This entry to my blog is probably more of a rant than anything, but I just can’t help pointing out the multitude of mistakes made by this organization. This isn’t a large organization, but a local one that seriously did not think through their campaign, nor did they go through the process themselves or they clearly would have known there is a BIG problem.
A few weeks ago I received a flyer for our local athletic association through my daughter’s preschool. They handle all the local county baseball and softball leagues for children. The flyer included the type of sport, age divisions and registration fee for each one, along with their website address. Note there is no phone number listed on the flyer which is a huge mistake as they may be missing out on potential registrants who do not have access to the Internet.
So, as I usually do, I head on over to the website to get more information. Our daughter will be 4 years old in a couple of months so we thought it would be good to get her started with T-ball for that age group. I mean who can resist a bunch of 4 year olds running amuck on the field learning the basics of baseball? I can totally picture her out there on the field while hubby and I are cheering her on in the stands!
The website is not professionally done, but initially it looks to serve the purpose of providing information. It is after all a volunteer organization that relies on donations and registration fees to support them. I proceed to search for more information on T-ball, things such as: 1) what date do they start?, 2) how many times a week do they practice and/or play?, 3) what time does practice and game time begin?, 4) how long does the season last?, etc. All of these are valid questions I believe.
First of all, after searching the site high and low, clicking on various links, I cannot find any of this information on the website for any one of the programs. I do however find the registration button, so I think to myself that maybe the information I seek will be included there. After going through 2 online waivers and releases in which I have to agree that I’ve read and understand, I finally get to the registration page. Unfortunately though there are still no answers to any of my questions, only an online registration form.
Frustrated at this point, I decide to visit their contact page. It includes various individuals with titles along with their organization email addresses. Ok, no problem, I’m certainly no stranger to email, so I choose the appropriate contact person for the sport I’m interested in and send a message…which bounces back to me as Undelivered Mail Returned to Sender. The report says that it is not a valid email address.
Ok, so back to the website I go in search of a different solution. I see they have a general email address, to which I send my message. Would you care to guess what happened? Yep, it bounced back, only with a totally different error message…that my email address does not have the permission to send e-mails to the mailing list. Huh? Seriously? Whoever set up this website and hosted email addresses clearly does not know what they’re doing or simply does not take the time to manage things very well.
Of course now, I must, as a last resort, pick up the phone and call to get this information. I think to myself that I should have just done this in the first place and saved myself all this trouble, but getting information online and via email is second nature to me and how I do business so that is usually my first action anyway.
Now back at the website where they clearly have a Baseball/Softball Hotline telephone number on every page of the site…I call. I’m greeted with a standard greeting and 2 options: press 1 for soccer or press 2 for baseball. I choose option 2 of course, but you won’t believe what happened next! It repeats “NWRAA baseball line, effective 4/21/08.” over and over and over and over and over again, without ever allowing you to speak to someone or leave a message. Even pressing “0″ gets you nowhere and you still hear the same looped message over and over…which tells you nothing!
So at this point it is safe to say that my daughter will not be playing T-ball this year, at least not with this organization. I have exhausted every single way to get in touch with them to answer my questions, but to no avail, which is a real shame. We were all ready to make total fools of ourselves while encouraging and cheering the loudest for our daughter from the stands.
What is the moral of this story? It really doesn’t matter how large a corporation or how small a non-profit organization you are; whether you’re a strictly online business or have a physical storefront. When you completely miss the boat on a campaign that is intended to bring in money, and you don’t go through the entire process yourself, or you just take a backseat and assume that things are working properly, then you set yourself up for failure. And unfortunately in this case, the failure affects not only the business, but the kids who would have been excited to play.
