Online Fitness Program

What is an Online Fitness Program?

The online fitness industry consists of videos, video-based classes, personalized coaching, wearable technology, and more. An online fitness program uses data generated by users themselves to create a custom fitness coaching experience.

Online fitness has experienced a massive growth over the past year with lockdowns and is likely to stay very popular.

Why Is It Important to Have an Online Fitness Program?

Consumers enjoyed personal fitness equipment and online fitness services for many years. However, the impact of lockdowns and stay-at-home orders forced the industry to grow exponentially.

Additionally, since the prospect of continued lockdowns still looms, and since customers have now seen the utility and convenience of these services, it is likely that online fitness will be with us for a long time.

What Internal Data Should I Have for a Good Online Fitness Program?

A good online fitness model begins with the goal and a plan. Companies should use data on existing customers to determine the best service they could offer. Customer demographics and best-selling classes, for example, provide a guideline for what customers to advertise to and what to offer them. It should also indicate what channels to provide services through: i.e., an app, a video channel, or some other service.

Finally, customer feedback, in combination with transaction data and social media data, also points to which coaches should lead online classes or demonstrate correct form of exercises, as needed.

What External Data Is Essential for a Good Program?

The range of external data necessary for a good online fitness model is large. The most important are exercise data, nutrition data, and customer data.

Clear and correct health and exercise data, of course, is crucial. Not only is this your product, but the consequences can be dire if an instructor provides unclear instructions to remote clients.

Customers must also be able to enter their own data. For ad-based or subscription-based services, in particular, clients expect personalized service that can help them reach their fitness goals. Therefore, the app, class, or coaching service should record historical data on the customer and adjust workouts for them. Machine learning programs can help do this in real time.

Finally, from the marketing point of view, client demographics and fitness app usage times can help you target new customers or send push notifications to existing ones. Market data and competitor data can also help with the development and marketing of the products or services you offer.

What External Data May Prove Useful for a Good Program?

Coaches and developers may consider new psychology data to find ways to motivate or train clients. Reaching out to people who suffer emotionally under the effects of quarantines or lockdowns may be more challenging than motivating people who voluntarily came to the gym before the pandemic hit.

Additionally, the service should integrate with other devices or applications. Offering the option to input data from a nutrition or diet app, for example, would be a definite draw for many potential clients.

What Are the Main Challenges of this Use Case?

Online fitness programs must also compete against a wide variety of free services. Program developers can offset this by offering personalized services and support. However, this leads to another serious challenge: security. If the online service contains any data related to a client’s personal health, then any breaches in data security could come with enormous consequences. Even if the service provided does not take in any HIPAA-covered private health data, customers will not be happy if their personal information becomes public.

Interesting Case Studies and Blogs to Look Into

Allerin: How big data is transforming the fitness industry
KDnuggets: Analytics for Personal Fitness Devices

Tangible Examples of Impact

For the first time ever, ClassPass recorded that 12 p.m., was the most popular time for a workout, specifically in Dallas, New York City, Los Angeles, Vancouver, and Washington D.C.

Travel + Leisure: Data From Fitness Platform ClassPass Shows How Workout Routines Shifted With the Craziness of 2020