Along the southern coastline of England, lies the neighbouring West Sussex communities of Adur and Worthing. Combined, these two seaside districts are home to more than 175,000 residents, a population that the award-winning Charity and Leisure Trust of South Downs Leisure (SDL) has been serving for the past decade.
Helping South Downs Leisure Better Serve Their Community with Our Complete Software Solution
Quick Facts
Client: South Downs Leisure
Community Size: 175,000+
Client Since: 2019
Key Challenges
- Different needs due to the transition from being with Councils to becoming a Trust
- Clunky, outdated software solution that wasn’t evolving with them
- Lack of functional features like online bookings and scheduled reporting
- Disjointed and inefficient staff experience that spanned multiple systems
Key Results Experienced
- A smooth onboarding experience despite resistance to change
- “Legendary” account management and support
- A readily available resource in Legend Bytes
- Increased NPS with support from our Contact Centre
- Growth of South Downs Leisure’s member base
- Improved member experience with online bookings
- Streamlined processes with scheduled reporting and dashboards
- Increased staff bandwidth due to marketing automations
- Integrated access control for a better customer experience
Along the southern coastline of England, lies the neighbouring West Sussex communities of Adur and Worthing. Combined, these two seaside districts are home to more than 175,000 residents, a population that the award-winning Charity and Leisure Trust of South Downs Leisure (SDL) has been serving for the past decade.
Through their partnership with more than 80 clubs, charities, and other providers, SDL offers community members of both Adur and Worthing leisure and hospitality facilities that seek to support the wellbeing of its residents. Helping in the Trust’s mission to enhance the lives of those who reside in the area are the passionate employees of South Downs Leisure, such as Katie McFarlane.
In the role of Business Development Director at SDL, Katie is the main point of contact for us here at Legend. Recently, she was kind enough to have a chat with our team and share her experience about partnering with us since 2019. During our conversation, Katie told us of some of the challenges SDL was facing before they switched over to Legend, the key reasons they selected us as their software of choice, and some of the many benefits they’ve experienced since the transition.
Read on to learn more about our partnership with South Downs Leisure!
South Downs Leisure’s Key Challenges Before Legend
Before SDL decided to make the switch to Legend, they had been using the same management software for an entire decade. Yet, despite the growth that South Downs Leisure was experiencing, they didn’t feel as though their software provider was evolving alongside with them. This became even more evident when SDL went from being with the Adur & Worthing Councils to becoming a Trust.
On the membership side, Katie shared that the interface of their former software was clunky and out-dated. This led to the team at SDL being concerned that they wouldn’t be able to keep up with the modern expectations of their members if they didn’t seek out a new solution.
From the staff perspective, Katie also mentioned that the team was frustrated by both the lack of features and the fact that they didn’t have all aspects of their leisure management in one place. This led to a very disjointed and inefficient user experience that spanned multiple systems.
“We were with the Councils and then we became a Trust, so everything that we did through [incumbent] was as if we were still with the Councils. [Incumbent] was quite a clunky system and, as we grew, we needed to get ahead of the game and become more modern and relevant. For example, we needed more features, more online accessibility for members, and a better reporting system. And we just wanted everything to be in one place. [Incumbent] was quite separate. So, we needed to move ahead with the times.”
Solution: A Partnership with Legend by Xplor
As a result of the challenges mentioned above, South Downs Leisure began their search for a new software. Specifically, they were looking for a leisure management system that offered a better user experience for both members and staff, as well as more streamlined capabilities that were better aligned with their new status as a Charity and Leisure Trust.
Despite considering four other vendors, SDL quickly discovered that Legend could offer everything on their wish list. As a result, their decision to go with our complete leisure management software solution was made easy.
“In looking for the new system, the challenges that we needed to resolve were things like customers being able to book themselves, online accessibility for members, integrated debit collection capabilities, and reporting. Legend streamlined all of this for us. I wasn’t involved in the purchasing process, but I was told it was the best system for all the options that we needed. Legend just ticked all the boxes for us.“
The Results of Our Partnership
From onboarding back in 2019 to benefits that persist today, South Downs Leisure has experienced many positive results since transitioning to Legend.
In particular, Katie shared that the support from our team has been incredible—from the initial switch over to the day-to-day account management. She even mentioned our online customer resource, Legend Bytes!
Katie also described how positively our wide range of software capabilities has affected South Downs Leisure’s staff and members over the years. A few highlights include our scheduled reporting, online bookings, and access control integration.
Continue reading for more details on the results of our partnership together.
A smooth onboarding experience
While Katie acknowledged that those who were not directly involved in the transition to Legend were hesitant about switching software, she was quick to say how normal she thinks that is. Change is often hard! Moving to a new software solution is no different—but the support and careful planning from our team helped alleviate any fears, making the onboarding experience a smooth one.
“There’s always going to be hesitations when changing, and I know there was a fear of change from anyone that wasn’t directly involved in the project of switching systems. I think that’s really, really natural. But Legend had a really good onboarding strategy. Your team had it laid out so we could see the processes and timelines—what was going to happen and when. And they were on-site supporting us at the time as well.“
“Legendary” account management and support
Katie went on to share that the support from Legend didn’t stop after they were onboarded. In fact, she had many wonderful things to say about our team, giving a huge shoutout to her account manager—who she even called a “legend” himself!
