Business School
eCommerce 56330
‘A Report on eCommerce Business Analysis of
Le Sporta Fitness Club’
Student Number
: 200515745
Programme of Study
: MSc Business Management
Year of Study
: 2007/2008
Semester
:2
Module Leader
: Ms Wendy Robson
Date of Submission
: Wednesday, 14th May, 2008
Words Count
: 1632 words
Executive Summary
Target Market Ecommerce Analysis

5 categories of customers are defined:
o Families who are couples with children and they like searching for
activities which facility for children of all ages
o Course learners who prefer joining classes and making friends
o Frequent exercisers who do exercise stably - 3 or 4 per week
o Athletics/National players who are professional in particular sport
o Muscle Builders who concentrate on building up their muscle
Best Practice Ecommerce Analysis

Visual style: A premium and high-tech design is suggested to target higher
income level customers as they prefer choosing a fitness club

Use of colour: It provides an elegant and leisure effect to attract higher income
level customers

Value adding: Fitness clubs send reminding messages to customers to attend
the class

Communication area: it enables customers share their opinions online after they
join the fitness club

Online function: It offers online booking, online subscription for customers

Content: A simple and clearly content is desirable

User friendly: Customers can call online directly by clicking the bottom which
connects to Skype service software.
Intranet/B2B Requirements Analysis

Contents to be put directly on the page
o The detail information of dealers
o The personal details of first time customers
o The details of members who booked that classes
2

Utilities
o To announce news for internal staff
o To apply sick and annual leaves
o To check their working schedule
o To read and send/reply messages to internal staff, customers, and
suppliers
o To view and edit their personal information
o To view internal staff contact details

Links
o Facilities maintenance companies and manufacturers to get information of
new equipments and the maintenance of facilities.
o Cleaning service companies to arrange the time for cleaning the fitness
club
o Toiletries dealers to order toiletries, such as shampoo, soup
o Food & drinking suppliers to order sandwiches, and bottle water
o Fitness consultant agencies to get advices as regards health and fitness
3
Content
1.0
Introduction
5
2.0
Target Market Ecommerce Analysis
6
2.1
The Table of Target Market
6
2.2
The Table of Business Process
8
3.0
4.0
Best Practice Ecommerce Analysis
9
3.1
The Table of Best Practice
9
3.2
The Table of Bad Practice
11
Intranet/B2B Requirements Analysis
12
4.1
Contents to be put directly on the Page
12
4.2
Utilities
12
4.3
Links
12
5.0
Conclusions
13
6.0
Appendixes
14
List of Appendix
Appendix 1 - Best Practices “Visual Style” and “the Use of Colour”
14
Appendix 2 - Best Practice “Content”
14
Appendix 3 – Best Practice “Find Out More”
15
Appendix 4 – Best Practice “User Friendly”
15
Appendix 5 – Best Practice in using “Join Us” instead of “Membership”
16
Appendix 6– Bad Practice in using “Membership”
16
4
1.0
Introduction
This report is the eCommerce business analysis of one of a small chain of fitness
gyms – Le Sporta Fitness Club. Le Sporta Fitness Club operates 3 fitness clubs which
located in London, Leeds, and Hull respectively. The report includes three sections.
Firstly, a market analysis of Le Sporta Fitness Club is going to be analyzed which
covers category of customers, the profile of customers, as well as the needs and wants
of customers on the website. Secondly, best practice analysis of the websites of other
fitness clubs which are targeting the similar customers and delivering the similar
services to the particular customers is covered in this section. The purpose of it is to
enhance the attractiveness to both members and potential customers through the use of
those best practices from other fitness clubs’ websites. The last section is the Intranet
requirements analysis is reported which covers the content, utilities, and links of the
website of Le Sporta Fitness Club.
5
2.0
Target Market Ecommerce Analysis
This section provides a market analysis of Le Sporta Fitness Club which covers different
categories of customers, the profile and description of customers, as well as the needs
and wants of customers on the website, it is presented in the following table. Besides,
the business process of eCommerce is presented in section 1.2 which covers the needs
and wants of customers in different phase of interaction.
2.1
The Table of Target Market
Category of
Description/ Profile
The wants of customers on a website
customers
Families

