Not every journey is a retail one. Sporting organisations like golf, tennis and sailing clubs often have to manage different types of patrons that have different privileges and access levels and traditionally, this has been done manually or with membership cards.
Some clubs are looking to be more digital. To streamline the experience for members and guests they come up with the idea – “We need an app.”
For digital natives and millennials who have grown up with Facebook and Amazon in an urban environment, a mobile application to manage an offline experience, like being a member of sports club, seems like the best way to interact with an organisation. However offline experiences don’t always lend themselves to being permanently connected to an expensive smart-phone.
Sports clubs like sailing, golf and tennis might be one of the only places where the phone is left in the car, or a bag in a locker. Heat, dirt, sand and water are not the best friends of smart-phones and then of course there is the not-so edge case of running out of battery!
So what is the best way to design a digital membership experience utilising a mobile app and other technologies like QR Code based membership cards or connected, contactless wearable devices?
Design Thinking for Member Experience and Sports Club Journeys.
Step 1 – Identify Your Personas
Just like Ecommerce for retailers, the users of the solution need to be defined and understood. Not all members are the same. So here are some things to think about…
- Participation Level – Is the member a player? How often do they use the facilities versus the restaurant or bar? What features do players need that casual members don’t? Maybe they care more about the results of the latest competition or regatta than the merchandise sale. How does being on the court or course change the way someone uses their phone? Is it within reach?
- Membership Level – Do some members have different privileges than others? Can they use the facilities at a certain time? Are they allowed access to all parts of the club? e.g. if they are under 18, they might not be allowed into the bar! Are they allowed to bring guests? What is their credit limit? Do they get discounts for loyalty?
- Demographics – Unfortunately the average age of members of Golf clubs and Yacht Clubs is increasing. A QR code may be baffling to some older members of the club and navigating an app that is second nature to a millennial might add friction to others.
- Admin – Don’t forget there are always two sides to any experience. As well as members, there are staff who have to incorporate the solution into the experience which might require hardware and training.
Step 2 – Understanding the Problems and Real Requirements
Do members really want an App? What is the underlying friction in the journey or experience that is looking to be solved? Is the development of an app more for the administrators who have inherited a legacy CRM or membership system that is clunky and inefficient? Is the app to more effectively manage credit control and limit fraud? Do processes that reduce the risk of infection through communicable diseases like contactless payments need to be implemented?
What does the end-to-end journey look like, and where are the places where there is friction and frustration? What does the journey look like for every kind of member?
Step 3 – Designing a Solution
At this point, the solution might not be an app – or at least no an app only. Looking outside the bubble of sports clubs, there are innovative solutions designed by similar organisations. Think about theme parks and festival promoters.
Theme Parks are complicated offline experiences. They have different operations from hotels to food and beverage sales to different ticket options. Replacing paper tickets with RFID or NFC wristbands allow theme parks to make the experience more seamless and collect data that can be used to make decisions.
What if, you combined a waterproof wristband that doesn’t need to be charged and turn that into your membership card for your sports club? Why not connect that band to an app so that contactless transactions, from gate opening to buying a drink can be tracked and managed?
This is a digital solution and an offline solution that has member experience at the heart of it. This works for a player who is covered in sweat as well as someone sitting in the comfort of the clubhouse.
Do you need an app for your sports club? Maybe. Do you need a cheap, contactless, waterproof, battery-less device that can take the place of a membership card and wallet? Perhaps you do.