How to Make a Sports Team Website

By Marc Zabudsky

Why do you want a site?

There are many reasons why teams get a web site. Here are some of the other reasons why teams get a web site:

• Communicate Effectively
• Promote the Team
• Advertise for their sponsors
• Photos
• For the Fans and Parents
• Everybody else is doing it
• The league you belong to does not have a website

Would you be surprised that the #1 reason that most teams get a web site is because all the other teams have one? But for whichever reason you ultimately have for getting web site, it is fun to make and a very rewarding experience.

Whats involved in a website?

Your time is valuable. You probably don't want to spend alot of time making updates to your website. But deciding on how to make a team website, you have some options.

• Build it yourself from scratch (Takes alot of time)
• Utilizing a Team Website solution (Takes very little time)

Components of a Team Website

Whether you choose to build-it-yourself or a template website, the basic features are the same. The following is a list of elements that you need to consider when creating a team website:

• Site Design
• Splash Page
• Main Page
• News Page
• Roster
• Locations
• Calendar
• Schedule
• Event Information
• Standings
• Statistics
• Photo Album
• Links
• Sponsors
• Page Content

Above and Beyond Features

• Game Attendance
• Surveys
• E-Mail Tools
• Forum
• Registration
• Page Editor
• Menu Editor
• Privacy Issues

Site Design

Choosing a Design

You need to decide how your site is going to look. If you play baseball, perhaps some images of people playing baseball, or images of bats and balls will help your visitors know instantly that they are looking at a baseball team website.

Site Colors

Every team has its own colors for uniforms, so try and choose a site design which include colors which match. It wouldn't make much sense to have your website look drastically different than you team colors.

Team Logo and Banner

If your team has a logo, then display your logo on your site. The logo provides a visual image of what your team is all about. Be sure to display your logo where it can be seen on every page.

Try creating a flashy banner that is dsiplayed at the top of each page to let visitors know that they are4 visiting your team website.

Here is an Online Team Banner Generators to help you create a simple banner for your website. Try it Out!

Main Page

The main page of your site is the first page people visit (except for the Splash Page), this page is sometimes called the "Power Page", because it contains the important information for visitors when they first come to your site. Usually the information provided on the main page is summary information allowing the visitor to click on the appropriate link to find out more. The main page of most team sites consists of:

• A paragraph welcoming visitors and describing what the team is all about
• A team picture
• Recent Team News
• The latest forum posts
• Popular pages or links

Remember to consider your audience and their needs when creating the main page. All the important information should be clearly summarized on the main page, and with easy links for visitors quickly find out more.

Splash Page - Optional

A Splash page is a "flashy" introduction page that visitors first see when they come to your website. A splash page is typically a Macromedia Flash plug-in, and treats visitors to a multi-media introduction of what your website is all about.

A few years back, splash pages used to be the de-facto standard for websites. However, since splash pages have a great first impression, their relevance declines as visitors return to your site at a later date.

Tips on Creating a Splash Page

If you do decide to make a splash page, here are a few tips to consider:

• Create it using software so it will work in most of today's browsers. The most popular ones are created with Macromedia Flash.
• Provide a "Skip this Page" link that allows visitors to proceed to the rest of the site without viewing the splash page.
• Once the multi-media has finished, redirect visitors to the main page.

Team News

Having news articles is very important. News should be update frequently so that everybody is aware of whats going on. If there are game cancellations, then posting this on the news section will quickly let everybody know whats happening.

Be sure to keep in the habit of posting often to encourage people to check your website frequently. Once players realize the value in checking the news often, you have created an important link to your players.

Also, when you post something in the news section, remember to update the main page to include a short summary, with a link to full news article.

Topics to post in the News Section

Items you might want to post as news include:

• Past Game Results
• Upcoming Tournaments
• Personal accomplishments of players
• Happenings within the team
• Important league information
• Game cancellations

Team Roster

This is a simple listing of all your players on your team. The team roster showcases players on your team, and their respective positions. Rosters also provide a link to player bio's and other related information.

What to display on a team roster?

Be sure to display players names, player numbers, date of birth, height, weight, and a photo

Player Bio's

Setup a Bio page for each player to give a brief history of the players accomplishments. Include relevant information that would be important for prospective scouts. Also be sure to include a recent photo of the player in full uniform.

You can optionally include the e-mail addresses of your players so that they can be easily contacted.

**Spam Warning** If you do decide to list e-mail addresses, try to display the address in such a way so that they can be read easily by normal people, but are not tracked by e-mail spammers. One good way is to make each e-mail address an image.

Locations

Provide information on where games and practices are held. Locations are important because they never change. However having information about each location makes it easier for players on your team to know where everything is.

What to Display

For each location, try and include the following information:

• Location Name
• Address
• Phone Number
• Web Site of the location
• Map URL (www address)
• Directions to get there

Calendar & Schedule

Calendars and schedules are useful because they tell everybody when and where your team will be practicing and playing games.

Calendars

A calendar is a visual representation of all events in a given month or week. At a glance a visitor can quickly know when and where the next games are.

Calendars should be organized by month, displaying each day of the week.

Schedules

A schedule is a listing of games or practices sorted by date. Schedules can provide a more information than a calendar, however it lack the visual cues that a calendar provides.

Information you can find on a schedule can include:

• Date and Time
• Type of Event (Game or Practice)
• Location
• Opponent

Visitors should be able to print or download a schedule, so they can easily refer to it at a later date.

