I get my name MomMomOnTheGo for a reason……I am incredibly busy and always on the go. I go by MomMom because that is what my Little One has called me since she could talk, but that is a different story!
I want to talk about how I keep my over busy self, incredibly organized.
Let’s put everything in perspective first…… I have 3 kids, 4 cats, 1 bunny, a better half, and a sister that lives with us as well. So there are 6 people in our household, my parents live close by, I have 5 animals and a too big of a house to clean. I also work full time outside of the home, have my amazing website as my hobby, oh and I do a ton of volunteer work which mainly includes managing all the sports teams.
Somewhere amidst all that, I sleep, well a little! 🙂
Okay so my secret to organization is TeamSnap. Plain and simple, I could not do all that I do if I did not use Teamsnap.
First of all let me tell you that there is a free TeamSnap program if you just want a basic organizational tool. You can use it for anything you wish, whether you are needing to organize a sports team, or just get everyone in your household organized. You could even use it for assigning your kids chores. After all, you know the kids these days know how to use an App so they could easily see all their chores on the Teamsnap App. No excuses there 🙂
If you need a little more control over your management tool, then you can take a look at the various paid TeamSnap accounts. I use a paid TeamSnap Program for managing my Little One’s hockey team. I just need the flexibility and tracking that the paid account allows for.
Here is a big tip from a seasoned manager….. Just charge the TeamSnap fee for any sports teams to the team so that you get paid back through any team fees your sports team charges. I am totally and happily organized all year long and it does not cost me a cent because I charge the sports team the TeamSnap fee. Heaven 🙂
So what can you do with TeamSnap? I guess answering everything does not explain it enough so let me go through a bit of the features here…..
Here is what your TeamSnap home page looks for once you have created your account. Creating an account is free and you always get a 21 day free trial.
You can see across the top of the page that the “Team” name is listed, which in this demo is MomMomOnTheGo. You will also note all the tabs across the top which show all the tools available to you on TeamSnap. Of course your home page can have a photo and a managers message.
You can integrate your TeamSnap account to Facebook and turn on or off posting and sharing to Facebook. With a youth team, I always keep the Facebook posting and sharing off. I recommend you check with your team before turning the public profile and Facebook sharing on.
The main things I do with TeamSnap that makes life easier when managing a team is I use the Schedule, Availability, Messaging, Media Sharing, and Refreshments. Can you remember when you had to plan all these things by calling everyone. How did our parents ever do it?
You can also track so many other things such as any fees, say equipment that has been handed out, any volunteer time needed to be done for parents, and just about anything else you could think of.
One important section is the Members Section.
The members area is where you enter all the people on the team or that are a member of your organization. For our sports team, I can enter the players, coaches, managers. I list the parents under each player and I can list multiple parents under each player so that they each have access to the account. I love that feature.
The member area lets people put as much or as little information that they want in there. They can specify their players date of birth if they wish, address, phone numbers etc….. My recommendation when you get your parents to sign up and input their data is to put their cell phone in and allow for text messaging. They need to check a box saying they allow it and provide their cell phone carrier. This feature is amazing especially when you get to the rink and there is a power failure and you want to let everyone know before they get there that practice is cancelled.
Of course one of the imperative areas of TeamSnap is the schedule and availability area. I enter all our events into the schedule and then all members (players and non players) can put their availability. No more guessing if someone is showing up or not. Also, no more having to hand a schedule out. Love it!
Honestly I am also always accessing the schedule and availability on my TeamSnap App. It is a great way to check which rink we are on when I am at the arena already or to remind myself who is away.
Okay I could go on forever about TeamSnap, but I will just show you one more area I love, refreshments.
I love that I can assign any refreshments through TeamSnap. It keeps the refreshment rotation clear as to what is being brought and whose turn it is to bring it.
The biggest decision you have when it comes to TeamSnap is not if you are going to use it or not, but rather, what plan you are going to need. It really depends on the features you need. You can also pay by the year, or month to month so you can cancel any time. I pay by the month because our team is seasonal. That way I am not billed on our off season.
Here is a wonderful video that helps show just how awesome TeamSnap is…
Make sure to check out the newer features of TeamSnap club & league with their new Website Builder . Your club or league will be able to quickly and easily build a more professional looking website.
TeamSnap is also more than an organizational tool, they have awesome Podcasts that provide great information and topics for discussion.
You can check out all the features, programs, and awesomeness for everything TeamSnap here….