Are you a physical activity professional looking for software to track your clients?
Adapted physical activity specialist, health and wellness coach, sports coach, strength and conditioning coach, physiotherapist billing outside standard codes, gym manager…
If individualized service matters to you, then you need professional software, and there seem to be no shortage of options.
In this article, we’ll walk you through the questions to ask yourself and the details worth a closer look, so you can make the right choice among all the tools out there.
The questions to ask yourself to choose the right client tracking software
Before comparing feature lists, ask yourself these questions.
Will this tool improve your coaching and your business enough to justify changing how you work?
Client tracking software is the tool you’ll use every day, with every client. The right choice depends on how well it fits your profession, your clientele, and the way you work. Software pays for itself in several ways; it’s up to you to define upfront what you expect from it, so you can tell if it checks the right boxes.
Structure, professionalism, time savings, client retention, consistency of service: what’s your main goal in switching tools?
Was it made for your line of work?
Depending on the type of client you work with and the kind of support you provide, some features matter more than others. To help you find your way, the next section offers a guide to the features worth looking for.
What kind of partner are you looking for?
Choosing software also means choosing the company behind it.
Software isn’t static: it takes a whole team behind the tool to keep improving it, respond when you run into a problem, protect your clients’ data, and ship regular updates.
So before you choose, look at the company behind the tool:
How long the company has been around
With AI tools, many companies are launched, build a piece of software, and disappear within a year or two, taking with them all the data you entered. To avoid starting from zero, choose a partner with a track record.
The quality of its customer support
You will inevitably need help from customer support. Check the stated response times, the language support is offered in, and what client reviews say about it.
Regular updates
Needs, technology, security standards, interfaces, and phones are constantly evolving. Make sure your provider ships regular updates.
At Hexfit, that translates into +250 updates per year, a 97% satisfaction rate, and a median response time of 1min 36s on live chat.
What level of security do you need?
As a professional, you’re responsible for the confidentiality and protection of your clients’ data: your choice of tool is your responsibility.
If the tool doesn’t properly protect the data it stores, you’re the one exposed. So before choosing, verify that the tool actually implements what’s needed to secure that data.
Here are a few certifications worth knowing about:
ISO 27001
An international information security standard, the same one used by banks and hospitals. To earn it, a company must demonstrate a real security management system is in place: ongoing risk assessment, access controls, an incident response plan, and staff security training. The certification is issued by an independent body and must be renewed through regular audits.
GDPR
The European regulation governing the collection and processing of personal data. It applies as soon as you have clients in Europe, and compliance is mandatory for everyone who does.
PIPEDA (Canada)
Canada’s federal law governing how private-sector organizations collect, use, and disclose personal information. In the physical activity field, most of the data you manage counts as personal and health-related information, so if you work with clients in Canada, make sure your software provider complies with PIPEDA. If you’re based elsewhere, look for the equivalent standard for your region (for example HIPAA in the US, or GDPR if you also serve clients in Europe).
Do you want to follow a fixed method, or build in your own way of working?
Not all software is equal when it comes to flexibility.
Some lock you into an imposed way of working. Others are designed to be shaped to fit your methods when needed, while still offering ready-to-use foundations.
If your way of doing things is a competitive advantage, then choosing flexible software, like Hexfit, matters a lot.
What you can customize:
- your program library: customizing and adding exercises,
- your testing library and assessment protocols,
- adding functional building blocks to the mobile app (e.g. an online store)
- adding on-demand content: session videos, freely accessible programs,
- program sequences.
Do you need a varied exercise library?
This point completely changes your day-to-day: a weak library forces you to build your own exercises one by one. So check what the software actually gives you as a starting base:
- The volume of exercises: how many exercises are actually available from day one
- Coverage by domain: does the library only cover sports performance, or also general fitness, mobility and rehab, stretching? With or without equipment?
- Exercise format: are exercises shown as images, video, or both?
- Quality of the explanations: does each exercise include clear instructions in addition to the visual, so your client understands the movement even when you’re not there?
- Ease of filtering: can you filter by muscle group, equipment, level or goal, and is it easy to find what you need?
Features to look for, by profession and specialty
Here are the features we suggest looking for in software, depending on your situation.
Fitness coach, personal trainer
You’re looking for software that helps you build engaging programs fast, keeps your clients motivated between sessions, and lets you manage more clients without sacrificing the personal touch.
Look for the following features:
- AI-assisted program building to move faster;
- A rich, well-filtered exercise library, to build an engaging program quickly and well
- Reusable program templates from one client to the next
- Nutrition tracking and meal analysis;
- Lifestyle habit tracking;
- Group challenges;
- A smooth client mobile app;
- Progress that’s visible and easy to explain;
- Built-in billing and appointment scheduling, so you don’t manage that on a separate tool.
Health & wellness coach, clinical exercise physiologist
You’re looking for software that structures your coaching, helps you make decisions to prevent injuries or musculoskeletal disorders, lets you quickly adapt programs to what’s happening in your clients’ lives, and keeps them engaged in their own care.
Look for the following features:
- A comprehensive assessment, with initial and ongoing evaluation tests suited to a clientele that’s often older or living with chronic conditions;
- Structured follow-up notes;
- Postural analysis;
- A complete history of injuries and medical background;
- Flexibility to add personalized protocols and customize tests;
- Client feedback collection at the end of every session;
- Alerts;
- A motivating way to visualize progress.
Gym manager, studio or clinic owner
Fitness studio, health and wellness facility, high-performance training center, or gym with a dedicated front desk: the quality and consistency of client tracking is non-negotiable. The challenge: coordinating your team and delivering a consistent, high-end experience that builds long-term loyalty.
Look for the following features:
- Multi-professional team management, with shared client files and centralized tracking
- Integration with your other management tools to avoid double data entry
- White-labeling to match your brand, to reinforce your identity
- A global dashboard to manage the whole team’s activity
- Integration with your gym’s app to unify the client experience
Physiotherapist
To diversify your practice beyond standard billing codes, look for software that adapts to the type of care you want to provide while letting you keep scheduling and billing for out-of-scope services separate.
Look for the following features:
- Centralized, structured, and secure patient record management, with detailed assessments and evaluations;
- A rehabilitation and mobility exercise library, in addition to strength training;
- A dedicated tool to structure your out-of-scope practice (assessments, prevention, post-rehab coaching, billing);
- Health data compliance (ISO 27001, GDPR, and the relevant health-data hosting standard for your country), non-negotiable when you manage patient records.
Strength and conditioning coach
To maximize your athletes’ performance, you need software that multiplies your skills as a strength and conditioning coach. It should adapt to your method, not impose someone else’s. Beyond the basics, you need a flexible tool you can shape to fit you, not the other way around.
Look for the following features:
- Advanced periodization;
- Precise session prescription;
- Performance tracking based on objective data;
- Structured, science-based physical tests and evaluations;
- Connectivity with specialized wearables;
- Instant feedback from athletes.
The best way to know is to try it
No comparison page replaces testing the tool with your own clients and your own way of working.
Join the 7 000 professionals already using Hexfit in 39 countries!
No credit card required, 14-day free trial.