Advanced Calendars and Schedules

A calendar and schedule can only provide summary information about events. You might want to consider including links for each event that visitors can click to get even more information about the desired event (such as itenaries, starting linups, special instructions, etc.)

Event Information

Event information is where you provide specific information about a game or practice. Visitors should be able to access event information by clicking on a links displayed in the calendar or schedule.

What to Display

Event information should include the following information:

• Event Type (Game/Practice/Tournament)
• Start Date and Time
• End Date and Time (if a multi-day event)
• Opponent (If known)
• Location of Event
• Extra Information (Such as an itenary, etc.)
• Who needs to Attend (Optional)

With the linking nature of the web, be sure to provide links for the location if the players need directions to get to the event.

Standings

Standings are a measure of your team's performance or rank. Standings is a listing of all the teams in the league or division, and are usually based on the number of wins and losses, or points. If you team has won all of its games, most likely you can expect to be displayed at the top of the list.

Basic Standings

The basic components of most standings are listed below:

• Rank
• Wins
• Losses
• Ties
• Defaults
• Total Points (Based on Wins/Losses/Ties)
• Points For (PF)
• Points Against (PA)
• Points Difference (PF-PA)

The above listing provides you with an indication of how standings are determined. Not all sports track the standings the same. For example in baseball, there are no Ties.

Your Team Standings

Since most leagues already track the standings, it is a bit more difficult for teams to track the standings themselves. For your displaying standings on your site, you have a couple of options:

• Manually enter in standings for each team in your division
• Provide a web link to your league standings
• Capture a RSS feed of standings from your league website
• Display the league standings page *inline* on your page through HTML.
• Provide a download of a standings document file (ie standings.doc)

It is very important to have a standings page, because your team needs to know how they rank in the league/division. Expect your players to check the standings page frequently.

Statistics

Similar to standings, statistics play an important part of your teams performance at a players level. Statistics can apply to any sport, however player statistics are usually tracked for teams who are play at a more competitive level. If your team is a recreational team, chances are you do not record player stats.

Player statistics are not an easy task. Although the end results are very rewarding for the team, player stats trackingn requires a dedicated individual to record the stats during gameplay, and then update the site at the end of the day.

Statistics Reporting

If your website requires you to manually update the site, entering in statistics can be a very laborous task. If you have many different statistical summaries, such as team leaders, and position specific stats, it would be advisable to incorporate a stats engine in which you enter in the stats once, and all the necessary reports are generated automatically.

Benefits of Statistics Tracking

If you decide to track player stats on your team, some of the benefits include:

• Increase player motivation
• Ability to set player goals
• Player promotion (especially for scouts)
• Encourage competition among the players
• Provide a focus for areas of training
• Track player progress throughout the season

Historical Statistics

Once you have entered in the statistics, you now have a historical record for the season, and stats for the previous season can be used in goal setting for the next season.

Photo Album

Photo albums are by far the most fun part of a team website. Be sure to take alot of pictures during games and practices. Whether you take photos of players in action, or group photos they provide great visuals for your site. Be sure to always add new photos to your photo album to encourage people to visit your site often.

It is important that you try to post pictures of everybody on your team, and not leave anybody out. This is a great way to help encourage team spirit, and help motivate the team.

Create a different photo album for each game or tournament your team plays in. This way if a fan or parent cannot attend a game they can easily see what they were missing out.

Also, be sure to upload photos of post game activities, or other activities your team participates in (such as a fund raiser, or a field trip) to help encourage participation for the next event.

Page Links

The Internet is based on links. So, it is important to include links from your team website to other websites that are relevant to your team. Some types of links you may want to include are:

• The League your team belongs to
• The sports association your league belongs to
• Personal websites of your players
• Your team sponsors
• Your favourite sports equipment supplier
• Information about your sport (such as drills, training, and strategies)
• Anything else relevant to your team

Sponsors

Most teams have sponsors that help to supply equipment or funding. Return your thanks to your sponsors by dedicating a page to all your sponsors or a page advertisement for each sponsor.

Sponsor Pages

Information to display on a sponsor page could be:

• Sponsor's Name
• Sponsor Logo or Banner
• Sponsors Address
• Website Link
• What they provided/game to the team (such as jersy's or equipment)
• Your Thanks

Sponsor Banners

You can also provide a banner advertisement for your sponsors that can be displayed on each page for visitors to see and click on.

Page Content

For your site, be sure to include pages that contain information that is relevant to your team but don't necessairly fit into any of the previous catagories mentioned. Examples of page content are:

• Game Rules
• Drills and Strategies
• Team Trip Information (Itenary)
• Any other relevant content

When creating page content, include images or photos to help get your message across. Bold or capitalize headers, and use colors to emphasize important information.

Make sure spelling and grammar are correct, and be creative to help get your message across.

Lets Get Started!

Creating your own team website can be a fun and rewarding experience. Your team site is a direct communication link between your players, and also provides an excellent venue for players to participate off the field.

When creating your team website, be sure to carefully plan out the elements you wish to include in yout site, keeping in mind the amount of time you can dedicate to your project.

If time is an issue, I recommend you try an Team Website solution such as Teamopolis Teams.

The Free version is Loaded full of features, and is a great way to quickly get your team website up and running in no time!

Additional Links:

• More Sports Articles
• How to Start a Sports Team
• Sports Directory
• Wiki - Baseball
• Wiki - Basketball
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• Wiki - Lacrosse
• Wiki - Rugby
• Wiki - Soccer
• Wiki - Softball
• Wiki - Ultimate Frisbee
• Wiki - Volleyball

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