“We have a lot going on at the moment at South Downs Leisure. So, to have that support of such a good account manager has been so invaluable to us. No matter what, we know that we have that key person who we can reach out to whenever we need. I just love the team at Legend.”
A readily available resource in Legend Bytes
Another way that Katie said Legend has supported her team is through our online customer resource, Legend Bytes. She mentioned that it’s been very helpful for staff to be able to easily source additional information themselves simply by going online.
“Legend Bytes has really helped the staff. It’s an online service that our staff members can use if they want to find additional support on how to do something within Legend’s systems. For example, how to set up a referral code. It’s really clear and to the point of how to do these things. There are numerous examples—I could go on.”
Increased NPS with support from our Contact Centre
The positive results that have come from our Contact Centre is another benefit that Katie mentioned during our conversation. Now that our Centre handles many of their customer issues, the team at SDL has been able to focus on accomplishing their priorities and initiatives as an organisation. Not to mention that the Contact Centre has helped improved their overall Net Promoter Score (NPS) by being available to resolve customer challenges right away.
“The Contact Centre is the best thing. It saves so much time. Before, there were so many tasks that kept our team from focusing on sales and retention. Since we’ve started using the Contact Centre, we’ve reached targets every month. We’ve managed to do so many more things and bring in new projects and initiatives because those team members are now available. We are really, really busy. So, having the Contact Centre to deal with any customer issues has increased our NPS score. Our customers are really happy that they can ring and get straight through. They don’t have to come in person to speak to someone.”
Growth of South Downs Leisure’s member base
As we’ve continued in our partnership together, South Downs Leisure has been able to leverage our software in a variety of ways, including our Refer a Friend functionality. Katie shared that this particular capability has helped SDL grow their member base through referrals.
“Refer a Friend is another thing that’s helped us. Our members are our sellers, and through Legend’s system, they can offer their friends automatic discounts and things like that. There’s just so much more functionality with Legend than we had before. The old system was clunky, it was slow, and there was a lot of things we couldn’t do. So, what we can do with Legend is so much better, which has then given us the ability to grow our member base.”
Improved member experience with online bookings
Legend’s booking capabilities—both online and through the app—have also improved the overall customer experience for South Downs Leisure members. Specifically, Katie mentioned that customers love that they can book themselves and their family members from wherever they are, before they arrive at a facility.
“Legend and the app together have made our members’ experiences so much better. With Legend’s online bookings, our customers are able to book for themselves and for their children ahead of time. Before, they used to have to come in person to the centres to book activities like swimming. Then, if it was full, we’d have to turn them away. Now, they can book their swim and add their child on, all before they arrive. It’s that ease of seeing everything online. It’s just so much easier.”
Streamlined processes with scheduled reporting and dashboards
Since switching to Legend, Katie shared that reporting has become so much easier. With their previous software provider, staff had to do a lot of manual work to get the reports they needed—including Katie staying up until midnight every month to pull their end-of-month report! For these and other reporting tasks, our live dashboards and scheduling capabilities have made all the difference.
“For me, it’s all about the reporting. Having a really strong reporting system in place is key. So, Legend’s reporting capabilities have helped me solve a lot of things. With [incumbent], there weren’t any dashboards, and we had to manually pull, count and manipulate spreadsheets in order to find numbers. I used to have to wait up till midnight to pull our end-of-month reports. Now, I have my scheduled report, which automatically pulls data for the correct time at the end of every month.”
Increased staff bandwidth due to marketing automations
Another capability of Legend’s software that’s positively impacted the team at South Downs Leisure is our marketing automation module. This functionality has helped streamline multiple customer journeys that Katie said were once all handled manually, saving staff an incredible amount of time.
“Legend has also helped our staff with marketing automation. We have so many customer journeys that are now automated. If someone signed up before, we would have to send them their terms and conditions, their direct debit mandate and their welcome email—all manually. But with Legend, it’s all automated. So, we have all these journeys running in the background that we don’t have to think about. It’s massively helped our marketing team.”
Integrated access control for a better customer experience
The final result that Katie shared with us revolved around Legend’s ability to integrate with their facilities’ access control. Before South Downs Leisure was using our software, members had to visit the reception desk in order to gain entrance into their centres. Now, this system is linked with Legend, allowing for customers to enter without needing a member of staff to buzz them through.
“We didn’t have access control before that linked with our system. So, customers used to have to come to the reception desks to get buzzed through. Whereas now, our access control is integrated within Legend. It really helps when a member of staff is on the phone or dealing with another customer, they don’t have to stop what they’re doing to let a person through. It’s just much more streamlined.”
Would South Downs Leisure Recommend Legend?
To finish off our chat with Katie, we asked if she would recommend Legend by Xplor to others who were looking for a new leisure management software. She did not hesitate in sharing:
“Absolutely! Of course I would. Legend is fantastic for both our staff and our members for all the reasons we’ve talked about.”
