7 Keys to Better Time Management and Efficiency in Your Fitness Business

By Josh Leve, AFS Founder & CEO

Running a fitness business can sometimes be a grind. Let's face it, you don't wake up every single day and feel like a 10. There are plenty of outside (and inside) factors that can have a negative impact on you and subsequently, your business.  

In the midst of busy days, derailments, staff turnover, and just keeping your business afloat, it’s important to have systems in place to measure where you’re at on a day-to-day, week to week, and month to month basis. Sometimes not knowing where to start is the hardest part!   Remember, keep things simple.  Don’t feel like you have to get very detail-oriented on everything; the idea is to move your business forward one step at a time.

As a business owner, it's your job to continually motivate not only your clients, but also your team so you can deliver results.  Sometimes you hit a wall, and that's expected. The real question is, how do you break through those walls?  

1. Start Small

Identify the 3 main goals for each of your departments.  When doing so, make sure your goals are SMART goals. 

S – Specific
M – Measurable
A – Attainable
R – Realistic
T – Timely or Time Sensitive

Rather than saying, “I want to grow my business this year,” a SMART goal might look something like this: “I’m going to obtain three new referrals every month and I'm going to do it by...” 

People often lose sight of this is when they only set a longer-term goal with no intermediate goals or steps to keep them motivated.  Breaking that big goal down into smaller goals, or simply ticking items off a daily checklist can help keep the motivation going over the long haul. 

Below are a few more examples you can put into action:

• Group fitness: how many check-ins do you want each month, how many bodies do you want in each class, what new classes do you want to add?
• Training: how many sessions do you want doing each month, how many are feasible with current staff, how many can your studio support with your current equipment?
• Employees and hiring: how many employees do you want to have by end of quarter, how will you create opportunities in order to hire these new employees?
• New programming: what programs do you want to roll out this quarter (good rule of thumb is no more than 2-3 new programs per quarter to not cannibalize each other); you also want to be able to space out marketing and ensure you can get a good number of participants into each one
• Pro shop: how much inventory do you have, how much do you want to sell, what new items do you want to sell?

Once you have your goals in place, break down each goal into smaller parts. This will allow you to control what you need to do on a week to week and day to day basis.  It will also allow you to begin to delegate how these goals are going to be attained through other employees (if applicable).  What you are doing is allowing you to control the amount of time you are spending on these action items, since you will still have to deal with everyday items anyways right?  The key to success is taking it day by day. 

Bonus Tip: Write your goals down! And perhaps most importantly, put it in a place where you’ll see them daily.

2. Remind Yourself of Where You Started

Sometimes along the path to a really big goal, you may lose sight of where you started.  Sure, maybe you've added 10 new clients, but what if your long-term goal was to add 50? 

Sometimes it's healthy to take a step back and think about where it started and how far you've come.  Even the smallest pieces of motivation along the way can keep us moving in the right direction. A subtle reminder of your progress can re-kindle the flame and get the motivation burning again.

3. Prioritize Your Time

Studio owners are constantly working towards being more efficient throughout the day. How many times have you said this to yourself..."If only there were more hours in the day!"

Here’s how to begin - you'll need to take a full week and take notes on everything you do. This means how long things take and the number of tasks in a given 7-day week. It’s also a time for you to begin re-thinking how you complete some items in case there's a faster or more efficient (possibly better) way to do them.  Not to self: this is going to take a little work on your part at first!

Use the following areas of your business as a starting point.  Map out everything you do on a daily basis, you could have a list of nearly 20 or more when complete.

• Cleaning
• Accounting
• Training
• Phone-calls/e-mails
• Marketing
• Teaching classes
• Recruiting
• Laundry
• Misc.

Completing the task above will provide you a specific glimpse into how you prioritize your work week. Is there an area of your business where you’re spending too much time on something? Or maybe the opposite, not spending enough time? Find out why not.  Learning to prioritize is about helping you become more efficient, as well as teaching you how to set goals for yourself that are attainable and realistic. 

It may also mean giving up on some things.  If you are spending way too much time teaching classes and other areas of your business are falling behind, it may be time spend a little more time and energy determining how to best spend your time.   You may also realize that one of your departments doesn’t have a lot of time allocated to it, and it could be growing into something bigger than you expected.

Breaking that big goal down into smaller goals, or simply ticking items off a daily checklist can help keep the motivation going over the long haul.

4. Delegate. Delegate. Delegate

If you’ve completed the exercise from above (and even if you haven’t) one of the biggest areas, and sometimes one of the hardest for studio owners to do, is to delegate. YOU CAN’T DO IT ALL! You need to strategize.  Are there any items you can move over to a front desk attendant?  Do you have a business partner who needs to be taking over a certain item?  Is it more worth it to have an outside person come in to assist in order to become more efficient?  These are probably best for items such as accounting or cleaning. 

Once you have begun to delegate and move things around, make sure to complete part one again after a month or so.  How have the changes affected your budget and your use of time? Remember, you want to continue to increase your efficiency, especially if you plan on expanding your business to take on more classes, trainers, programs, etc.

5. Surround Yourself with Other Great People

Every great business has a great environment.  The environments may be totally different, but in every great business other great people surround you. When there’s a culture of success, everyone is motivated and wants to improve themselves and those around them.

If you have negative people that are draining you of your energy, or holding back others from getting their best results, think about alternatives, possibly even cutting them loose.

6. Stay up to Date on Your Education 

It's true.  When your education is on point, your clients will notice, they will tell their friends, and they will renew. 

You might not have to change how you do things every five years, but you should be constantly educating yourself to improve your own skills.

7. Bring YOUR Best Everyday & Stay Positive

Bill Hartman uses the term “compartmentalize.”  This is taking the bad stuff in your life, putting it on the shelf while you’re at work, and doing your job to the best of your ability regardless of what you have going on outside. There’s nothing better than bringing a positive attitude into your business each and every day. 

A positive attitude is infectious – your clients and your team will feel your positivity, and it rubs off on them.