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Getting Started with Flow Roll

Welcome to Flow Roll! Whether you're moving from another platform or setting up your academy's software for the first time, this guide will walk you through the essential steps to get your gym up and running smoothly.


1. Create Your Account

Signing up takes two quick steps, and you can do it from any browser. This is the short version — Creating Your Account and Signing In covers the whole thing in detail, including belt systems, Face ID sign-in, and joining a gym you were invited to.

Step 1 — Your account information: Enter your first and last name, phone number, email address, and a password. Passwords need at least 8 characters and one special character.

Step 2 — Your gym information: Enter your Gym Name (the only required field here), plus your gym's phone, email, and website if you have them. This is also where you tell Flow Roll which Martial Arts you teach and which Belt System each one uses — you can add several disciplines and mark one as your Primary. Prefer to do it later? Your martial arts and belt systems can be changed any time from the Account page — but your gym's name, phone, email, and website are set here only.

Verify your email: After you sign up, we'll email you a verification link — click it to activate your account. If it hasn't arrived, check your spam folder or click Resend Email.

Pick a plan: Every plan comes with a 14 Day Free Trial. New accounts are shown the plan options right after the first sign-in, and you can always revisit them from AccountView Subscription Plans.

[!NOTE] Subscriptions can't be purchased inside the iPhone or iPad app. Sign up and choose your plan at flow-roll.com from a computer or mobile browser, then open the app and select I Already Have Access.


2. Configure Your Academy Settings

Before you start adding members, it's crucial to ensure your academy's foundational settings are tailored to how you run your classes.

Initial Setup During Registration: When you first created your Flow Roll account, you were asked to provide your gym's basic information, select your martial art, and configure your Belt System. This ensures your academy is ready to go from day one.

Updating your martial arts & belt systems later: Flow Roll lets your gym offer one or more martial arts, each with its own optional belt system, and member ranks are tracked per art. If you skipped this step during sign-up or need to make changes later:

  1. Open the Account page from the navigation menu (gear icon).
  2. Scroll to the Member Configuration section and locate Martial Arts.
  3. Select Edit (pencil icon).
  4. Pick an art from the Martial Art dropdown (or choose Other and type its name). To track rank for that art, toggle Belt System on and choose a predefined system (like Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, Judo, or Karate), or select Create Custom Belt System to enter your own belt colors from lowest to highest.
  5. Use Add martial art to offer more disciplines, then select Save.

Creating Membership Tiers: Set up the different plans you offer your students.

  1. On the Account page, scroll to Membership Tiers.
  2. Select Add Tier to define your plans (e.g., "Basic", "Unlimited", "Kids Program").
  3. You can optionally toggle Attendance Limit to restrict how often a member on this tier can attend classes per day, week, or month.

Uploading Your Master Waiver: Before anyone signs a waiver — a lead, a member, or a walk-in — your gym's legal document needs to be on file.

  1. Open the Waivers page from the navigation menu (pen icon).
  2. Select Upload Waiver and choose your PDF (admins only—the button is hidden for other roles).

Every signature your gym collects then lands on that page. See Managing Waivers for the full walkthrough.

Enabling AI Summaries: If you want smart, AI-driven insights about your gym's health and member retention on your dashboard, toggle AI Summaries on in the Dashboard Preferences section.


3. Add Your Staff and Members

Once your settings are dialed in, it's time to bring your people into Flow Roll.

Inviting Staff Members: If you have other coaches or admins who need access to manage the gym:

  1. Go to the Account page.
  2. Select Manage Users under your personal details.
  3. Invite your staff members and assign them the appropriate role — Admin (full access, including deleting records), Editor (view and edit), or Viewer (view-only). Managing Your Staff and Their Access covers invites, pending invitations, and role changes in full.

Adding Students: You have two options for bringing your students into the system:


4. Connect to Stripe for Billing

To fully automate your academy, connect Flow Roll to Stripe. This allows you to track subscription statuses directly within your dashboard.

Linking Your Gym:

  1. Navigate to the Account page.
  2. Scroll to the Stripe Integration section.
  3. Click Link Stripe Account to Gym.
  4. You will be redirected to Stripe to securely authorize the connection. Once complete, you'll be brought back to Flow Roll.

Linking Members to Subscriptions: After Stripe is connected, you can link your Flow Roll member profiles to their existing Stripe customer records so that Flow Roll automatically tracks if their payments are active or past due.

See Collecting Membership Payments for creating plans, sending payment links, and handling failed charges, and Selling Products and Memberships for using Flow Roll as a point of sale.


5. Daily Operations

With your gym set up, you're ready for daily use!

Need more help?

If you ever get stuck, you can use the Ask Flow feature inside the app, refer back to the other documents here on the Support page, or contact our team directly at support@flow-roll.com!