness world, it’s normal to have a combination of membership plans, digital options, and drop-in class packages. You still want to be able to track all this information so you know where to put your time and energy. 

4. Referrals 

A referral program is a great way to turn your members into brand cheerleaders and organically target your ideal customer. Your gym referral program offers an incentive to both the referrer and the referee. This idea is that you encourage your members to recommend your brand by offering a reward. When running a referral program, it’s a good idea to create a referral report. Through this, you can view the progress of your referral program, see which customers have referred someone, and track the success of the program. 

5. Total revenue 

Although you can look into invoices and payments, the total revenue reporting template is a useful number to track for a clear overview of the business. One of the most essential reports you can view is your total revenue. You can run revenue reports daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly. It helps to show you what’s bringing in the most revenue, what is falling short, and if you are on track to hit your targets. The total revenue report may not be the most exciting one, but it’s a valuable tool for accessing information quickly that allows you to identify opportunities. 

6. New members 

By tracking new members and sign-ups, you can compare your numbers and try to identify opportunities to reduce member churn. For instance, if you notice that new member sign-ups are down from last year, you can start to analyze where you have made changes and if you need to evaluate your strategy. These insights can help you find out where you’re performing well and where you need to intervene and optimize the member journey. 

7. Inactive members 

Sometimes people sign up for a gym or join a class and then never show up. Or, they start off feeling motivated and going to the gym a few times a week, before showing up less and less. The key purpose of analyzing your inactive members is to catch those members who are not using your services. Remind your members of your brand and drive value with a complimentary workout, nutrition plan, or personal trainer session. This report can help to improve member retention and reduce the chances of members leaving you in the first place. 

6 reasons your business needs fitness reporting 

After collecting and understanding data, the final step is reporting. When you report data, you can effectively communicate it to your team. Gym management software allows you to gather data and strengthen your data analytics strategy so that you can make sense of all the data you collect. Here are six reasons why your business needs fitness reporting. 

1. Boost sales and marketing performance 

A data game plan is essential for making the most out of your data and fitness reports. When it comes to the world of sales and digital marketing, data is your friend. It allows you to target your ideal customer more effectively and provoke action at the right time. Marketing is all about delivering the right message to the right person at the right time. The more you understand your ideal customer, the better you can market your business. Fitness reporting allows your salespeople to make real-time data-driven decisions to empower your staff.  

2. Increase member retention 

Your member retention rate is a huge part of your success. As a membership-based industry, member churn can be a big issue for business owners. By collecting customer data, you can begin to predict member churn and retention rates for both individuals and specific groups. In addition, you can harness the power of data to improve and optimize areas of the business that increase member retention. For instance, a data-driven communication strategy engages your members at the best time to improve the overall experience. In turn, this can help to solidify your brand in members’ minds and increase retention.

3. Improve decision-making 

By using facts, metrics, and data to guide your business and strategic decisions, you base your choices on actual data rather than just intuition and observation. Data-driven companies are 58% more likely to beat revenue goals than those not focused on data. Companies that are data-driven are also 23 times more likely to acquire customers than their peers. Data analytics and reporting are crucial parts of digital transformation. Tracking numbers and monitoring data can help you to lower acquisition costs, boost revenue, and improve the overall customer experience. 

4. Gain a competitive edge 

Information for business data allows you to create reports that give you unique insight into your business and customers. With better consumer insights, productivity, and sales insight, it gives your business a competitive edge. Although most business leaders know about the power of data, they are not all harnessing that power. Because there is so much data, it can be difficult to utilize it in a way that brings about positive change. With gym management software and data analytics, you can gain insights that give you a competitive edge.  

5. Create an exceptional member experience 

The proper application of data analytics is key to identifying real problems, providing solutions, and creating an exceptional member experience. Fitness analytics can help your business by giving you insights into your members so that you can implement strategies to improve the member experience. By collecting data and using fitness reports, you can decrease member attrition through a unique member experience that’s built around a complete understanding of your customers.  

6. Navigate your vision 

When starting a fitness business or gym, you have a vision. This could be financial goals and where you see the business in five years’ time. Maybe you want to be the go-to brand for Pilates or create a multi-location fitness franchise. Either way, data can validate your ideas and help you navigate your vision. Execute your strategies and implement activities that support your goals and vision, based on actual data. 

In summary 

Data is everywhere and data-driven decision-making is the future of the fitness industry. By continuing to increase the understanding of your members and human behavior in general, big data gives you access to incredible insights. Without reporting, it can be difficult to interpret data in a way that allows you to make actionable decisions. Fitness reporting gives you the opportunity to utilize data to improve the customer experience, enhance your marketing, and navigate the competitive world of fitness.