Whether you’re just starting your own youth lacrosse program, or you’ve been active for years, recruiting players to participate each season is essential.
In order to recruit more players, you first need to make sure your program is well run and organized, following those key aspects, you can start to focus on a few techniques to help recruit more youth lacrosse players.
#1 - Reaching out to Higher Level Lacrosse Coaches and Administrators
If you’re a youth lacrosse program, there can be a ton of value in creating relationships with higher level lacrosse programs. Whether that’s high school, middle school, or even college level, these coaches and administrators can make a huge impact on your ability to recruit efficiently. From younger siblings of their own players, to friends of theirs, to parents reaching out in search for guidance for their kids, the value these coaches can bring to your program shouldn’t be underestimated. You can shoot them a quick email, give them a call, or even take them out for a few drinks to chat about opportunities!
Networking with these coaches and administrators can truly help you to build a long lasting youth lacrosse club in your community. It's also mutually beneficial to help each out as you can help to build a pipeline from your program, to the middle school program, to the high school program, and even travel programs all by simply networking and connecting with each other.
Connecting with higher level coaches and administrators is one of the best ways to build up your network
#2 - Hosting Free Clinics and Camps
Hosting free clinics and camps can often times be an overlooked aspect of recruiting for some programs. By offering free clinics or camps during the off-season or pre-season, you can build a lot of relationships with new potential lacrosse players and parents for your program.
If you have a talented coaching staff and a few days to spare, try hosting a mini camp and see how it goes! You may even want to try lightly promoting your camp on Facebook, social media, and around your community. You can even ask a few of the higher level coaches for help in doing so! All in all, holding camps and clinics can be one of the most effective ways of introducing new players to your program by getting to know each other and building credibility.
Allowing players to meet and learn from your talented coaching staff for free can be a great way to bring in more lacrosse players
#3 - Build Relationships with Local Schools and Youth Clubs
A lot like reaching out to higher level lacrosse coaches and administers, building relationships with your local school district can work wonders when it comes recruitment time. Often times, schools love helping their students get into extra-circulator activities, especially sports. So don’t be afraid to ask if you can go speak to their students and hold a meeting about joining your program. This can also be a great time to offer a free camp or clinic and start collecting some names and contact information.
Furthermore, the same concepts can apply for youth clubs like your local rec centers or YMCA's. You shouldn't be afraid to reach out them for help with recruiting players to your program as they'll most likely want to help out! Just be sure to stay focused on building strong relationships that will last. You may find that you can establish some great recruiting pipelines for the future!
Don't overlook reaching out to your local school district, often times they love to help their students get into extra-circulator activities like sports
#4 - Build a Website and Grow Your Youth Lacrosse Programs Reach
Building a well organized website can be critical to your success when not just recruiting new youth lacrosse players, but also when it comes to organizational management. Having a strong presence online can help your program store all of your information in one place. Which can work wonders when it comes to establishing a lot of credibility with parents, players and other lacrosse programs.
Furthermore, having a website with your own custom domain name can do wonders when it comes to your searchability online for SEO purposes. With a little work, you can help push your program to the first page of Google. Being on the first page will help athletes and other lacrosse teams be able to find your program easily. Another major benefit of building a website is being able to register players online, collect their information, stream-line communications, and schedule events. All of which makes the idea of working with your program really easy for parents and players alike!
A website can work wonders for your programs credibility and organization which certainly comes in handy when recruiting new lacrosse players
#5 - Build out Your Youth Lacrosse Programs Brand
Last up on our list is continuing to build out your youth lacrosse programs’ brand. A brand not only helps with the credibility of your program, it can also mean a lot to your players and those working with your program. Often times, players like to be apart of something they believe in and something they think is cool. Having a poor logo and color scheme certainly won’t help your program sign up more lacrosse players than another.
For as little as $5, you can hire professional graphic designers on websites such as Fiverr to help create you a professional logo. Furthermore, you can then take your logo and apply it to things such as your helmets, jerseys, and website. This will help you to create a much more cohesive and organized brand for your program.
Another thing to keep in mind when establishing your programs brand, is to be sure to keep all branding concurrent across all your platforms. Whether that’s your uniforms, website, or social media channels. This will help your brand stay credible and recognizable.
