Simplifying scheduling and payments for personal trainers
From spreadsheets to scalable software, turning an idea into a working platform for personal trainers
The Problem
As part of an internal side project we set out to discover whether we could improve on the plethora of personal training software available to personal trainers.
What initially started out as a hunch about a gap in the market for personalised personal training software quickly turned into something else once we actually started the process of interviewing a number of personal trainers.
One of the main issues self employed personal trainers face is reconciling the time delivered in sessions vs the time the have actually billed a client for. As of writing there isn't anything on the market that solves this basic problem with personal trainers using a number of different pieces of software for each task they needed to perform.
With the ambition of our side project being much more than booking system this gave is a starting point as to which the most useful feature might be.
- Stakeholder Interviews
- Journey Mapping
- Wireframes
- Prototyping
- User Testing
- UI Design
The Process
We spoke to trainers to understand how they run their personal training businesses so we could identify key pain points as well as where the spent unnecessary time duplicating administrative effort. We carried out the following tasks.
Proto-persona and journey-mapping workshops
These sessions helped us build an understanding of who we were designing for and what they’re trying to achieve. By sketching out realistic user types and mapping their paths through the process, we uncovered gaps, stumbling points and opportunities early on. It means we make fewer assumptions and base decisions on shared evidence rather than personal opinion. There were multiple personal trainer persona types with slightly different business models and ways of working.
User-story definition and interactive wireframes
Clear user stories keep the team focused, each feature must serve a specific need, not just “feel useful”. Turning these stories into interactive wireframes let us test them directly with the personal trainers before anything was built. This flushed out missing steps, awkward interactions, unnecessary complexity and the correct language or nomenclature for the interface long before code becomes expensive to change.
Rapid guerrilla testing to validate flows
A quick round of informal testing with personal trainers doesn’t require a lab or a long report, just honest reactions from personal trainers trying to complete tasks. These tests stoped us polishing a flawed design and give practical direction on what to fix next.
Interface design focused on clarity and consistency
Good interface design isn’t about decoration; it’s about helping people understand what to do next without having to think twice. By keeping the layouts consistent, language plain and controls predictable between each section, we reduced cognitive load and avoid needless mistakes. The result is a product that feels straightforward, reliable and “just works”.
- Built with AWS Amplify and Next.js
- Stripe integration for easy payments
- Fully responsive and accessible
- Ready for native app support
The Solution
The result is a clean, responsive platform built around the core tasks trainers handle every day with a consistent users interface between each task.
Early users are already live, and the foundations are in place for future native apps, custom branding and personalisation as the product grows.
Trainers can:
- Manage timetables in daily or weekly views.
- Charge for no sessions that were not attended.
- Let clients prepay for sessions using a session balance.
- At a glance see any clients with unpaid sessions or zero session balance.
- Track sessions automatically in one place.
- Log or process payments through Stripe or mark as cash payment.
By grounding the platform in real trainer behaviour, PT Portal moved from concept to product with a structure that reduces admin, speeds up scheduling and scales with the business.