Personal Recruiting Websites

I am aware of NSR and other recruiting websites that charge a fee for a personal page on their system but are there any others? Do people make their own sites? There are so many free web hosting sites and blogs out there. I'd love to see some if you can post a link.

I also wonder if coaches really look at them, what do you think?

How do you drive traffic to a site like that, or even to NSR or the others with free basic pages?

Thanks

 

Sites

Here are a few:

www.ondeck.net, www.fastpitchrecruiting.com, www.berecruited.com, www.squidoo.com
Hope this will assist you.

 

I have a family website and a business website. For my daughter I created a page that was pretty much like her resume that was handed out at tournaments. You could get fancier if you wanted to with videos and lots of pictures but I wanted to keep it simple and fast to open. The page was hidden from general view with no direct links on any website and I blocked the search engines. The page contained personal information that shouldn't be available to the general public.

So instead of requiring someone to go and find it at a recruiting site, she would add a link to the page in her emails to coaches. For the coach it was a simple matter to click on the link in the email if they were interested.

The nice part about the webpage was that it could be updated as time goes by and new emails sent out to your list of coaches letting them know about the new information.

I dont know really how effective it was but the page had as many hits as emails sent out so it was being looked at.

 

Very creative...outstanding job, cmmguy!

Usually, I am not a proponent of videos and created websites for the purpose of getting a coach's attention. Most coaches file those in a bucket; if they handle it at all. BUT...if your DD is a player a school is interested in, they will check out the site to see how she did in a particular game or tournament.

Some coaches may take the time to "view" a video. It can be a nice tool for them. Unfortunately, many of the coaches don't have the time to do so.

I strongly suggest to all parents that instead of investing in a video; take that money and invest in a great instructor. You'll get more bang for your buck....and your DD will improve her ability and talent to be ready to "showcase" those improved talents to the coaches that you considered sending a tape. And...no matter if a coach looks at a tape or not, they all will make their opinions based on witnessing a player actually play.

I like what cmmguy has done. It's not a lot of work and no real cost. If just one coach views the site, it was certainly worth it.

 

Thanks

Thanks everyone for the replies, both public and private. Great info from everyone. I was really wondering how much college coaches use websites and I suppose some do and some don't but if there isn't any real cost involved, it can't really hurt. Special thanks to Wavefisher, GREAT info thanks!

 

SIFan- I don't know if this helps, but speaking from a baseball coaches viewpoint; having spoke with many of them, not one coach I have ever spoken with watched a videotape submitted by a parent or an outside source. However, it may not be the same in softball, but I can imagine their reasons for not watching them would be similar.

But, creating a website, I believe, can be an excellent idea. Fundamentally, it still places the importance on the players talent to drive the interest to the website.