Recruiting Campaign of the Women Ultimate Team Vaasa

Challenges

How to set up a recruiting campaign supported by social media

Background

The Ultimate Club Vaasa Saints from Finland started a social media campaign in order to recruit new female players. Terhi Teräväinen from Vaasa Saints answered the questions.

This case study is laid out like an interview.

Case Study

Why? When did you decide to start the campaign? Why social media?

Tehri: "We started the campaign in October 2019, when we became too fed up with the low numbers of practice-goers at our women's team practices. Social media is a cost-effective platform for this kind of campaigning: it is easy to maintain and free of charge at its best. Furthermore, we thought that we could reach our target group on social media."

How? Details about the posts? Who shared the posts? In which media you were present? Did you take gender-specific questions into account?

Tehri: "Our campaign posts were originally shared on our team's accounts on Facebook and Instagram. They included pictures of us women in different ultimate related contexts, together with texts that directly described that we were looking for new players. We also told our followers where and when we are practicing and that they could contact us for more info.
We encouraged all our players, both women and men, to share our posts across the platforms, both in their own feeds and in relevant local Facebook groups.
This campaign was specifically aimed at attracting new female-identifying players and that is what we said in the post texts. We also considered it important to portray specifically women in the pictures we shared along these posts and to convey that we have a women's team, even if we cooperate a lot with our men's team and play mixed, too."

Results? Social media numbers? How many newcomers? Feelings about the success?

Tehri: "At most, our posts reached some 16.000 Facebook users in our region organically. We had some 20 new players come and test our practices during the winter and spring, and some 15 actually stayed for more than three times. About half of them are still with our team, even after the difficult covid-19 period.
We were really happy that our campaigning succeeded so well and we are planning to remake it, once the situation is again better for recruiting new players. We also plan to do a campaign of their own for our men's team."

What was done in order to keep the newcomers?

Tehri: "We emphasized that keeping the newcomers is everyone's business, not only the coaches'.
At the beginning of every practice, we took time to welcome everyone to the practice and go through everyone's names. All our more experienced players were expected to act sort of as mentors to the newcomers, so that everyone had a more experienced partner to throw with and get advice from during the practice. We asked the newcomers to participate in all the activities we had outside of practice and welcomed them into our WhatsApp group as soon as they were comfortable with giving out their number to us.
Everyone embraced the idea of 'this is everyone's business' wonderfully and we got lots of positive feedback from our newcomers on how well we succeeded in making them feel welcome and comfortable in our midst."

Something about the effects to the whole ultimate community?

Tehri: "Our campaigning was recognized nationally within our federation and other teams and individuals commented positively on our undertakings."

Did you take gender-specific questions into account?

Tehri: "All the time, we kept in mind who our target group was (women) and tried to adjust the language, tone of voice and pictures in our campaign posts accordingly.
We took into consideration that not everyone has played team sports before and they especially may not be familiar with the concept of practicing and playing mixed. That is why we organized separate practices for women whenever we could and if we were hinted that any of our newcomers felt intimidated by the more physical nature of play when you practice in a mixed group.

However, we think that all newcomers want to be encountered in a friendly manner, irrespective of gender. The most important thing, in our opinion, is to welcome everyone personally and make them feel valued, respected and important. "

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