Why do companies invest in software? Often, it’s to either improve an inefficiency or seize an opportunity. Pure Game Sports Network wanted to do both: Build a platform to connect fans to the high school sports they love while creating a new, more effective fundraising opportunity for the high school athletic programs.
Will Carter, one of the founders of Pure Game, recognized a need. High school athletic departments have an ever-growing need for financial resources and he noticed a significant opportunity to allow these high school athletic departments to keep more of the funds they raise.
Media outlets profit from your content and the audience that high school athletics attracts each year – without giving you the ability to tap into the value it creates. With Pure Game, the ad spaces provided give the team direct revenue opportunities that only you control. And as your brand and audience grow through Pure Game, the value of your ad spaces grows as well. Finally, teams have a way to promote their squads, their players and make it financially rewarding.
Will Carter
Pure Game approached Airship about designing the software platform needed to achieve to their goals. Part of this process included performing user research and then combining that research with the provided brand elements to build the initial wireframes and high-fidelity designs.
This service is what we like to call Mapping, which is just a fancy way of saying planning and designing a software build. This helps clients and developers understand the scope, cost, and timeline before diving into a software build.
Our mission for Pure Game: Map a sophisticated, easy-to-use, scalable platform to "convert the passion for high school sports into more revenue, recognition and recruitment for your athletic program."
The Deliverables
Everything starts with discovery meetings, which is where we discuss their business goals, vision for the product, usability needs, and more.
“Schools need to tap into the growing power they have as the interest in high school sports grows each year. We want to offer our schools the opportunity to streamline the way they generate exposure and revenue for their teams.”
Will Carter, Founder
After the discovery meetings, the Airship crew gets to work. For each Mapping, we handpick crew members who are the best fit for the client's project needs. This includes a technical advisor/architect (one of our excellent software developers), a project navigator, a UX designer/user research specialist, and an opportunity explorer.
The Mapping helped their team understand how much it would cost to build the mobile application, how long it would take, helped them discover opportunities for new features down the road, as well as plan for maintaining the application. We also created a high-fidelity mockup of the app design.
All of this preparation allowed them to have a more accurate picture of what it would take to launch their product, adjust where needed, and zero-in on the look of the app before signing any long-term agreements.
Pure Game Sports Network: Launching Summer 2019!
We're happy that Pure Game decided to then use Airship to build their product, and we're currently on a Journey to develop and launch in Summer 2019.
It's great being able to work together with Will and the Pure Game team to build the premier hub for high school sports across Alabama.
Even better, Pure Game is partnering with the Alabama Football Coaches Association to get the app in the hands of all high school sports fans across the states.
"High school athletic departments looking to promote their teams and players will have a new platform beginning this summer. The Pure Game Sports Network will begin operation, providing schools with an opportunity to grow their brand in a new and innovative way."
ALFCA
Pure Game was also one of the concept stage finalists for the recent Alabama Launchpad competition, a program of the Economic Development Partnership of Alabama (EDPA).
To learn more about Pure Game, visit their website. If you want to learn more about UX deliverables and why they're important, check out Holly's blog posts here and here.