(Full nest)


Couples with
children
in the fitness club that family can join
Search for
together after exercised

activities which
Course

learners

Link to leisure activities such as café
Assess
to
details
of
classes,
facility for children
timetable, offer, location of fitness
of all ages
clubs, transport possibility
People who

Company details

Frequently asked questions

E-mail enquiry and contact details

Subscription of membership

Opening time

Link to information of group offer

Assess
to
details
of
classes,
prefer joining
timetable, offer, location of fitness
classes rather
clubs, transport possibility
than doing gyms

Company details
Sociable, they like

Frequently asked questions
making friends in

E-mail enquiry and contact details
the course

Subscription of membership

Opening time
6
Frequent

exercisers

Assess to details of offer, location of


Promotions for mutual members
Health conscious

Company details

Subscription of membership

Opening time

Assess to details of offer, location of
People who are
professional in
players
particular sports

fitness clubs, transport possibility
times per week
National
fitness clubs, transport possibility


Builders
People who

Company details

Frequently asked questions

E-mail enquiry and contact details

Subscription of membership

Opening time

Assess to the information of personal
concentrate on
training on muscle building
building up their

News and events on muscle building
muscle rather

Assess to details of offer, location of
than doing

News & Events about competitions in
sports
Interested in
sports
Muscle
Promotions & News
exercise 3 or 4

Athletics/
People who do

fitness clubs, transport possibility
exercise

Company details
Willing to have a

Frequently asked questions
perfect body

E-mail enquiry and contact details
sharp

Subscription of membership

Opening time
7
2.2
The Table of the Business Process
Phase of
The wants of customers at this stage
Notes about group
interaction
Per-sale
support

Company details


Frequently asked questions

E-mail enquiry and contact details

Searching tools

What the fitness club offers

Site map

Opening time

Privacy policy

Advices and comments about fitness
Every categories
of customers
clubs from discussion board

