From Quitting Gyms to Owning One | ClubReady Draws in More Than Customers for CKO Kickboxing
September 6, 2024
Michael Sclafani had never completed a gym membership before he found CKO Kickboxing. Suddenly, he found himself a year into the program – and knew he’d found his calling. “If I showed up for 12 months, anybody could,” said Sclafani. “I should do one of these.”
Since 2013, Sclafani has been the owner of CKO Kickboxing in Freehold, New Jersey. “ClubReady has been very positive on my business,” said Sclafani, describing the way the software enables him to recruit new members. “There’s going to be a lot of other things that ClubReady can do in the background while you’re out there promoting your business in the real world.”
Time Saving, Revenue Raising
CKO’s onboarding is automated through ClubReady, saving countless hours and engaging new members automatically. “I did this probably 12 years ago and it’s been running in the background for years,” said Sclafani. “A lot of the automation stuff is super, super time saving.”
ClubReady’s automations don’t just save time – they increase revenue by allowing members to automatically sign up for various partner offerings or programs CKO promotes via email. “It just all happens in the background and we’re bringing in additional revenues,” said Sclafani.
Reporting-Driven Retention
Gross sales reports, broken out by individual items, make Sclafani’s life easier. Twelve years of CKO’s selling trends, sorted by season and individual items, helps him determine which promotions to run, while easy check-in reports benchmark member loyalty. “[I] get notifications through ClubReady when a member takes maybe their hundredth class,” said Sclafani, which allows his team to reward the member with boxing gloves or other merch.
Class attendance benefits from CKO’s integrated ClubReady system, allowing members to choose classes based on how crowded they might be. No-shows pull an automatic fee, driving revenue and attendance at the same time. Waitlists increase customer visibility by automatically booking the next available member on the class list.
Keeping Heart Rates and Membership Up
CKO Kickboxing Freehold’s members favor Performance IQ, which displays their biometric data on TV screens in the gym. “The members love to see themselves on the TV screen,” said Sclafani, noting the live tracking is encouraging to members. “It gives them that extra boost to go a little harder.”
Biometric data is automatically sent to each member’s mobile app, tracking average heart rate and calorie burn with an effort-based point system. “They can see from class to class, ‘Ah, did I take it easy? This class did I improve?’” said Sclafani.
“The members love it because they can get their workout results on their phone,” said Sclafani. “They don’t need to carry around key tags anymore either because the barcodes are right on the app themselves.” Access to their stats via the app encourages members to set personal challenges for themselves and beat their prior performances.
Breezy Billing, Useful UI & Super Support
“The ClubReady software is very user friendly,” said Sclafani, describing his favorite ClubReady feature. “I can see all my active members in one spot, my inactive members in another spot, and all future potential prospects in another category.”
“Billing is super easy,” Sclafani said. “You can easily sift through the different pages, sending out communications, emails, text messages.” ClubReady even streamlined reimbursement processes for his customers by accommodating insurance programs. “That was pretty cool that they would customize that,” said Sclafani.
Sclafani also expressed the benefits of ClubReady Support. “If there’s something that’s really pressing, I could just click open a chat,” Sclafani said, adding that help usually arrives from a ClubReady representative within a couple of minutes. Remote-desktop assistance is also available for more in-depth requests. “There’s a solution for either option, something that’s a little longer or something that I need pretty quickly.”
Tomorrow’s Tech
CKO Kickboxing looks forward to implementing Club Concierge in the future, a ClubReady service that performs lead follow-up on behalf of the business. “It’s hard to always run the classes, run the front counter, and then also stay in touch with those leads,” said Sclafani. “It’s a nice little bonus to have them working on the back end.”
“ClubReady makes me a better business owner because I come off way more professional and organized than if I did not have ClubReady,” he said.