I’m a child of the modern era. I grew up with the internet, YouTube and smart phones. And while these devices certainly weren’t designed with the horse world in mind, they’ve done plenty to make our lives in the barn just a little bit easier. I’ve incorporated some really great technology into the way I run my business. Here are a few of my favorite devices, apps and other techno toys that make my business run well.
• TimeCenter.com, our online lesson scheduling system. I used to schedule lessons something like this: An interested student emails or calls me and says, “Hey, I’d like a lesson. When do you have time?” I email or call back and say, “Great, I have Tuesday or Thursday.” Student says she can’t do those days, but could do next Wednesday. I say not this Wednesday, but rather next Wednesday, at 4. They say it has to be earlier than 4, or they could do next next Friday after 2, and on, and on, and on.
Now I schedule lessons like this: an interested student goes to www.timecenter.com/spriesersporthorse, looks at my and my assistant trainers’ teaching schedules, and signs up for what works for them. Bang. Done. The system also emails students a reminder, locks changes out at 24 hours (per my cancellation policy), and syncs to my phone.
There are lots of websites out there like TimeCenter, but I’ve had unbelievable customer service from them, plus they’re based in Sweden, which means that, since I’m one of those annoying morning people, I can shoot them an email at 3 in the morning my time and get an instant response. That’s just the icing on the cake of spending so, so much less time organizing appointments and more time riding and teaching. Hoorah!
• BarnManager.com, which is exactly what it sounds like. I run a big program with lots of horses, including some that come and go for weeks or months at a time. I wanted an easy way to keep track of the essentials—when they were last shod, when they got their fall shots, when they had their last dewormer or fecal test.
BarnManager does all that and more. The software is infinitely customizable, allowing users to record pretty much anything: work, turn-out, drugs and medications, competition schedules and results. We can upload a coggins to each horse’s record, and since we can access the site from anywhere, it means we can access that paperwork from anywhere, like at a show when we’ve forgotten to submit one with an entry because we’re stupid. (This, obviously, never happens to me, because I’m a genius. Obviously.)
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There’s even a billing option, which makes billing clients a snap, if yours is the kind of business that does a lot of things a la carte. All my staff get usernames and logins, so we can all keep horses records up to date. And everything is super easy and intuitive, very user friendly.
The girls at BarnManager are also experts at customer service—if we come across a glitch or something we’d like to see added, it gets done, stat. It’s that easy.
The only thing missing is a smart phone app, which should be out later this summer.
And just for my readers, the awesome ladies of BarnManager are offering 50% off your first month if you sign up by May 31 and enter coupon code Fiero. Thanks guys!
• our infrared solarium from Sport Innovations. Hard to believe it as the temps get into the 90s this week, but it does get chilly in Virginia. I first fell in love with solariums when I lived and trained in Germany, another country with a propensity for cold and damp in the wintertime, and loved that the infrared lights don’t just warm the air, but penetrate deep into the muscles to loosen them up.
Our solariums (we have two, one for each wash stall) also have fans that blow heated air, so God forbid someone rolls in the mud the day before being body clipped (here’s looking at you, Johnny), they can get a bath even when the temps aren’t so nice.
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• the Equuscom WiWi wireless headset system. A few years ago I got a node on my vocal cords from yelling to students at horse shows. I had to stay silent for two weeks to recover, and I’ve not really been right since; I can feel my voice start to waiver at the end of a long teaching day, even when I’m at home with my arena sound system.
But particularly when I’m travelling, to clinics or shows, I have to really protect my voice. Enter the WiWi (pronounced why-why, by the by), a teeny weenie little transponder that connects to a range of ear pieces, from the in-ear to the around-ear to the over-ear. There are enough options for every preference. And these little buggers wear like iron; they hold up to an entire day of constant use, have crystal-clear sound quality, and can carry a long distance. Mostly they’re no muss, no fuss, unlike all the other headset communication devices we’ve owned over the years (and we’ve pretty much owned them all). The WiWi gets my vote.
• Facebook, Constant Contact and other communication tools. Ah, Facebook, the great time waster. But in addition to letting me stalk the people I went to high school with to make sure they’re getting fat at the same rate I am, Facebook has given me a really good portal to communicate with my customers. Combining that with our new website (coming soon!!) and using Constant Contact to manage our email blasts, and I can get my message out, whatever that message is.
I use other forms of social media—Twitter, Instagram—but it seems like the Sprieser Sporthorse Facebook page and my own Lauren Sprieser Facebook page are the ones that get the most traffic, and are the most well-suited to what I use them for, announcing news from the farm (like new sale horses, welcoming new clients or congratulations on show results), promoting farm events (like clinics or camps), and promoting this blog. We have a new website (again, about to be released unto the world, stay tuned) which is an important place for directions, biographical information on myself and the farm and my staff, and more details on what we do, but Facebook is The Place for news.
Constant Contact also lets me email my customers a really beautiful newsletter, instead of just “Here’s What’s Up” in boring ol’ text.
So it’s not just tweeting while driving, Words With Friends and Farmville; technology has made our horsey lives better. Now let me take a selfie with my horse.
