Bolsters EZFacility’s Position in Europe as a Leading Provider of Software, Management and Financial services for the Fitness & Leisure Industries

Bethpage, New York, (June 22, 2010) – EZFacility, Inc. (a division of Jonas Software), a global leader in scheduling, management and membership software solutions for health and fitness clubs, leisure facilities, sports facilities, and personal training studios, is pleased to announce the purchase of all the shares of SDA Solutions.  With headquarters in Leeds, UK, SDA Solutions specializes in providing web-based leisure and fitness center membership, management, CRM, booking and billing solutions for leisure centers, fitness facilities, health clubs, personal training centers and fitness studios.

“We are very pleased to announce the acquisition of SDA Solutions, and happily welcome SDA’s employees and customers to the EZFacility family”, comments Adam Zeitsiff, Chief Executive Officer of EZFacility.  “SDA has developed one of the most robust and feature-rich leisure and fitness center management systems available in the market today.  They have built a large base of highly respected customers, including some of the most well known leisure and fitness brands in the UK.  We look forward to working with the SDA team to expand their presence throughout the European market,  and continue to build upon their leadership position.”

“Everyone at SDA Solutions is delighted to be joining the team at EZFacility and Jonas Software”, said Stuart Dyson, founder and Managing Director of SDA Solutions.  “Joining a company with a deep understanding of the benefits of web-based software solutions and a proven track record of success, presents a wonderful opportunity for our customers, employees and business partners.”

EZFacility will continue to promote and build the SDA brand and is fully committed to the future investment and development of their software products and financial services.  The entire SDA team in their Leeds, UK office will remain with the company and help contribute to its future growth.  Stuart and Susan Dyson will continue providing their vision, industry expertise and leadership skills to SDA, and will assist in the growth and expansion of both their products and market presence for the long-term.

About EZFacility:

EZFacility, a division of Jonas Software, Inc., is a global leader in SaaS-based scheduling, management, membership, billing and financial solutions for health and fitness clubs, leisure centers, sports & recreation facilities, personal training studios, colleges and universities, and numerous other fitness and sports-based businesses.  The company is headquartered in Bethpage, New York, has multiple offices in England and Australia, and supports over 1,400 customer facilities and 35,000 users in over a dozen countries around the globe.  Visit EZFacility on the web at www.ezfacility.com.

About Jonas Software:

Jonas is the leading provider of enterprise management software solutions to the Club, Leisure, Fitness & Sports, Attractions, Foodservices and Construction Management industries. Jonas has over 10,000 customers in over 20 countries worldwide. Jonas’ focus is on creating long term relationships with our customers and ensuring we meet and exceed their software and service needs.

Even when you're away from your desktop or laptop, you can use your iPhone, Android or other web enabled phone to check in on how your SDAconnect email campaigns are going. All you have to do is visit your normal login page from your phone, and we'll try to automatically detect that you're on a mobile device and give you a special mobile version to look at.

What's included in the mobile version?

Mobile devices have small screens and limited input options, so we've kept things nice and simple - you get fast and easy access to campaign reports for your own campaigns. The design and layout has been built specifically for mobile browsing, so it's light, fast and easily readable. Here's how it looks on an iPhone:

Can I still use the full version on a mobile device?

Yes, if you ever want to go back to the full version of SDAconnect you can click the 'switch to full version' link on the bottom of the page.

To start using the mobile version on your phone, go to http://email.sdaconnect.net and login with your username and password as normal.

Daily Digest

It's now easier than ever to find out what's happening using the Daily Digest report. The Daily Digest sends an automatic email to any subscribed user, displaying key performance information from the previous day. This is a great way to get a quick 'heads up' and keep your finger on the pulse of your business. Using the Daily Digest you can get instant answers to such questions as:

• How many members joined?
• How many contact records were edited?
• How much revenue was taken from bookings?
• How many activities were completed?
• What was my income from Point of Sale?
• How many members currently owe money?

It's also possible to have the email exclude KPIs with zero values if this is required, as well as configure the time when the email is sent.You could add the information received to other reports or it could act as a trigger to run more, in-depth reports if you see something that needs further investigation.

