Meet Piloxing® Academy, the pioneer of a fitness discipline combining pilates, boxing and dance. More than 1.5 million daily participants in 92+ countries around the world take part in their classes, workshops and training sessions.
This industry leader serves as the singular information hub for their customers, for whom Piloxing has become a passion and even a career. Yet, their digital presence was far from reflecting that same authority and breadth.
Instead, different facets of the business operated on multiple platforms, using multiple URLs, without sharing information across sites. That digital structure created a disjointed user experience and countless hours of redundant, manual administrative work.
When one of their web platforms began approaching end of life, Piloxing Academy began searching for a singular solution that could facilitate the company’s growth. It wasn’t long before they were referred to Impulse Creative by another agency for a “heavy HubSpot implementation."
Our team seized the opportunity to leverage both new and classic HubSpot tools, along with one-of-a-kind integrations, to create a multi-faceted digital space for Piloxing Academy’s worldwide network of trainers, classes and workshops.
“There’s a bunch of new features in HubSpot that allow for restricted access and access based on being a logged-in user and we’re one of the first agencies to utilize it,” explained Impulse Creative CEO Remington Begg.
When Piloxing Academy came onboard at Impulse Creative, they had already chosen HubSpot as their new platform. Our challenge was to merge the information and functionality of three separate portals into one streamlined site.
The new website needed to serve the client’s three main buyer personas: master trainers, trainers/aspiring trainers and class attendees. Each needed a separate comprehensive directory, dynamic library of multimedia resources and scheduling features.
Previously, Piloxing Academy used their main website to serve class attendees with a database of customers, class/workshop listings and resource directories. Trainers and master trainers used a portal based on Ning, another platform and website, to create and store the resources they were generating for class attendees. These separate sites, multiple logins and having to manually update information across platforms made the old system cumbersome and difficult to use.
For master trainers, we needed to ensure HubSpot could support the creation, storage and organization of the resources they generated for class attendees. We also needed to create a directory listing of the training workshops they hosted for instructors worldwide. Trainers, those who lead classes for attendees, needed the ability to change the class directory easily and often, without having access to HubSpot. Class attendees needed a streamlined user experience in which they could easily locate and sign up for classes.
Our development team’s first step was bringing everything into one central contact database in HubSpot, which is why we used the HubSpot CRM. Then, we built out directories for workshops, trainers, and classes using multiple HubDB tables. That allowed for us to create directory listings on the website.
With that foundation in place, there were three main solutions we built workflows for: the process of signing up for workshops, the new submission approval process and a member’s only resource library.
For this workflow, we leveraged Eventbrite, an event-hosting tool that allows trainers to register for workshops while also giving master trainers a way to record the attendance of the workshops. That integration allowed all of Piloxing Academy’s event-based information to sync back to HubSpot and update the status of each trainer contact.
Then, we integrated DepositFix, a conduit between Stripe and HubSpot, which allowed for us to connect to Stripe as a credit card processor for the subscription payments required for paid membership access.
Piloxing Academy needed a tool for the approval of trainer profiles, giving them essential quality control as membership boomed. Trainer profiles, updated information, photos, class information, all user-generated content had to be reviewed before becoming visible on the website.
The HubSpot Service Hub provided forms and service ticket tools for a seamless approval process. Once approved, new content is automatically populated in HubDB via HubSpot’s API and was made publicly visible on the Piloxing Academy website.
Finally, we built out a membership section of the website, bringing the educational portal onto the main Piloxing Academy website for the first time. For this solution we utilized HubSpot’s new membership features, as well as smart content, to create an intranet that showed resources based on the user’s membership level.
Trainers now have access to contextual content based on membership type and previous activity including course materials, choreography videos, music, marketing, equipment resources, discounts and more.
The My PIA central dashboard for class attendees, trainers and master trainers shows a bio, billing address, contact information, memberships, photo and available classes. In just one click from their personal dashboard, trainers can access a form to add a class and submit it for approval by the Piloxing Academy team and make certain information public in their profiles.
Piloxing.com trainers can now find what they need and get to work faster thanks to a streamlined user experience, single platform for resources and easy to maintain event information. Visitors to Piloxing.com from all over the world are automatically shown classes in their area on a map with expandable details including times, fees, driving directions and more.
Signing up for classes or workshops and accessing the resources you need is now easier than ever for all site visitors and members on every level, facilitating Piloxing Academy’s current and future growth.
As a result of these changes, the Piloxing Academy corporate team is saving time and resources, with automated processes for content approval and implementation, as well as cross-tool data sharing.
They’re also happy to be able to manage videos on a time-based basis through the tools Impulse Creative set up for them, so their clients see what they’re supposed to see. And they don’t have to spend time each day changing access for all of their members. It’s saving time, which translates to saving as much as the salary of two marketing specialists.
And on the front-end, members and instructors see a system that delivers exactly what they need. It’s a win-win-win.