Background

Located just north of Silicon Valley and a short distance from San Francisco International Airport, the Northern California city of Millbrae offers residents an ideal blend of cosmopolitan and typical suburban life. This allows for a smaller softball league and the opportunity to partner with nearby leagues in other cities, expanding experiences and alliances.

In the dugout with Robert Latin, MGSA League President

Robert Latin’s outstanding record as the League’s Finance and Fundraising Director, and Webmaster, earned him the role of League President for the upcoming 2011-2012 season. With three daughters and two jobs, he also coached his two youngest in the 6U Division and his oldest in the 10U Division. Once the Rec League finished up in May, he led Millbrae’s 10U All-Stars through five summer tournaments. This, along with his finance and fundraising activities; one has to wonder when he sleeps.

What inspired you to pursue online registration and a Clubspaces website?

The initial interest was sparked by an email from ASA promoting the Clubspaces websites. I looked into it and found another local league had created their website on Clubspaces as well. Our old League website was archaic and didn’t provide much information to the community regarding MGSA. It was difficult to customize and had no appeal whatsoever. Then when I saw how easy the Clubspaces site was, and that it offered full customization as well as complete online registration, I knew we had to try it. I could tell how easy the navigation was and that it would be easy to set up once, modify as needed, and eventually hand over to someone else down the line.

Have you found the switch to online registration has increased efficiency?

Absolutely. Previously, all registration was on paper: forms would be mailed in or dropped off at a local recreation center. Now it’s really simplified. In fact, not one player registered manually this year. Before, 80% of our registrations came in during the last two weeks before the cut-off date. Now we get 50% in first the two or three weeks. It’s a great benefit. It also makes it so much easier to get word out about everything that’s happening in MGSA. It’s user-friendly for parents, and that’s the way it should be. Looking back, I can see how much data entry had been required of our Registration Manager. Now we don’t have misspelled names; we just need to organize, get the word out and run reports when needed.

Are you using your online registration to raise funds?

Definitely. When we started this in 2010 we included as part of registration an option for parents to select a taxdeductible donation to MGSA. The last figure I saw indicated generous contributions of more than $600 from parents, which we wouldn’t have received without the online registration function.

Do you find the site helps you acquire and promote sponsors?

Our Clubspaces website has been a win-win in this area. If you’re going to ask businesses to give you money I feel you have to provide value in return. We had a remarkable year last year, with 21 sponsors; this brought MGSA a tremendous amount of money. I was able to create a value package for sponsors providing excellent exposure for them. It was easy to add business logos/names with hyperlinks to their company websites. Active showed me how to put sponsor ads and information not just on the sponsor and home pages, but throughout the site, thus increasing exposure for our sponsors. The bottom line was, every parent would have to utilize the website for information and to register and our sponsors would be right there in front of them at all times. I know we’ll generate an even greater number of sponsorships next year.

How does online registration help you assign players to divisions by age?

Well, there’s information entered for each age group, which allows the system to organize everything automatically. Because the system only allows a registration to fall within a specified age group once the birth date is entered, we know each placement is correct. That has completely simplified the process and informs parents of their daughter’s divisions immediately. Accurate data is a crucial part of ASA softball.

How have you used your Clubspaces website to increase participation?

Email is a much faster and more cost effective method of reaching the players and parents, past and current, so sending information about our website was quick and easy. We send broadcast emails, one of which encouraged folks to check out our new Clubspaces site; another was to promote online registration. Just knowing I could give out the website and know that people could check it out on their own and get all the information they need about MGSA makes it well worth it. One day during an All-Star practice, a family with two girls was walking by and had a few questions about our softball program. So as to not take much time from my players, I was able to refer them to our website for all sorts of great information on how to get their girls involved.

Have you received the guidance and tech support you need from Active?

Yes, the support has been very good. I learn best by going in and playing around on the back end of the website, but whenever I needed answers to problems, my account rep or someone in customer service could provide solutions. There never was a time when my questions were not taken care of in a timely manner.

What other features do you like about Clubspaces?

The photo gallery is very cool; one of the very first things we got up were photos from previous years. The sponsorship thing was great too, and we sold more merchandise this year: shirts, hoodies and yearbooks that were all advertised on the website with photos. The calendar is a great tool, being able to organize special events. Just being able to put a flash of information on top of the home page is very valuable. I also like how the different sections of the site offer solid value to users, with FAQs, a list of the board members and contact info, etc.

Clubspaces is the Official Online League Management System of ASA