As technology continues to inform every aspect of our lives, health clubs are finding new and creative ways to utilize it to enhance their members’ experience—both inside and outside the facility. Four walls no longer define their relationship with customers, and high-tech provides them with a way to advise, influence, and serve people, even after they’ve left the building.

As fitness becomes a goal for more and more Americans, the club’s physical space is being transformed into a portal, a gatekeeper, serving as a central, essential resource for information, services, and products to help them adopt and successfully pursue a healthy lifestyle—wherever, whenever, they like.

Today, clubs are using sophisticated technology to engage, assess, assist, track, and support individuals through every phase of the process—from the time they’re an inquisitive prospect…to the moment, following a rewarding workout and refreshing shower, they walk out through the front door.

Stuck on the Web

Understanding that, now, the Internet is the first place most consumers turn to when researching a product or service, many clubs are using their Websites to entice prospective clients. Their sites provide descriptions of the facility, its programs, and staff; publish class schedules; provide virtual tours; and, even, showcase videos of classes in action. Visitors to the site can get a good feel for the club before they step inside for a real-life tour.

In many cases, they can, if they like, sign up for a tour or a free trial while still online.

The fact that guests to the site are asked to provide basic personal and demographic information allows club staff to follow up with them effectively. Remember the old days, when a person had to come to the club and spend some time with a salesperson just to get a name and address!

Once the prospect has been transformed into a dues-paying member, they can continue to make good use of the Website, conducting all sorts of transactions, including: signing up for classes and personal training sessions; checking their account; purchasing products; making dues payments, etc. In the process, they also avoid the pitfalls of phone tag, and, a benefit for clubs, don’t eat up valuable staff time.

The Sport and Health Clubs, a Vienna, Virginia-based chain with over 23 clubs in the Greater Washington, D.C., area, has implemented new Web technology that allows their members to perform many of these functions, including updating their account information and registering and paying for programs online. “Our members are able to perform any type of paid transaction—book a tennis court, sign up for a Pilates class or personal training—online,” explains Nancy Terry, the company’s senior vice president of marketing, “We’re automating the whole process of court and program registration so that people can do it from the convenience of their home.”

Sport and Health also utilizes the Internet to send out e-mail blasts informing members about their monthly open-house events, and to provide them with valuable, fitness-centric e-magazines that are customized to be club-specific.

The Houstonian, a large, upscale facility that’s part of The Houstonian Hotel Club and Spa, in Houston, is an enthusiastic proponent of technology, which provides important value-added benefits for both its customers and trainers. Many of its members are executives who travel internationally, and the club’s Website boasts tools that help them maintain their exercise routines while on the road. “Workout videos on the Houstonian site alllow them to work out anywhere in the world, so they don’t necessarily have to come to the gym,” explains Cher Harris, the assistant general manager of The Houstonian complex.

“Our trainers,” she points out, “manage their own schedules, and most of them use BlackBerrys or iPods, which interact with our club-management software.”

Techno-benefits for members

Full-fledged patrons also profit big-time from technology when it comes to assessments, regimens, tracking, and regular follow-ups. A growing number of manufacturers have developed a wide variety of remarkably intelligent, instructive, and easy-to-use tools to manage every element of a member’s program. For assessments, Millennium Partners Sports Club Management LLC, the Boston-based owner of six Sports Club LA facilities, employs the Polar Body Age System.

All of the subjects’s stats are entered into the system, as are the results of the standard assessment tests—blood pressure, heart rate, resistance strength, and sit-and-reach—which are conducted on devices that attach directly to the computer. Once all of the data’s been entered, the system spits out a simple, easy-to-understand number: the member’s “body age.”

“We chose the system because it communicates in a way that people can understand,” explains Dave Center, the chain’s national director of fitness. “It does a simple thing: We enter the member’s age, conduct the assessment, and then, we can tell them how old their body actually is. This provides both the client and trainer with very specific metrics, which are detailed in a report.

“This is very accurate and basic information communicated in a user-friendly manner,” says Canter.

With the findings in hand, the trainer uses the system’s Cardio Coaching feature to recommend workouts based on the goals the member has set. These routines can be transferred to the member’s own wrist device, and, to complete the cycle, their workout results can then be downloaded onto the Body Age computer to track progress. “When you physically see the numbers in front you, your fitness level becomes real,” notes Ann Bruck, a master trainer at Sports Club LA.

Never-ending attention

Eventually, every member who comes in walks back out, but a club’s responsibility—and its opportunities—no longer begin, and end, at the front door. Part of its success depends on keeping members involved in a healthy lifestyle. Just because, for instance, some of them may prefer to exercise outdoors on certain days doesn’t necessarily mean that they’ll cancel their membership—diversity in working out, in fact, is a sure way to maintain a healthy lifestyle.

Town Sports International Holdings, Inc. (TSI), the Manhattan-based chain with more than 135 clubs in the Eastern Corridor believes, and has bought into, that philosophy. The technology that it’s chosen to affect it is the NetPulse system, which can entertain members, accompany them throughout their lives, record their physical activity, and, eventually, win them tangible rewards from their club.

The system, recently installed in TSI’s facilities, makes use of an interactive Web-enabled screen that, in addition to offering entertainment options on demand, also tracks members’ workouts. Ed Trainor, the chain’s vice president of fitness services, claims that the technology allows TSI to “reach out and touch” each and every one of its 350,000-plus members personally.

“Exercise adherence has always been one of the industry’s biggest challenges. Let’s put technology to work for us!” he exclaims. “With NetPulse’s touch screen and Web-based system, once a member logs on, the machine can track everything they do.” The screens are compatible with existing cardiovascular equipment, he explains, and manufacturers can also use them to publish instructions or suggest particular routines.

All workouts are registered as, or can be converted into, calories burned—the benchmark that TSI has chosen—but clubs can utilize any metric they prefer. When, after they leave the club, members work out elsewhere, they can use personal tracking devices—e.g., heart-rate monitors, watches, GPS units, or smartphones—to convert the session into calories, which can then be downloaded to the NetPulse system and tallied. Finally, the calories are converted into rewards.

“This is the Holy Grail for the fitness industry,” Trainor enthuses. “It makes the club the headquarters for fitness.”

‘It takes a community’

A sure way to keep members coming back to headquarters is to cultivate a strong sense of community, and one of the newest ways to do that, technologically, is to make use of social networking. Such systems can keep members in touch, not only with their club, but also with one another.

Life Time Fitness, Inc. (NYSE: LTM), the Chanhassen, Minnesota-based chain with 84 upscale facilities in 19 states, is driving interaction with a new platform of its own design, MyLT.com, which involves a social network, Website, and virtual club dedicated to its members.

“MyLT.com allows all of those interested in a specific area to connect with one another. For example, if someone enjoys yoga, then they can join the yoga group; they can chat, e-mail, and socialize with other enthusiasts, and receive information about yoga programming, events, and special offers. We utilize the same approach with more than a dozen other interest groups,” notes Kent Wipf, the chain’s public-relations manager. “Members can also use the system to check their usage report, make changes to their membership, and sign up for programs, classes, and events.”

The resulting community can do wonders for club utilization and member retention.

“Today, we can reach more people, in more ways, by utilizing technology and the Internet than we ever could before,” concludes Harris, of The Houstonian.

Jean Suffin, jrsuffin@yahoo.com