For all of the college coaches that are Tweeting, using Facebook to promote their team, using tools like Front Rush to communicate with recruits or NCSA Athletic Recruiting to find new prospects that have verified information and streaming video, there are lots of others who are keeping it “old school”.
They’ll recruit their kids with hand written letters and personal phone calls, thank you very much.
With all the advances in technology, there are more than a few college coaches who aren’t going to use it in their daily recruiting efforts.
And you know what? That’s fine. You can still sign great recruits using some of those “old school” methods that have been around for years and years. However, to use them effectively with this generation of teenage prospect, you’ll need to do a little fine-tuning in your approach and use of these common recruiting techniques.
Here are six things you need to know about these tried-and-true recruiting techniques as you eye your next recruit:
Use the phone to make the first contact. Did you know that our in-depth study of how prospects make their college decision showed that a phone call from the coach was their preferred first contact? Chalk one up for the old-schoolers out there! Phone calls work when they are used correctly, and this one has some big-time benefits: It tells recruits that you’re serious about them right from the start, the phone call can be very short and to the point (saving you from those awkward “what-the-heck-do-I-talk-about-now” moments) and you can set up the next step in the process.
Speaking of phone calls, keep them short. Coach, you don’t need to spend 30 minutes or an hour on the phone. This is a “get-to-the-point” generation of kids. If you find yourself doing all (or most) of the talking, keep your phone call to 10 minutes or less. Our research shows that it’s just as effective as a long phone call (more so, in many cases) and you won’t overstay your welcome with your prospect. The one exception to the short phone call rule? If your prospect is asking questions and doing the talking. If that’s the case, stay on the phone as long as possible…and, you should realize that you have just been given a HUGE “buying signal” from your prospect.
The home visit still works. With travel budgets decreasing throughout the NCAA, home visits are going to become less and less frequent. If you can swing it, making a home visit becomes an even bigger weapon in effective recruiting. The keys to a good home visit? I’ll briefly name three since that’s something that we normally talk about in depth if we get to work with a coach and their college one-one-one: 1) Try to do only 20% of the talking by asking great questions, 2) take as much time as possible to find out about the non-sports side of the family and interacting with siblings who might be present for the meeting, and 3) if you’re going to do a presentation about your school or your program, don’t bore them with ultra-detailed information that you end up reading to them. Make it less presentation, more conversation. Oh, one more thing: If you want them, ASK THEM TO COMMIT AT THE END OF THE MEETING! Don’t leave the home of a prospect you really want without making it clear that you’d take a “yes” from them right then and there. Not enough coaches do that, and the result is that they walk away from a golden opportunity to secure a recruit. Don’t be that coach!
You’d better spend time getting to know their coach. More and more, today’s prospect looks to their high school and/or club coach for guidance on recruiting. At an extreme, many will let their coach select the “right” school at the end of the recruiting process (I’ve seen it happen a LOT in the past two years). If you’ve got an old school recruiting attitude, it’s an absolute must to include your prospect’s coaches in the process. In the good old days, a relationship with a recruit’s coach was a no-brainer. It was a natural part of the cycle. Today, I see coaches not paying as much attention to what their prospect’s coaches think of them and their program. I think that any smart coach should (and if you want to know how, come to our national recruiting conference this June).
Hand-written letters win every time. What’s more old school than a blank piece of letterhead and an ink pen? Not much. But this old recruiting standard carries even more weight these days. Why? Because recruits know that the time you take to write them is meaningful. They know how busy you are, and the fact that you’ve taken time out of your day to correspond with them means a lot. They will always read hand-written mail, and will assign value to the fact that you took the time to write them.
Be seen in person. Being visible at games, tournaments and practices counts in the eyes of your prospect. When we conduct one of our On-Campus Workshops, and talk with our athlete focus groups at a school, we find that most athletes are able to remember times when the coach they signed with came to their gym or their stadium to watch them compete. Again, they know that takes time…and that’s the one big thing that this generation of athlete respects.
Old school recruiting strategies definitely still have a place in modern day recruiting.
Don’t get me wrong, I think technology tools that are available to college coaches today are incredible additions to their recruiting arsenals. However, I’m also a realist: I know that there are coaches out there that aren’t comfortable using technology, and don’t want to use it in their everyday recruiting.
If I just described you, my message is simple:
You can still be an effective “old school” college recruiter if you follow these proven principles.