Automate Your Lesson Schedule

Stop working harder, and start working smarter!

Over the many years of my coaching career, I have spent countless hours e-mailing students with my schedule, setting up lessons, re-scheduling lessons, canceling lessons, swapping lessons, and reminding students of their lessons.  Does this sound familiar to you?  I am not surprised one bit!

About 6 years ago I finally had enough after I had a wave of last minute cancellations and people calling me at all hours of the day and night to change their schedule.  I knew there had to be a solution out there and I found one.  It cost me $10 per month and let my clients register for an account where they would schedule lessons and cancel them based on my pre-set rules.  I had my cancellation policies on the site as well as my avaliable hours and many other things.  This allowed my students to schedule, cancel, and change lesson time at their convenience from the comfort of their home.

The first system I used for a little over 2 years until I found an even better system that accepted payments and had all the bells and whistles.  It wasn't an easy choice picking the right new system, but after carefully considering the pros and cons of over 20 different booking systems I had found THE ONE.  I must have spent a good month writing down all the features of each system and ended up making a grid with each system and which features they offered.  The winner in the end was BOOKEO.

BOOKEO has many useful options at a low cost.  I know you may be worried about having a monthly or annual commitment, but I want you to think about it this way...how many hours per month do you spend communicating with your clients for your schedule?  How many unpaid lessons or last minute cancelations have lowered your income?  With this system, you can set it up to still charge for the lesson if your client cancels the lesson within 24h of the scheduled lesson.


This system will save you time, increase your revenue, and offers the following features and more!

• embedding in your own web site
• online payments and deposits
• workshops and group classes
• gift vouchers, prepaid packages
• GroupOn / LivingSocial integration
• memberships
• marketing campaigns
• 2-way sync with Google Calendar

If you are an Apple product user, you will be happy to hear that your iCal will be updated every time a new lesson is scheduled!  It will take some time to set it all up, but once it is up you will have more hours that you can spend with your loved ones, free time, or to EARN MORE!

What are you waiting for?  Start automating your business NOW!

Summer Tip

Coach / Student Agreements or Contracts

Signed agreements between a coach and student/parent are very uncommon in the skating world.  It is more widely used by coaches of higher level skaters.  Some might wonder why a skating coach would want a parent and student to sign an agreement.  Well, you don't see gyms, dance studios personal trainers, massage parlors, and even utility companies, etc. not use some sort of agreement, do you?  So why wouldn't a coach have one?  An agreement is mainly there to protect the coach and student and to make sure the student and parent understand and agree to what is expected of them.

The agreement amongst other things usually covers student and parent information, skating history and level, need to know medical history, emergency contact, dresscode, policies and rules, ethics, payment methods, pricing, and the risk of the sport.  That way, everyone is clear on what is expected of them which leads to less confusion.

You should give it a try!  It just might save you a lot of stress and money.

Feel free to message me if you have any questions
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Skating Lessons Overpriced?

I took the liberty to break down the reason that skating lessons don't cost $10 per hour. A Junior Coach generally starts at $40 per hour and Olympic coaches and Choreographers may charge as much as $200 per hour or more. Attached you'll find information I put together for things to make more sense.

Summer 2012

Happy Summer!

Proper Dress for Beginner Skaters

So it's been a while since I have posted on the blog, but I just felt a need to write about this subject.  Every  day that I am on the ice during Public Skate, I see beginner skaters showing up in shorts or dresses and a short sleeve shirt.  Not only that.  When they put on skates, they tend to be way too large and the skates are either not laced up at all or very loose.  Now that is a recipe for disaster!

Here are some tips for first time and beginner skaters:

1. Wear warm pants like jeans or sweat pants.
2. Wear a long sleeved shirt and a jacket.
3. Bring along gloves.
4. Young children especially, should be wearing a helmet.
5. Wear thin and long socks (not tennis socks) to prevent blisters.
6. Make sure your skates fit properly (I recommend starting with figure skating skates).  Skates need to be snug!
7. Lacing up skates can be tricky.  It is important that your laces are even and not too short.  Start tightening your laces front he bottom of the boot, then cross the laces and use the first set of hooks.  Then you cross the laces again and hook the next set of hooks... keep going that way until you are at the very top!  Make sure the top of the boot is tied snug as well.  To finish up, tie your laces and double knot it for extra safety.  If your laces are too long you can tuck them under the tied laces.

What are Plyometrics?

Plyometrics is a type of exercise training designed to produce fast, powerful movements, and improve the functions of the nervous system, generally for the purpose of improving performance in sports. Plyometric movements, in which a muscle is loaded and then contracted in rapid sequence, use the strength, elasticity and innervation of muscle and surrounding tissues to jump higher, run faster, throw farther, or hit harder, depending on the desired training goal. Plyometrics is used to increase the speed or force of muscular contractions, often with the goal of increasing the height of a jump.

-Wikipedia

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plyometrics