Sports Drills for Determining Skill Placements:  Working with athletes is one of the most gratifying parts of owning or working at a sports business. But, it’s even better when you see the final results, after months of intense training. What they've learned stays with them for the rest of their careers, even if they've only worked with you for a limited amount of time. So what will you do on the final day when your athlete clients leave your sports camp? The best thing is to show off what they've learned so they can leave on a high note. A good way to spend your final day is to do games and drills to prove their physical skills. There isn't any way to truly know they've assimilated what you've taught without seeing it in practice. Plus, do these same drills to start camp, and then you, your athletes, and their parents can truly see where progress was made.

Secure your sports checkout process for more conversions on your sports website:  If you have a sports website for your training business you need to be sure it’s functioning effectively and safely for users. Especially when clients are making purchases from your site, you need to know that visitors are getting the information they need, and that your shopping cart makes it easy for them to complete a purchase. If you offer sports camps or extended training programs, you need to make it easy for guests to register, make online payments, and confirm their scheduled times. But let’s go back to your basic site setup, whatever your site is designed to do, there’s another issue that could make or break your business. Your registration website needs to be secure, and you need to make sure that your site visitors know it's secure. If visitors think your site isn't safe, they’re less likely to convert to paying clients. More importantly, you could be compromising your clients’ personal data, like their email address or credit card information—if your clients’ data is hacked, you’ll not only lose their trust—but most likely their business as well.

Updating Your Organizational Procedures:  Do you ever feel like you’re wasting time on back-end management like staffing schedules? Are you able to avoid conflicts and confusion when it comes to who is running what training and when? If you've been in business for a while, perhaps coordinating staff schedules at your sports facility comes down to writing everything down on paper, using aging management software, or even a combination of paper, phone calls, email calendars and the classic company whiteboard. If you're still using the above methods, it's time to ditch them quickly to avoid growing problems, miscommunications, and stop wasting time. To stay competitive, realizing how risky paper-based or out-of-date software systems are can save you a lot of headache.

Gather Client Testimonials in No Time: Customer testimonials and reviews are one of the best ways to connect with new prospects through simply sharing stories from existing clients. This marketing method quickly builds trust and proves that your services are producing the promised results. Finding ways to collect and share customer testimonials should be a priority in your marketing to engage likely clients, enhance your digital strategy, and grow your sports training business. Since 87% of customers share good experiences with others, customers are receptive to posting reviews. Yet, it takes a little nudging and creativity to get them involved. Here are six easy ways to get your clients to submit testimonials for you to use as part of your sports marketing efforts.

Top Reasons to Check Out a POS System:  Running a sports business means taking continual action to find clients who may have to go through complex registration and payments for any training programs. This can start to become a hassle for parents if you continuously use paper-based systems that slow things down. Since many of your clients are busy athletes, they don't want to spend extra time having to fill out registration forms and then mailing it out or returning in person. The same goes with making payments for your training services. Your staff may feel overburdened having to send out paper invoices every day, not including time taken to call about late payments. Not to mention the way in which you put your business and clients at risk when relying on cash, checks and paper based systems. Here are top reasons to use a point of sale system built specifically for sports so you and your staff don't waste time with manual tasks.

What You Don't Know Can Hurt You: When a prospective client receives an email from your sports business, visits your training academy website, or sees one of your posts on social media, odds are they’re not doing it in a vacuum. In fact, according to Adweek more than 4 of every 5 consumers will do online research before making a purchase or deciding on what company to do business with, and most potential clients start by using a search engine. There are all sorts of reasons why clients eventually settle on company “B” vs. companies “A,” “C” and “D.”  Maybe company B has more types of instruction, or they have better trainers, or they give discounts for returning athletes. Maybe company B has a stronger brand mission, or their website layout is more attractive or easier to navigate.

What to know to help athletes recognize and avoid burnout: The fiercely competitive world of sports celebrates those who embody iron will and sheer grit. Not only are they perceived to have an edge over others, but their character is idolized. Statistics from the National Basketball Association (NBA) show that: 1 in 17 high school players play in college 1 in 8,926 high school players is drafted by the NBA 1 in 525 college players is drafted by the NBA

From marketing to great customer experience, here's how: Are you looking for ways to increase registrations for your training business? According to Capterra, you’re 14x more likely to sell to an existing happy client than you are to sell to a new prospect. Now this doesn’t mean to neglect your efforts to generate new clients, but it does mean that great attention should be placed on your current clients’ experiences. Superb customer retention can be a recurring revenue source that steadily feeds your business. By focusing on previous clients as well as gaining new ones, you can drive sports registration rates and meet your training objectives.

From navigation quality to trust in your brand - Take these steps to evaluate your sports website design:  If your sports business has had the same website for a while, you may be managing your site on autopilot, assuming it is effective. Just because you have a website doesn't mean it's doing the best it can to bring in new clients. In fact, your site can easily become outdated in a matter of months if you haven't bothered to do an evaluation of what is working. It’s important to take some time to see what's really occurring on your sports website by looking at your performance metrics. The steps for evaluating your sports website design aren't overly complicated. Here are some things to scope out as you evaluate your site.

6 Tips for Keeping Staff on the Same Page: Whether you're working with kids at a camp or young athletes in your training center, you want every client who walks through your doors to have the same high-quality experience. Every employee they interact with is a representative of the business. It's important that you keep trainers on the same page -- from sharing your mission to having a solid staff scheduling software -- these tactics can help make that easier.