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A youth sports recruiting platform, user-ready in a month and a half

A sports recruiting platform where athletes get noticed, coaches scale their impact, and recruiters finally see who is out there.

Client
A startup with ties to youth sports organizations
My role
Product and engineering lead
Timeline
1.5 months, from scratch to deployed
Running cost
$15 to 20 a month, dev and prod
The problem

In the region, hundreds of programmes train and compete, with thousands of young athletes. At that scale, nobody can see everyone. A recruiter cannot visit every game. A coach cannot be impactful at scale. An athlete cannot get noticed.

The company owner wanted to show that one unified platform could fix all three, to investors, partners and customers.

Before: too many to see, too few hours to helpThousands of young athletestraining and competing, hard to get noticedHundreds of programmeseach coach can only reach so manyCollege recruiterscannot visit every game??No single place where an athlete can be found, a coach can scale, or a recruiter can look.
Before: too many to see, too few hours to helpThousands of young athletestraining and competing, hard to get noticed?Hundreds of programmeseach coach can only reach so many?College recruiterscannot visit every gameNo single place where an athlete can be found,a coach can scale, or a recruiter can look.
The requirements

A prototype fleshed out enough to show what the platform would look like, how it works and its key benefits, for six kinds of people:

  • Athletes build a public or private profile, upload game footage, post verifiable combine results, and target the colleges they want.
  • Parents control their child's account, then hand it over when the child is old enough.
  • Coaches, both team coaches and platform coaches who give rotating feedback, review footage and follow progress.
  • Organizations run several teams, with admins and an admin panel.
  • Recruiters discover athletes, watch footage and trust verified results, without travelling to every game.

Two hard rules: children's privacy and money had to be right, and scope had to stay tight. Complete enough to win over investors, not so big that we overran time for marginal gains.

The solution

I built the product and the system end to end, with design input from a designer. The landing pages were built by another developer, whom I led.

Get noticed

Public and private athlete profiles, footage for recruiters, and verifiable combines: sports test results count once someone outside the event team has verified them.

Money

A payment state machine on Stripe: subscriptions, cancellations, payment issues, and overdue accounts switching off on their own.

Safe for kids

Age transitions and parental handoff, with COPPA compliance: consent gathering, privacy and terms, and data deletion options.

Feedback

Video review with annotations, rotating platform coaches on top of team coaches, and a chat prototype.

Comms

Cadenced emails to every role, plus an admin panel for organizations and the platform.

Built to run

Development and production environments, CI, monitoring, alerts and logging, on Google Cloud for about $15 to 20 a month. Demo users and defined demo flows were ready for the pitch.

Kept out

Exports and a full chat system stayed out. Enough to show the potential, without overrunning scope and time for marginal results.

After: six kinds of people, one platformAthletepublic or private profile, footageParentmanages a child's account, then hands it overPlatform coachrotating feedback on top of the team coachTeam coachcritiques and tracks their athletesOrganization adminruns many teams under one roofCollege recruiterdiscovers athletes, watches footageOne platformpayments, privacy, video review,chat, teams, admin panel
After: six kinds of people, one platformOne platformpayments, privacy, video review,chat, teams, admin panelAthletepublic or private profile, footageParentmanages a child's account, then hands it overPlatform coachrotating feedback on top of the team coachTeam coachcritiques and tracks their athletesOrganization adminruns many teams under one roofCollege recruiterdiscovers athletes, watches footage
Everything in the platform, at a glanceGet noticedPublic and private athlete profilesGame footage recruiters can watchCollege targeting and discoveryVerifiable combine resultsCoachingVideo review with annotationsTeam coaches on every athleteRotating platform coachesChat (prototype)Families and moneyParental controls and handoffSubscriptions and age-based pricingAutomatic payment handlingCOPPA consent and data deletionRunning itOrganizations and teamsAdmin panelCadenced emails to every roleEvery action audited
Everything in the platform, at a glanceGet noticedPublic and private athlete profilesGame footage recruiters can watchCollege targeting and discoveryVerifiable combine resultsCoachingVideo review with annotationsTeam coaches on every athleteRotating platform coachesChat (prototype)Families and moneyParental controls and handoffSubscriptions and age-based pricingAutomatic payment handlingCOPPA consent and data deletionRunning itOrganizations and teamsAdmin panelCadenced emails to every roleEvery action audited
Payments that manage themselvesSubscribedaccount activePayment issuedetected by StripeRemindersemails on a set cadenceOverdueaccount switches offPayment arrives: the account comes straight backCancellations, age-based pricing changes and every transition are handled without anyone lifting a finger.
Payments that manage themselvesSubscribedaccount activePayment issuedetected by StripeRemindersemails on a set cadenceOverdueaccount switches offPayment arrives: the account comes straight backCancellations, age-based pricing changes and everytransition are handled without anyone lifting a finger.
Where it stood
1.5 months
From a blank page to a deployed platform
$15 to 20
A month for development and production
Ready to onboard
Real users could start while features were still being refined

Testers and some real users tried it. The owner had demo accounts and set demo flows to show investors, partners and customers a platform that really works.

Why it matters to you: if you need a convincing, working product fast, I build what proves the idea and leave out the rest, so you do not overspend on scope.

Building a product with several kinds of users?

Book a free 30-minute call and we will work out the simplest version that does the job.

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