9 Tech Tools Your Dance Studio Needs

It always feels like you have 1,000 things to do every day…actually 1,000 things feels like it will barely get you to lunch time.  There are plenty of tools out there that can help make running your dance studio that little bit easier.  Imagine if you could be more productive, get more students through the door and see more money trickle into your bank account!

Unfortunately there is not an app that will do all that for you with a few taps on your screen…but we can always dream right??

A word of warning here too, setting up these apps and programs will take a bit of time.  Becoming proficient in them may take even longer.  Anything that adds this much value to your business takes more than simply signing up.  But the time that you invest learning to use these tools yourself, or training staff up to use them will be INVALUABLE to your Dance Studio in the long term.

Music Tools

Music is kinda important in a Dance Studio…would be a little empty without it. What system do you have in place currently to ensure your music is high quality and easily accessible to all staff?  These 3 tech tools will help your music issues a thing of the past.

• iTunes – Free

  I know, I know…most of you will already have this so you’re already ahead of the game :-).  It is vital that you are using iTunes or another platform to purchase high quality versions of songs to use in your classes.  The fact that it means you wont face any copyright or legal issues helps too! No more ripping audio of YouTube clips etc…the quality is low and you could get into trouble.

• Cloudbeats – Free…but pay the $7.99 for the full version

  It’s 3 minutes before the pre-school Ballet class starts and your teacher has only now told you she can’t make it (sound familiar??). You don’t have their song and you’ve got 12 excited little ballerinas itching to get into class. Cloudbeats can help here.

  This is a great little app for your phone that allows your teachers to access all of their current class music from their phones.  Teachers upload their music into a shared folder on Google Drive, OneDrive or Dropbox and any staff member can play their songs from anywhere, anytime.

• Logic Pro X – $199

  The best music editing program out there…but you need to be a Mac user. I can hear you asking “Why would I buy this when Garage Band is free?”
  A valid question, but for Dance Studio’s, Logic Pro is worth every cent.  Think about how many song edits you do in a year? How about in 5 years or 10 years? The amount of extra features and control you have over Garage Band is awesome.  If you’re a perfectionist and want your music edits sounding top notch then this is the way to go.  It will take a little bit to learn, but take some time and do it and you wont regret it!

Team Communication

Whether you already have a few admin staff, or are just looking at putting on your first office team member, having clear and effective communication channels is key.  These 3 tools will help your Dance Studio admin team be a slick unit.

• Slack – Free

  Their tagline is ‘Where work happens’ which is pretty apt.  Slack’s purpose is decluttering your inbox so that we can communicate more effectively with colleagues and actually get shit done (instead of spending all day lost in emails). On the surface, it’s just an instant messenger system, but once you get into it you will find that it is so much more.

• Asana – Free

  Allows you to get yourself and your team organised with the tasks that need to get done.  You outline a task and, state the due date and assign the task to yourself or (hopefully) another team member. Asana complements Slack really well…Asana is your to-do list, while Slack helps you communicate with others to get the tasks completed.

• GSuite – From $5 per user per month

  Google’s Gsuite apps are transforming workplaces around the world.  I know thats a big statement right…but it’s true.  I could write a whole blog simply dedicated to the benefits of using GSuite (and I will, so check back here).  It provides you with:

  – the best Email Inbox platform going around

  – the ability to create documents, spreadsheets, slideshows and 1000 other things.

  – an easy and seamless way to share documents between your team

  – So, so, so much more.

  In the meantime their YouTube channel is awesome and outlines all the cool things that you can do with GSuite in nice little 5-6 minute videos.  Set aside some time and check it out…I guarantee you’ll sign up after.

3 other must have apps in your Dance Studio

• Azagi – From 10c per student per month

  So I’m not going to let this blog post go without a shameless plug 🙂  But in all reality we think that Azagi is a great tool to increase positive parent engagement at your studio.  It helps keeps your parents informed and turns them into raving fans of your studio.  It is quick and easy for teachers to use and is a cost effective way to help boost your retention rates.

• Jackrabbit – From $45 per month

  In my mind, this is the premier Dance Studio software out there.  If you don’t have studio software as yet this is an absolute must.  Check out my blog on choosing the best Studio Software package to read more.

• Canva – Free

  This is a great app for quickly designing fantastic looking images and graphics for your marketing.  It’s got a really easy to use interface and has pre-done templates for all of your Facebook ads so you can just drag your own images and text and away you go!

Jump on in and sign up!

So you’re ready to give some of these a go and improve your productivity and profitability (yay for you!).  Remember that the key to making any technology implementation a success is:

1. Allow yourself enough time to properly set up and familiarise yourself with the program. It will take a bit of time to set up the program or app properly.  Invest the time so that you can enjoy the benefits.
2. Introduce them one at a time.  If you try and start 3 or 4 of these things at once, chances are you’ll get frustrated and think it’s all too hard and throw them all on the scrap heap.

Good luck! If you have any other tech tools that you find amazing in your day to day running of your studio we’d love to hear about it in the comments below!