How Many emails to send to a College Coach?

[BT3100]

My daughter is a committed 2020, and we've used both Captain U and FieldLevel recruiting sites. Didn't pay a dime for either, and received plenty of contacts by creating a profile with additional details like GPA, degree interests, and adding video links. Fieldlevel definitely generated a lot more results than Captian U via the free profile, and has been great at matching up DD's profile with potential schools based on location, profile, teammate connections, coach connections, and HS & TB coach evaluations. Still, the free CaptainU profile has generated recent interest (like November and December 2019?), but the coaches are a little too late! If my daughter hadn't already committed, I would have definitely paid for the monthly fee for FieldLevel going into Spring/Summer season. Someone mentioned here about setting up a website for your DD, I think that's also a great idea. I had a link on Fieldlevel to my daughter's current HS tournament and TB schedule posted on a free Weebly.com website, along with the latest video links and some screenshots of stats from GameChanger, not much personal info. I couldn't tell who was visiting, but could see day to day stats of site visits. Good luck in your search!!

Hi, does FeildLevel show you which coaches opened your emails and when? Do they tell you who viewed your video and which one?
That was what we liked about captain U. For $20 per Month we received that info that helped us narrow down our efforts to focus on those schools who showed interest in DD and read her emails. Sometimes it's about economy of time. Travel coaches tell kids to email as many coaches as possible and attend all camps. You could go broke attending camp after camp.

 

[diamond14]

DD's team used Fieldlevel, so we went with it. It has been used by college coaches to view her information. To BT's point, at least with regard to basic level, that it does not show specific schools have accessed her page. But, since we are not promiscuous in our college search, we have found a hack. She has a fairly narrow focus of a dozen schools in the NE with whom she communicates. We time our emails to schools such that we can assess which coaches have viewed information, as FL will tell u: a Dx school from State Y has viewed video "Huge Bomb KOs Tournament Director" : ). Perfect, for sure not. But for some I think it may be perfectly functional.

 

[cleareyesfullheart]

Rolling Hard, here's the problem with what you said.... EVERY email received by coaches says something like this: it'd be an honor to play for you, etc. etc. And very few kids actually mean it.

Coaches and TB organizations (in many cases) encourage kids to cast a wide net out with coaches, writing to every single coach with their own form letter of their interest, their schedule, their stats, etc. The hope is, if I send 300 emails and I get a reply back from 2 or 3... that's good! And college coaches know this. Right or wrong, this is probably why colleges don't respond to many of them because the player's "interest" is usually sent to 300 schools in the same form letter. I was the PITCHING COACH at schools and would get daily emails from shortstops, center-fielders, etc. who are simply writing to every single coach who's email is not hidden on a webpage. Literally dozens per day during the fall showcase season.

I made note of pitching emails I got there were not form letters from PSA's (Prospective Student Athletes). While in Omaha, if someone mentioned something about Omaha, about Creighton's campus, etc. I'd know this was more of a direct email to me vs. one that's going to be copied and sent on and on. Yes, of course those can be form letters too and you can substitute "Austin" for Omaha and keep sending but, it's not nearly as common.

Bill

It's easy to see if the recruit is really interested or just sending it to everyone. Many times there isn't any personal information about the school. Saying it would be an honor to play for your outstanding program, when the team went 13-28 or whatever, is one clue. Also putting in a major the school doesn't have is a second clue. The kid really needs to do research on every school she writes to.

 

[kaley1]

Emails with schedules are important, but I'm not sure how many emails get read that simply introduce and offer interest. I agree that camps are best, but the girls' competitive coaches need to be calling ahead. That's where your comp coaches become really important. My daughter is a freshman, first year at college, and I heard her head coach say over and over again he could care less about stats during the recruiting process. I wouldn't include them. They need a reason to look at a girl (at least big D1's). I don't believe they're getting interest from emails. I did my research when my daughter was about 12 by looking at college rosters and seeing where the kids came from. I think some comp programs are "feeders" into certain programs. Ultimately though, my dd's comp coach got the coach to look at my dd at a camp and things went from there.