Tennis Canada's new website: it's love.

(And I mean that in a good way.)

It's a generally-accepted truth in PR that new organizational websites don't automatically become news anymore. By "anymore," I mean new websites were news back in the days when websites were a big deal... but nowadays they're table stakes for any large-scale organization seeking any public credibility.

As a result, unless the launch has a strong, audience-focused communication strategy behind it, a "new and improved website" usually goes into the same news category as a "new payroll system." It may be a big deal to the people involved, but the rest of the world pretty much yawns.

Recognizing this, Tennis Canada executed a great PR strategy over the last few weeks to make its new website news -- and from what I can see, at least, it looks like it worked.


Lesson from Tennis Canada: how to make your new website news

1. First, make sure the changes you're making truly are noteworthy; a new font ain't gonna cut it.

Tennis Canada's old website was, let's say, not great. In fact, it was so not great that in last year's PR major class, it was one of the examples I used to show what an ineffective website looks like. In the words of Tennis Canada's own director of communications and media relations last week in an interview with Marketing Magazine,

"Our old site was an online binder... It was more for putting up our annual reports and strategy plans and there was no opportunity for dialogue."

The new site is far more than that, offering a great mix of static and interactive content geared to the organization's audience (people who enjoy and play tennis in Canada). As Liz Atkins from the communications agency Smith Roberts put it in the same Marketing article, the new site's objective is to "talk less about Tennis Canada, and more about tennis in Canada."

It's a key distinction that will make all the difference to Tennis Canada's audiences.

In addition to all the regular stuff you'd expect like live streaming of major events (e.g. Tennis Canada's annual Rogers Cup) and live scoring, the site offers discussion forums and chats surrounding special events (e.g. last Friday's live draw for the men's Rogers Cup in Toronto); blogs from a range of perspectives (pro tour observers, a member of the Rogers Cup ball crew, a Canadian junior player); and opportunities to submit questions about your game to a pro coach, who will reportedly deal with submitted questions in video lessons on the site.

There's a good mix of content related to both pro and amateur tennis, reflecting exactly what Tennis Canada's audiences are likely looking for: ways to get more information about the sport they love, and to connect with others who do.


2. Give your new site an interesting angle that'll get people talking.

Despite its olden-days image as a stuffy, country-club sport, tennis is fun to play and follow. Tennis fans want their tennis experience -- including their relationship with their national tennis organization -- to be fun.

Old URL: www.tenniscanada.com [predictable, professional... not so much fun]

New URL: www.lovemeansnothing.ca [wha?? fun!]

People love to feel like insiders, and a good campaign targeted at a group that has common "insider" language will draw on it to make that audience want to get involved.

In tennis, "love" is the term used to signify a score in a game, set or match (but not a tie-breaker!) of zero. If you have two games and I have none, the score is "two - love." So in tennis, love really does mean nothing... and makes for a great "insider rewards" URL that will grab tennis fans' attention.

It also sends a signal that this site isn't going to be the stuffy old "binder" of information it used to be.


3. Then, tie your launch to something big.

As far as pro tennis goes in Canada, there's no bigger event than the Rogers Cup, when the top-ranked male and female players in the world come to Toronto and Montreal to play. So if your objective is to get some attention for your new Tennis Canada website, you're not likely to find a time when Canadian tennis fans are talking more about tennis in Canada than during the Rogers Cup.


Tennis Canada set its new website to launch with a live feed of world number one player Rafael Nadal at the announcement of the men's Rogers Cup draw last Friday afternoon -- and in so doing, gave fans a reason to want to come check out the new site. In addition to re-directing www.tenniscanada.com to the placeholder page above, it did some proactive publicity work in advance, which resulted in stories like this one on the Toronto Star sports blog, and used the Rogers Cup Toronto Twitter feed to drive fans to the site launch.

I don't know how many visitors the site attracted Friday afternoon, but I'd bet it numbered in the thousands; the chat room running alongside the draw alone had 700 members at one point.