Social networking with TwitterConnect

LeisurePoint can automatically post (or Tweet) directly to a member’s Twitter page every time they check-in, turn up for a booked session or make a booking. These Tweets can be seen in exactly the same way as any other Tweet posted by the member themselves. Once Twitter Connect is activated, messages based on the member’s selected preferences will be sent to Twitter and a history entry will be added to their record in for future reference and reporting.

 Continuous Authority Credit Card Payments

In 3.3 we've added the ability to register a credit card for continuous authority. This means a card can be registered once and used multiple times and will allow you to:

• Resubmit and collect via Credit Card any Direct Debit payments that have been rejected. Your collection rates will increase dramatically with this new functionality.
• Offer Credit card as a payment method for recurring membership fees for those people who don't want to use Direct Debit.

Also, because we use a token system and no longer store Credit Card details the system is much more secure. This token is linked to the gateway of our PCI compliant Credit Card partner, Commidea, who process the payments and return the results back to ClubCentric. This service is available for a low monthly fee and will transform your payment processing and collections efficiency.

ClubCentric 3.3 is available now. For any customers who would like to see a detailed preview of Version 3.3, please contact us at sales@sdasolutions to sign up for the upcoming webinar and training course. 

With LeisurePoint it's now easier than ever to find out what's happening using the Daily Digest report.The Daily Digest sends an automatic email to any subscribed user, displaying key performance information from the previous day. This is a great way to get a quick 'heads up' and keep your finger on the pulse of your business.

The 39 available measurements cover the following areas:

• Leads
• Prospects
• Members
• Organisations
• Users
• Edited Records
• WebAccess
• Activities
• Notes/History
• SDAconnect
• Point of Sale (POS)
• Financial
• Bookings

Using the Daily Digest you can get instant answers to such questions as:

• How many members joined?
• How many contact records were edited?
• How much revenue was taken from bookings?
• How many activities were completed?
• What was my income from Point of Sale?
• How many members currently owe money?

It's also possible to have the email exclude KPIs with zero values if this is required, as well as configure the time when the email is sent.You could add the information received to other reports or it could act as a trigger to run more, in-depth reports if you see something that needs further investigation

The Daily Digest is available in LeisurePoint 3.3 and can be configured in the Settings area, under 'Daily Digest'.

Twitter is constantly in the news right now and continues to grow at an incredible pace. According to internet research company Hitwise, UK Internet traffic to Twitter has increased 10-fold over the last 12 months, and is now in the top 300 visited sites in the UK – no doubt helped by celebs like Stephen Fry and his 50,000 followers.

If you’re not familiar with Twitter, in a nutshell it’s a very simple way to keep friends, family and important contacts updated on what’s happening in their life – with a limit of 140 characters per message ’tweet’.

We had a good look at Twitter and realised that it’s also a great way for members to connect with their Club using a message transport system that’s tried, tested and best of all, absolutely free! With Twitter connect for LeisurePoint you can now setup your members to automatically send Tweets about what they’re up to at your Club, providing a genuinely useful service that you, your members and their followers will love – here’s how it works…

How Twitter Connect for LeisurePoint works.

LeisurePoint can automatically post (or Tweet) directly to a member’s Twitter page every time they check-in, turn up for a booked session or make a booking. These Tweets can be seen in exactly the same way as any other Tweet posted by the member themselves.

Example Tweets include:

After checking in:

• Just checked in at <<SITENAME>> (<<LOCATION>>).
  Example - Just checked in at Big Wave Fitness (Leeds).
  
  
• Just checked in at <<SITENAME>> (<<LOCATION>>) for <<ACTIVITY>> (<<LOCATION>>).
  Example - just checked in at Big Wave Fitness (Leeds) for Personal Training (John Adams).

After making a booking:

• Booked <<ACTIVITY>> at <<SITENAME>> (<<LOCATION>>).
  Example - Booked BODYPUMP class at Big Wave Fitness (Leeds).

