How functionaries of a small tennis club in Styria saved a lot of time in administration and revived the club with 100 challenge matches in just a few months: Digitalization is now reaching more and more the tennis sport!
In search of current trends in tennis clubs we found what we were looking for. Whether large commercial facilities or small clubs, with the right tools, tennis facility operators and operators can save a lot of time on administration while offering players great, timely services.
On a more detailed search for the right tools for their own plant, the wheat is separated from the chaff. Free as well as overpriced suppliers are on the market, with completely different service offers. One system scores with extensive possibilities, fair prices and is constantly being further developed: eTennis – with a free trial in the demo version until you are convinced!
In an interview with tennisnet.com, a functionary who was working intensively on the selection of the right tool for his own club in the spring of 2018, answered our questions:
My name is Armin Tüchler and I am secretary of the TC St. Bartholomä. The municipality of Sankt Bartholomä is located about 15 kilometres northwest of Graz and has 1400 inhabitants. The association currently has 120 members with a good mix of 8 to 80 years of age. We are particularly pleased that the summer tennis camps made possible by the TC and its sponsors have helped many children and young people to find their way to tennis and clubs this year. We see it as our task to encourage this age group in particular to exercise and therefore also offer trainer lessons for children every Tuesday afternoon. Most of the costs are covered by our sponsors, the rest by the tennis club.
Since we have quadrupled our membership in the last four years, our two places are very well used, especially in the evening hours. Some members also play golf and are therefore used to reserve their tee times online, which gave us the idea to test such a system for our needs. We then decided on eTennis after testing a number of providers, as the mix of functions, intuitive use, service and price offers by far the best overall package. The simple operation with the smartphone was also important to us, and here the optimized display for smartphones is of course a big advantage.
At first, some members were skeptical when we made the proposal at the Annual General Meeting. Especially the access for children and older members without smartphones was critically questioned. But the young people are very familiar with this anyway and it was also astonishing that the older generation found the change so easy, but this is certainly due to the easy handling. I don’t think our members can imagine switching back to the old paper lists.
Of course we use the reservation module for our two seats. We also use membership administration and membership fee billing with online payment, which saves us a lot of time. This year we also played a ranking list for the first time in twenty years and used this function of eTennis for it. That gave our club another real boost! Since the calendar shows when who is playing against whom and when spectators come to the matches, it is a great enrichment for our club life! For next year, we are also considering the purchase of the public relations function, which would greatly facilitate communication with members.
I’m glad that we chose eTennis because it simply took our club into the digital present. This is also important to appeal especially to the youth.
Try now for free: www.eTennis.at