Zen Planner Year in Review: How we improved to better serve in 2020

This past year was full of challenges for everyone in the fitness industry, but nobody felt the stress and pressure more than gym and studio owners.

When gyms began shutting down in March of 2020, the Zen Planner team immediately began to work on features — like virtual and class capacity enhancements — to help small gyms and studios. Making it easier for you to stay connected with your members virtually became a vital service to retain members and sustain relationships. As new capacity restrictions required you to limit the number of people in their facility, we responded by enhancing our class capacity offering and improved our waitlist function.

We know the past year was busy and often overwhelming, and you may have missed some of the features we released last year. Don’t worry, we’ve got you covered! Here’s a quick rundown of the improvements we made in Zen Planner to help you run your business more efficiently and profitably. 

Virtual Capabilities

• Virtual Classes: We created a space for virtual classes. These can be easily accessed via Member Connect or the Member App. Now classes can be taught solely online or in tandem with reduced capacity in-person classes. 
• Member App Check-in: Members can now check in to classes on their Member App so those taking virtual classes can easily check in at home. This also creates less crowding and eliminates people touching the same check-in tablet or device in the gym. 
• Free Trial Widget: This is a modern, streamlined version of the free trial forms we’ve had in the past. New prospects can quickly fill out up to 10 fields of information after selecting a class date and time and easily register for free trial classes.

 Class Capacity

• Custom Class Settings: Specific classes can now be customized to a shorter or longer reservation or cancellation window. This helps gym owners adjust to COVID-19 regulations and customize restrictions by class.
• Reservations/Waitlist in Staff App: Staff can now see who has reserved a spot in class on the Staff App, as well as who is on the waitlist. They can easily manage both the reservations list and waitlist on their phone, rather than having to log on to Studio.
• Member Waitlist Confirmation: Members can receive an email or text when they’re off the waitlist, and they can use the Member App to confirm they want the new spot. With smaller class sizes and the use of waitlists, gym owners can make sure no spot is taken by someone who won’t be showing up.
• Set RSVP Limit Per Day: Staff can set a limitation on how many reservations a single member can make per day. This allows gym owners to ensure that members are not booking several reservations and then canceling at the last minute. 

Integrations

• UpLaunch: Integrating with UpLaunch means users of both softwares can streamline their operations by syncing their contacts to ensure both platforms are automatically updated with the same information. 
• SugarWOD: Improving our existing integration to grant access to SugarWOD based on membership type in Zen Planner.

Want to learn more? Join us on Thursday, January 21st at 11:00 a.m. MST for a Year in Review webinar that will help you use Zen Planner to its fullest!

Register here to join us for the webinar.