A Tweet from LeisurePoint looks like this in Twitter:

This service can be switched on in one of two ways:

1. By the member setting it up themselves using the new Twitter page in WebAccess:

2. Or by a staff user setting it up directly in the LeisurePoint member record.

Once Twitter Connect is activated, messages based on the member’s selected preferences will be sent to Twitter and a history entry will be added to their record in LeisurePoint for future reference and reporting (see above).

What can you do with Twitter Connect for LeisurePoint?

Without doing very much you have another useful channel for generating new leads, creating wider awareness of your club, promoting loyalty and retention and, finally, promoting your products and services online.

For Members - If members follow each other on Twitter they can see when each other is checking in to the club – useful if they arranged to meet up. If they have a booking for say, tennis, the member can also see their partner has arrived and what court the booking is on – no more mix-ups! Friends and family following the member can see when a check-in happens and Tweet encouragement for keeping the exercise habit, perfect for new year’s resolutions.

For Instructors, Personal Trainers and Coaches - Staff can follow their clients on Twitter and be notified immediately when they check-in. This is really useful for retention interactions, PT motivation or just knowing that the member is in the club and will be turning up for their Tennis lesson or PT session.

Twitter Connect for LeisurePoint is available now, please contact us at sales@sdasolutions.com if you would like to know more.

Bookings

Make bookings for other members - Primary members can now make bookings for associate members on their package. For example, a member may want to book a tennis court for their child or partner. A primary member can also amend and cancel bookings on behalf of their associate.

More flexible booking intervals - Previous versions only allowed bookings to be made to be made on a fixed interval (such as every hour). The new version allows you to set an interval in which the next booking can be made so that available time throughout the day can be used up more efficiently.

 New booking rules manager - Bookings rules in ClubCentric are handled by a rules engine which checks all the rules and conditions before allowing a booking to be made or not. This engine has been improved to make it quicker and easier to manage existing rules and add new ones in future. New rules are available to limit bookings based on such scenarios as:

• Duration of a booking at peak times e.g. Member can't book tennis for more than an hour at peak times.
• Amount of time booked for an activity in a period e.g. no more than 10 hours of tennis can be booked in a 7 day period.
• Number of bookings in a period e.g. no more than 2 personal training bookings in a day.
• No shows in a period. e.g. Remove booking rights if more than 3 no shows in the last 5 days.

Instant synchronisation for new members - Previous versions would synchronise new members with Bookings every 15 minutes or so. 3.2 performs this synchronisation instantly, enabling a new member to join and make a booking straight away. Particularly useful if you want to sign up a member and book them in for an induction or PT session immediately.

Reorder how resources are displayed - If you want to display your resources in a non-sequential way you can now do this. For example, you may want to put under-used resources first to encourage these to be booked before more heavily used resources. Using tennis as an example, you may want to display your courts in the sequence 5, 6, 1, 2, 3, 4 etc as this is the same as the physical layout of your courts.

Apply a default price for a booking - If you have lots of sites and resources it can take a while to add your prices. 3.2. contains a default price which for all items in the booking group, without the need to update each item individually. You can still change prices for individual items without affecting the default price for the other items.

WebAccess 2.0

The internal architecture of WebAccess has been completely redesigned so that you can now:

• Run WebAccess as a standalone web application as before.
• Integrate individual WebAccess elements into your existing website with exactly the same look and feel.
• Integrate with SitePoint, SDA's new service for dynamic hosted websites.

Cancel or amend a booking online - previously, a booking could be made online but could only be changed by contacting the club directly. Now you can cancel a booking or make changes to an existing booking. As you cancel or amend you will be advised of any cancellation fees or price changes, which can then be paid by credit or debit card immediately.

New online booking wizard - the process of making a general booking (Personal Training, Racquets etc) has been improved. Customers can view available slots in a day calendar and quickly make the booking or use the search filters to find other days and times. This can be combined with payment either by credit/debit card or on account.

Generate booking confirmations and reminders - At the end of the booking process the customer can choose to receive confirmations and reminders by email or SMS text message at a user-defined time e.g. 2 hours before the booking is due to start.

