What exactly have I had been rambling about on my radio show First Call on JuniorHockey.com over the years with regards to marketing your team? With 5-10 minutes of talk time available in the past, I had to cram a lot in a short period of time.

I guess my elevator speech needs work. Perhaps a return to the online airways is in order soon.

So, let’s break this down a bit and let me give you a better idea of what 5-Hole Graphics can do to help your team’s image and marketing potential. This is not limited to just Tier III where recruiting is paramount, this is for any team looking to help build a fan base and recruit the top end players.

Below is just a small sampling of the lengthy series of columns that will discuss how you can better market your program.

When it comes to teenage hockey players or any sport for that matter, believe it or not your website is not your first line of offense when it comes to attracting talent. Putting together a solid social media campaign with dynamic graphics, insightful and informative posts and a broad range of viewership is key to reaching out to hockey players quickly. Putting together a range of social media platforms that work together can be one of your most effective recruiting tools.

Once you’ve attracted the attention of players and parents, your social media platforms will lead them to your team website. There are some great looking websites out there, but looks can be deceiving. If things aren’t organized or clearly laid out for the visitor to make their way around the site quickly and easily, all the great looks and graphics can mean a whole lot of nothing. 

If players and parents can find their way around a site to find the important information, like coach’s bios, rosters, alumni college commitments and, the all-forgotten CONTACT PAGE, then your site has become basically useless.

It won’t take long for people to get frustrated looking for information that should be easily accessible and give up, moving on to the next team.

Yes, it is that simple believe it or not.

Even the weakest teams in junior hockey, with a quality writer telling their story, can sound like a potential league champion.

Don’t just rely on a college intern with no hockey knowledge to put your team on the map verbally. And yes, that is VERY important despite what some think. Get someone who knows the game. Every sport can make claim to this rightfully, but hockey is a unique sport and requires a certain level of hockey intelligence to properly write a game recap, preview or hockey news story.

By the way, if this all sounded like the start of an advertisement/infomercial/whatever-you-want-to-call-it…

YOU’RE RIGHT!

This column serves two purposes. First was an introduction to this new series of columns about your team’s marketing, public relations and overall image. Second was to show you how working with 5-Hole Graphics and, in turn, juniorhockey.com becomes another avenue to market and promote your team to the masses. By establishing a relationship with juniorhockey.com you get the opportunity to put out an advertisement/infomercial/whatever-you-want-to-call-it for your team or organization as often as you want!

Let’s answer some questions now, from a 5-Hole Graphics standpoint. We are in a unique position to handle ALL of these three major issues and MUCH, MUCH MORE! Need marketing materials? Postcards, handouts, posters and more? We’ve got you covered. How about new uniform design or game night programs? Maybe you’re in need of team and fan apparel or even new full uniforms and equipment? 5-Hole and its partner companies can help there too!

Log on to www.facebook.com/5HoleGraphics or even better, contact my directly at fiveholegrfx@gmail.com and let’s discuss how we can fix your team or league’s image. Special package rates available or pick and choose what you need. We can discuss it all, tell you how we can help and if we can’t, we’ll point you in the right direction.