Free trial for the fitness clubs

Privacy policy

Term and conditions

Class description and timetable

Course learner

Subscription of membership

Every categories

Opening time

Details of classes and timetable

Online booking system

Email
During the
of customers
confirmation
of

Course learner

Athletes/
successful
booking
sale

Booking on personal training

Online booking system

Email
National players
successful

Muscle builders
News & Events (Special offer or

Every categories
confirmation
of
booking

After the
promotion) to customers’ emails or
8
of customers
sales
their accounts

Forum for them to share opinions and
their feedback
After the

Special offer to mature members

sales
exercisers

3.0
Frequent

Re-booking service
Course learner
Best Practice Ecommerce Analysis
Both the best and bad practices of the website for the fitness gym business are
presented in this section in order to understand what elements the fitness gym – Le
Sporta Fitness Club – can do better on its website. In order to become the best website,
there are many factors essential which are showing in the following table:
3.1
The Table of Best Practice
Elements
Explanations
Visual Style
Layout should match to suitable age and income level as
audiences prefer joining the fitness club based on it. For intance,
adults with higher income level would prefer choosing a fitness
club which website was made as a premium and high-tech
design. The fitness club – Esporta – is a good example
(Appendix 1).
Use of Colour
Pale delicate colours, such as grey and white, used in the
background, and hard colours, such as deep purple, used in the
passage are recommended because the above matching is able
to present an elegant and leisure effect to attract the target
audience. For example, people who are in higher social class
would like browsing website with the elegant and leisure effects.
Esporta is an example (Appendix 1).
9
Value adding
Since many people forget their booking date and time for the
fitness class due to the busy life. Some fitness clubs such as
Fitness First, offer after-sales-services to their members. For
example, when a member books a dancing class in the fitness
club, they will send a confirmation of booking to both their
member accounts and email addresses.
Communication area It is good in providing forums that enable customers to post their
experiences.
Online function
Some fitness clubs provides online functions to their customers.
For example, online booking that member can book a dancing
class online. Besides, online subscription enables people who
would like joining the club.
Content
Simple and clearly content in each website page is good to avoid
the website becoming complicated. For example, Esporta puts
only several paragraphs in each page (Appendix 2). If people
would like knowing further details, they can click on the hyperlink
of ‘Find out more’. (Appendix 3).
User friendly
It is a tool which enables people to contact the fitness club
directly by clicking the bottom which links to the Skype telephone
service (Appendix 4).
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3.2
The Table of Bad Practices
Elements
Explanations
Animation
Some fitness clubs create an animation such as add-ins, and
java plug ins, that some people cannot access it because they
may still use the old version of Microsoft.
Links
Links to irrelevant website which is not matched to the topic.
Expression style
As fitness gym is one of the leisure activities, some vocabularies
should not be too formal, energetic words instead. For example,
‘Join Us’ is suggested instead of ‘Subscription’ or ‘To be a
member’ (Appendix 5 & 6).
Photo
If a website targets adults, photos with old people or teenagers
should not be posted; otherwise it will be confused for targeting a
market. For example, a photo shows a joyful of adults who are
doing gym is more relevant to a photo that teenagers who are
doing gym.
Colour
Too sharp colour in the website content (Appendix 6) will make
people stop further browsing the website. It is because fitness
gym is the leisure activity, target audiences would like to browse
some websites which enable to read easily and comfortably.
11
4.0
Intranet/B2B Requirements Analysis
Intranet is used by staff who are working within a company – fitness club. The main
purpose of the Intranet is to provide an interface to a fitness club to contact both
customers and suppliers. Apart from that, there are several different roles within the
fitness club as follows:
4.1
Contents to be put directly on the page

The detail information of dealers such as contact information

The personal details of first time customers

The details of members who booked that classes
o Personal information of members
o Booking information such as time, location, type of class
4.2
Utilities

To announce news for internal staff

To apply sick and annual leaves

To check their working schedules

To read and send/reply messages to internal staff, customers, and suppliers

To view and edit their personal information

To view the contact details of internal staff
4.3
Links
There are links that staff can connect to the suppliers directly:

Facilities maintenance companies or manufacturers – to get information of new
equipments, such as facilities of gyms, the maintenance of facilities, special
offers

Cleaning service companies – to arrange the time for cleaning the fitness club

Toiletries dealers – to order toiletries, such as shampoo, soup for customers use
after they did exercise

Food & drinking suppliers – to order sandwiches, and bottle water for customers

Fitness consultant agencies – to get advices as regards health and fitness
12
Conclusions
The report has analyzed the eCommerce of fitness club. First of all, 5 categories of
customers were targeted for Le Sporta Fitness Club, followed by covering the best
practices of websites that the fitness club should apply. The best practices focused on
the following elements: visual style, use of colour, value adding, communication area,
online function, content, and user friendly. The analysis of Intranet requirements is
mentioned in the last section.
13
6.0
Appendixes
Appendix 1 - Best Practices “Visual Style” and “the Use of Colour”
Sources: http://www.esporta.com/default.asp
Note 1: Refer to “Visual Style”: The premium and high-tech design is that the picture can be changed
automatically.
Note 2: Refer to “The Use of Colour”: The use of colour of the website was matched perfectly.
Appendix 2 - Best Practice “Content”
Source: http://www.esporta.com/bristol/default.asp
14
Appendix 3 – Best Practice “Find out more”
Source: http://www.esporta.com/classes.asp
Appendix 4 – Best Practice “User Friendly”
Source: http://www.barryhouse.co.uk
15
Appendix 5 – Best Practice in using “Join Us” instead of “Membership”
Source: http://www.fitnessfirst.com.hk/cn/joinus/joinus.asp
Note: Refer to “Expression style”: The website uses “Join Us” instead of “Membership”.
Appendix 6 – Bad Practice in using “Membership”
Source: http://www.lafitness.co.uk/
Note 1: Refer to “Expression style”: The website uses “Membership” which is too formal.
Note 2: Refer to “Colour”: The website is too sharp.
16