Improved MyBookings area - Previous versions contained a list of all pending bookings. This is now extended to include the ability to amend or cancel a booking from the list as well as new filter options to see previous bookings by status (completed, cancelled, no show etc) to get a full view of bookings past, present and future.

Run Live timetable across multiple domains - Now you can publish your class timetables onto multiple websites domains so that your members can view and book classes from virtually anywhere.

Add or remove optional items in a booking - A member can now make a booking and add or remove any optional items related to that booking. For example, a Member could book a tennis court and add a ball machine and speed gun at the same time.

Book for an associate online - A member can quickly go online and make a booking for one of their associates at any time. This is very handy for parents who want to book something for their children, for example.

Capture leads and prospects online - Easily create a data collection form on your website for new enquiries. You can choose the fields and style the form to fit your existing website design. All the details from the form are sent into ClubCentric with automatic activity scheduling and email updates to the salesperson. This feature will save hours of tedious data entry from email and disconnected forms.

Join online - A joining wizard is now available which can guide a joiner through the entire joining process including BACS setup and automatic address entry. The configuration also allows you to limit which packages are sold online.

Forgotten password reset - Previous versions required users who had forgotten their password to contact their club. The generation of a new password is now completely automated and requires no input from the site at all.

More control - You can now controll all aspects of WebAccess look and feel, which tabs are displayed and the order of any favourites. Personalise your system exactly how it suits you.

General

Email and letter templates can now be filtered and deleted - For those with long lists of letter and email templates you can now filter templates on their status and delete templates that are no longer required.

Advanced Find search on member contact preferences - You can now search on all contact preferences so that you can find all people who do not allow contact by SMS, for example.

More retention management features - Advanced Find now contains a range of searches for finding and contacting low and non-attenders. For example you could find all members who have attended less than 2 times in the last month and send them an email, letter or SMS. New, professionally written, retention templates are available to chose from in the templates list.

Improved integration with SDAconnect - It is now possible to sync the results of an Advanced Find query with SDAconnect, SDA's subscriber email campaign system. This will allow you to produce highly targeted campaigns for general information, special offers and retention management. For example, you could find all the low users, send an email campaign with a link to a special offer and track the number of people who clicked on the link.

Issues Fixed

Over 30 issues have been fixed in this release.

ClubCentric 3.2 is available now. For any customers who would like to see a detailed preview of Version 3.2, please contact us at support@sdasolutions to sign up for the upcoming webinar.

We've noticed that our customers have great ideas, but it's sometimes tough for us to determine which are the most popular. We believe strongly that it’s our job to let demand steer development - It's not about what we want, but rather what our community (you) wants. Therefore, we're going to try using a different way to listen and act more efficiently – it’s a new ideas management site called UserVoice and here’s how it works...

Pretty soon we'll be circulating the site address where you can logon and start contributing your ideas. The next release of ClubCentric and LeisurePoint will also have a quick access tab where you can log in directly.Once you’re accepted onto our ideas forum, you can view other people’s suggestions and add your own. UserVoice also has a voting mechanism enabling you to vote on certain feature requests you would like to see, and how important they are to you. The feature requests that receive more votes will be given a higher priority and move up the development queue, and ultimately make their way into a release. We urge you to get started and post a few features and vote on the ones you want the most. However, be careful, as each user only gets a limited number of votes, so use them wisely!

Go to http://ideas.sdasolutions.com to login or request access. We look forward to seeing your ideas and suggestions in UserVoice and remember, this is your opportunity to influence what we do - make the most of it!

The subject line of your email can make or break your campaign. If you don't have a compelling subject line the chance of your email even getting read is slim. According to a recent MarketingSherpa.com survey, 40% of email marketers said testing changes to just their subject line had a high impact on their return on investment (ROI). 45% said subject line changes accounted for a medium ROI and only 15% said that testing changes to their subject line results in a low ROI. As a general rule, for every email you send you've got room for no more than 50 characters in your subject line to grab their attention and encourage readers to continue to the body of your email.