4. And if you can, tie it to someone big.

[Photo courtesy Beth Wilson]

Nadal is the number one men's tennis player in the world and, it must be said, an all-around great guy. Fans love him, players love him, the media love him. If you want to attract tennis fans' attention, having Rafa involved is a great way to do it.

So that's what Tennis Canada did. It live-streamed Nadal's participation in the announcement of the men's Rogers Cup draw on Friday afternoon, and at the event, had him answer questions from fans submitted through the new site (all of which had figured prominently in the advance publicity).

I'm from a tennis family. Dad, siblings and I have all played and coached; my sister and I were "ballboys" at the Canadian nationals a zillion years ago; we download and use Grand Slam apps; we don't miss a major tournament; and we've attended the Rogers Cup. But with all that said, I have never taken the time to watch a "live draw" event.

That is, I hadn't... until last Friday.


5. Then, make your audience feel like they own it.

As I mentioned above, Tennis Canada has woven a number of great community-building features into the new site, all of which I think will keep people coming back post-Nadal (a few early bugs like broken links notwithstanding).

But the organization has also taken it a step further, and is letting the site's users write its headlines. The form you fill out to join the site includes a field that asks what "love" means to you; fans' quotes now rotate on the site's masthead.


How could a tennis fan not love it?

Or not want to contribute and be part of it?

Or not keep coming back to see new fan-generated quotes about the sport they love... and maybe even their own?

Kudos, Tennis Canada.

For want of a nail…

Remember the rhyme about how little things can have big consequences?

For Want of a Nail

For want of a nail the shoe was lost.
For want of a shoe the horse was lost.
For want of a horse the rider was lost.
For want of a rider the battle was lost.
For want of a battle the kingdom was lost.
And all for the want of a horseshoe nail.

Source: Wikipedia

Well, I got a great example of that in the mail this week.

My sister and I have tickets to the Rogers Cup ATP tennis tournament in Montreal in August – we’ll be haunting the grounds of Stade Uniprix (formerly Jarry Park Stadium) for two days of the tournament, like we did centuries ago when we were ballgirls for the Canadian nationals at the Rideau Tennis Club in Ottawa.

We ordered our tickets online, and they came in the mail a couple of weeks ago. Then this week, I got another, totally unexpected envelope from Rogers Cup in the mail: metro tickets to get us to and from our matches.

“Great PR,” I thought – “a freebie, great involvement of a government sponsor, opportunity for the tournament to promote its sustainability initiatives – everyone looks good and the customer is delighted. Must blog about it.” I filed the metro tickets away with the event tickets.

Then this week, I saw a tweet about someone having gotten metro tickets from the Rogers Cup… but for the wrong days. So I checked mine and… lo and behold… mine aren’t right either!

I can only imagine what a logistical nightmare this is going to be for the organizers. They can just re-issue metro tickets for the right days (which could double the cost); or they can do a big internal communication initiative to ensure Société de transport de Montréal employees accept the tickets for any day of the tournament, with an external communication initiative to ensure everyone knows they can use the tickets for any day. Or they might come up with some other solution (though they wouldn’t be well-advised to ask customers to send the original metro tickets back). No matter how you slice it, it’s going to be expensive, both in time and money – likely both for Tennis Canada and the Société de transport de Montréal.

Of course, this will have no effect on how much my sister and I enjoy cheering Roger and Rafa on (Nadal’s injuries and Federer’s impending fatherhood permitting), but it does make what should have been a great gesture somewhat of a pain for the customer, and an enormous hassle for organizers (not to mention that it reflects poorly on the organization overall).

In event planning, you do your best to check, double-check and triple-check everything. Unfortunately, every once in a while, some little detail like this gets by you… and to paraphrase Vincent Gardenia’s character in Moonstruck, that is a long, bad, expensive day.



UPDATE - HOW THEY HANDLED IT:

I left a voice mail with tournament organizers on Saturday, and got a call back today (within one business day). The fellow said they'd had "big problems" with the metro ticket initiative, but that they would just send out new tickets for the right dates. Potentially an expensive, but definitely the most customer-friendly way to manage it. Nice job.