Get the most out of Web Teams

The Web Teams blog has been going for a little while now and we have posted more than 50 articles.

This is our main method of communicating to all of you that run Web Teams sites.

For those of you that aren't that familiar with blogs, you may wish to read the tips below. They will help you get the most of Web Teams.

1. Searching
To find blog posts of interest to you simply type in a search term and click to search.

For example, try "mobile" for stories on how to get Web Teams on your mobile phone:



2. Labels
Two the right of the blog you can click on a topic that interests you. You will see all posts about that topic.

For example, click "new development" to read all of the posts on recent developments to Web Teams:


3. Posts you may have missed
Here are a pick of 4 or 5 of our many blog posts...

• Improvements to your Home Page - read about little changes we make to the site to keep on improving the service.
  
  
• Google Map on your Site - embed the fabulous Google Maps tool within your site.
  
  
• Customer Survey 08/09 - Results - read about what our thousands of users think of us.
  
  
• Another Fund Raising Case Study - find out how you can easily make your website make money for your team.
  
  
• Go Go Web Teams Gadget! - you like Windows Vista or Google gadgets? - download the Web Teams Gadget for your site.

4. Get the blog content elsewhere
You can add the Google Web Teams Blog gadget to your Google home page:

You can get the Web Teams Blog content within your RSS reader of choice:

5. Comment on the blog posts

If you have an opinion on any blog post - let us have your feedback - it only takes 10 seconds to add a comment and you can share your thoughts with the rest of the Web Teams community.

Web Teams Continues NonLeagueZone.com Support

Web Teams have continued their support to the popular non-league football forum NonLeagueZone.com.

A team of six or seven dedicated non league football fans run this super community with almost 10,000 members!

Stephen from Web Teams used to be a bit of a contributor to the Northern League section of this site back in the late 1990s when involved with teams such as North Shields, Prudhoe Town and Dunston Fed.

Over the last year or two Web Teams helps with the running costs of this site and are delighted to continue to do so for the 2009/10 football season. In return, Web teams gets a banner advert at the top.

If your team or league is involved in the UK non-league pyramid and you want a discussion forum that is part of a wider community - please go to NonLeagueZone.com and get in touch with one of the moderators.

Web Teams Goes Video Crazy!

Just over a year ago we allowed YouTube videos to be added to your Web Teams match reports and news items.

http://webteams.blogspot.com/2008/06/post-your-videos-on-web-teams.html

Flicking through many Web Teams team sites over the weekend, I noticed that loads of sites now do this.

All digital cameras have video functionality these days and it seems many of you take video clips on the side lines, upload them to YouTube and then embed them in your Web Teams sites. Some of you even make nicely edited movies with background sound tracks and titles (presumably using Windows Movie Maker).

Flicking through the first 15 or 16 sites I came across I found the following 4 videos...

St. James AFC

http://www.webteams.co.uk/NewsItems.aspx?team=stjamesafc#id10

Centre AFC

http://www.webteams.co.uk/NewsItems.aspx?team=centreafc#id19

Hafod Ranger AFC

http://www.webteams.co.uk/MatchReport.aspx?team=hafodrangersafc&mid=match33.xml

Norton Sports

http://www.webteams.co.uk/NewsItems.aspx?team=nortonsportsfc#id51

Improvements to your Home Page

The improvements to your home page outlined below will go live soon. As always, please let us know your thoughts!


Before


...and after

What are the key differences:

• The latest news item has a snippet of its content on your front page. This gives your site visitors more of a "teaser" of what the story is about and encourages them to click through and read it.
  
  
• The latest match also has a snippet of content now on your home page.
  
  
• The titles of these two main stories are in larger text and bold - again drawing your visitors attention.
  
  
• The player/staff pictures on the front are now the relevant individuals mentioned in the news item or gaining the player of the match. This means you're not seeing the same old faces always on the home page.
  
  

Remember, to keep your home page looking really good - try and add a new news item each week and make sure you add at least one paragraph as a match report when you enter your latest result.

Bohemian Rhapsody on the Danny Baker show

From last year, but quite funny. The version of Bohemian Rhapsody on the Danny Baker show where Freddie's lyrics are replaced with random footballer names...



I see a little silhouetto of a man
FACEY BA LYTTLE SILVA ETO HUTH HAMANN

Scaramouche, scaramouche, will you do the fandango?
DIARRA BRUCE DIARRA BRUCE BRILL KANU HAMANN BRANCO

Thunderbolt and lightning, very very frightening me
YOUNG KERR HOULT SAND BRIGHT KING VIEIRA VIERI FREI LING LEE

Galileo, galileo
BAILEY MAYO

Galileo, galileo
BAILEY MAYO

Galileo figaro-magnifico
BAILEY MAYO FIGO LAW HAGI ZICO

Google Map on your Site

If you've added a post code in your site details area then you automaticaly now get a Google Map on your home page.

The pictures below show how this appears to a site visitor:

1. Click on the "map" hyperlink


2. An inline Google Map is displayed in your club details area of the page


3. All the functionality you expect from Google Maps is available - you can move it around, zoom in and out and display road map or satellite map


If you want to try this - we took the screenshots above from:

- webteams.co.uk/glenrothes

10 years of Web Teams

It's now 10 years since Web Teams was formed. For a bit of a history about Web Teams see the blog post below:
- http://webteams.blogspot.com/2008/05/brief-history-of-web-teams.html

But to celebrate 10 years, here are some early designs...

1. Early teaser holding page
The imagery below is from September 1999. The rest of the web world had horrible "under construction" animated gifs. We were inspired more from the Starship Troopers trailer at the cinema in the late 90s.

2. First team home page design
Again from 1999, this was the design for the homepage. Nice and simple with the main core features that Web Teams was all about: News, Results, League Table, Squad details and Stats. The Newcastle College side was the team that Pat from Web Teams used to play for in the North East Sunday League.



3. Team home page design Mk II
It was quickly decided that something more impressive was needed for the homepage and the main feature links were moved to the left hand side. An overview of the content and a team photo where quickly drafted into the main area of the page. The Wallsend Comrades side was the team that Stephen from Web Teams used to play for in the North East Sunday League. Wallsend Comrades used to regularly thrash Newcastle College :)



4. First real site
The first "real" site filled with proper data was the Durham Ladies football site for 2000/2001 season. This acted as a test site along with a number of others as the Web Teams user base slowly started to grow.



10 years has gone by very quickly. But on behalf of Pat and myself we'd like to thank all of those who use the service and make it what it is. Throughout each year we appreciate all of your suggestions for improvement and kind messages and we very much look forward to the next 10 years!