Here are 10 tips for creating a subject line guaranteed to jump your email to the top of the pile:

1. Test the subject line
Take a look at email campaigns you've sent in the past. Which subject lines worked the best and gave you the highest open and conversion rates? You might find that for a particular topic there's a general trend or subject style that resulted in higher open rates. Use the campaign comparison tool in SDAconnect to see which email and subject lines resulted in the most opens.

2. Make it important
Try and put as much important and relevant information into your subject lines as possible. For example, if you're sending out an email about a special offer make sure the details of the offer appear in the subject line in a clear and concise format such as "Club X - sign up now and get an extra month. Offer ends tomorrow".

3. Personalise the subject line
If you have details about your subscribers then use them in your subject line to get their attention. A subject line containing the subscribers name ALWAYS outperforms one that doesn't.

4. Avoid spam keywords
Most email servers automatically filter out any emails that contain spam keywords in their subject line. Certain words trigger spam detection software so keep them out of your subject lines at all times. Use the spam test in SDAconnect  to see if your subject line is 'spammy'.

5. Trigger curiosity
The best way to improve your open rates is to pique the interest of your subscribers. A compelling headline that entices them to open and read the contents of your email can do wonders for your conversion rate. For example "Hi [First Name] - Does this happen to you...".

6. Make the offer clear
If you're making a special offer to your subscribers then be upfront and include it as part of your subject line. People love bargains and special offers so let them know about it before anything else.

7. Emphasise the benefits
This is a great way to encourage people to read on. For example " Club X - 10 tips to hit your weight loss target".

8. Copy what works elsewhere
If you see or receive something that gets your attention, chances are it will work for your email campaign too. Don't be afraid to 'borrow' good ideas and adapt them to your campaign.

9. Identify yourself
Make sure your subscribers know the email is coming from a trusted and credible source - you. Deceptive subject lines can confuse and annoy, so always try and include your club name where possible. Also, make sure you set the "From" attribute of your email to include your name and your club name, such as "From: John Smith <john@clubx.com>".

10. Avoid exclamations!
Avoid using excessive exclamation at the end of your subject lines. Too much hype is annoying - let your content speak for itself without being 'shouty'.

Hope you find these tips useful for your next campaign and drop me an email if you come up with others or have some good results you want to share in the blog.

8. On Time, Every Time
When sending a regular email to your subscribers, always make sure that it's sent on the same day, at the same time. For example, every Wednesday at 9am. Your subscribers will come to "expect" your email to arrive in their inbox on the same day at the same time every week, meaning that they want to read your content and are generally more receptive to any special offers or promotions you may include.

9. The Half-a-Second Subject Line
When your email arrives in your subscriber’s inbox, you generally have about half a second to catch their attention with the subject line of your email. After this, they will either delete your email or ignore it. In your subject line, try and specify a benefit that the subscriber can expect by reading your email. For example, instead of using 'Our Club Newsletter', use 'Our Club Newsletter: 10 Tips for Fitness Success'.

10. The 'Free' Hook
Free is overused these days, especially in email. However, if you're looking to grow your subscriber list, then come up with something of value to your target audience (such as a guest visit or consultation) and offer it to them for free when they signup for your newsletter.

11. The Preview Pane
Popular email clients such as MS Outlook show a preview of an email when it's selected in your inbox. Always have some interesting content at the very top of your email, as this is the part that will show in the preview window of your subscribers email system. If it's interesting enough, then your subscriber will open your email and continue reading.

12. Graphics Overload
Remember many users have image downloads switched off by default on their email client preview, so if your key message is in an image it won't even be seen. Make sure your key message can be seen prior to downloading any email images.

13. Link-Click Testing
When creating marketing emails, try using different text for both content and links. Also try re-positioning images such as logos and buttons. After sending 2 different emails, compare the click-through stats and see which one worked best. Now, when you need to send marketing emails in the future, you know that you will be sending the right mix of content and images that will attract the most click-through, and ultimately the most sales. Use A/B testing in SDAconnect to send two different versions to a small set of subscribers and then send the winning email to the remaining subscribers on your list.

14. Make your Email Valued
You do what you do because you're an expert in your field - right? Add value to your website, build visitor trust, establish your credibility and collect more subscriptions to your mailing list by providing valuable and relevant content. Fitness tips, success stories and the latest scientific research on fitness and nutrition will be sure to hit the spot.

15. Always Sign Off
Always include a signature or sign-off at the bottom of your email, as it's one of the easiest ways to attract more traffic to your website. This signature should include your personal details, your company details, and an unsubscribe link. You can use your signature to link back to your website, and even to other products.

By implementing the 15 best practices described in this article, you can take your email marketing to a whole new level –- attracting more subscribers, and building both awareness and credibility at the same time, without spending a fortune.

Email has been described as 'the most personal advertising medium in history' and, based on personal experience alone, I'm not one to disagree. I spend many hours either reading, writing or reorganising my ever-expanding inbox - fighting a constant battle to eradicate spam and keep track of items of interest. If you have the same experience, think about how you would want your marketing material to land in their inbox (sometimes it won't even make it that far).

To help your email efforts I've compiled a few generally accepted tips and ideas that, if used wisely and consistently, will result in a better response from your subscribers -- whether it be for more feedback, more interest, or even more business.

1. Avoiding Spam Filters
The majority of large Internet service providers now use rigorous spam protection mechanisms to trap unsolicited email before it gets into their customers inboxes. Spam filters generally "rank" each email by a number of different criteria, and, if that email rates above a certain level (such as 10 spam points), then it is flagged as spam and deleted. To make sure your emails don't get flagged as spam - and deleted before they even get to your subscribers - avoid using words such as '£££', 'Save', 'Discount', etc in both the subject line and the content of your email. When sending your campaigns from SDAconnect you can run a full spam test to see how your email rates (see image below). By doing this prior to sending you can amend the template and keep running the spam test until your rating improves.

2. Maximising Click Through Rates
Both web pages and emails can contain a lot of text and graphics, and this sometimes makes it harder to get your subscribers to perform a certain task, such as clicking on a link to see your special offers. Numerous research papers tell us that the majority of Internet users respond better to a plain, bold, blue text link - such as this - as opposed to a banner or button. So, if you're going to include links in your emails, make sure they are bold, blue and underlined. This will mean that more subscribers click through, meaning more conversions/sales for you.

3. The Power of Personalisation
The power of personalisation can and should be used in your emails. In fact, by simply starting your email with "Hi [subscriber_name]" instead of the boring "Dear Member", you can increase both your reading and click-through rates by up to 650%. Why? Put simply, it's because your subscribers feel like they already have a relationship with you as you've addressed them by their name.

4. Signup Confirmation
Don't get accused of spamming - always aim to use a double opt-in confirmation process. Double opt-in means that after your visitor initially enters their email address to subscribe to your list, you should then send them a "confirmation" email. This email should contain a special link back to your email-marketing system, which will then verify that this visitor did indeed sign up to your mailing list. SDAconnect has options for single or double opt-in, but choosing double opt-in will increase your open rate and provide reassurance to the subscriber that they are dealing with a professional operator.

5. One-Click Unsubscription
If you want to grow your mailing list, then there are 2 things that you absolutely should have: an opt-in process, and a quick way to unsubscribe. In fact, in some countries, it's actually mandatory that every email has an unsubscribe link in it. The unsubscribe link should take the recipient directly to a page where they are then removed - courteously - from your mailing list.

6. Sending Tuesday / Wednesday = Increased Response
Studies conducted by online research analysts have shown that the best days to perform a mail-out to your list are Tuesday and Wednesday, as this is when people are more receptive to communication. This means that they are more likely to read your content and click on links, meaning more sales. Try sending out your campaigns on different days and times and measure the response for next time.

7. Consistency is the Key
If you're running a newsletter or frequent email publication, make sure you keep the look and feel consistent from issue to issue. This will help to maintain and strengthen your brand and your image to your subscribers, which again will make it easier to close sales when you need to. SDAconnect contains a range of standard templates for consistent communications every time. We can also make a unique standard template if you want a personalised design.

That's all for now. Part two coming soon...