High school sports software has always been complicated. But it wasn’t supposed to be that way.
From the early days of the first scheduling platform, to things like websites, apps and athletic registration tools, software was always supposed to make life easier for Athletic Administrators.
Sometimes it worked, but too often incompatibilities between tools lead to redundancies, duplicated work, and wasted time. Entering the same data into multiple places is annoying at best. At worst, it can be the difference between finishing your tasks in time to greet families during pre-game warm-ups, or being stuck in the office doing data entry until midnight.
Since we started VNN, we heard the same refrain over and over again from our clients: “why can’t we have the software we like, and have it all just work together automatically?”
For over two decades now, something as simple as a single platform that connects all your favorite software has never been an option. But we think it should be, and together with our partners, that’s exactly what we’re creating at VNN.
After years of laying the groundwork, I’m excited to announce that VNN and our partners have now built the nation’s first ever, fully-integrated platform for high school athletics.
This means that our client schools can choose the products they love — whether that be scheduling tools like 8to18 or Arbiter, registration tools like Register My Athlete and Final Forms, or even video tools like Rapid Replay and the NFHS network — and know that the data from those products will work together across all the tools they’re using.
In other words, schools have the ability to use what they like, and it all works together automatically.
VNN has been building toward this fully-connected platform since the beginning. Several of our most popular features historically have been integrations between the VNN platform and other popular software — from the first ever open schedule-integration between companies to ensure website schedules are always up to date, to an integration with Facebook and Twitter that ensures Athletic Administrators reach their communities on all platforms, to Pressbox, the score-reporting app that ensures local media outlets across the country receive post-game updates without any duplicate reporting.
VNN’s vision has always been to create an open ecosystem for all of high school sports, where data is shared freely, making life easier for Athletic Administrators, and making high school sports a richer and even more transformative experience for athletes and their families. As we shared that big idea to other companies working in the space, we found that it wasn’t limited to only our team either. Many of those who we admired for their innovative game-changing takes on digital technology had the same perspective too. It only made sense that we should collaborate on an open future in high school sports.
This year, along with several like-minded companies across high school sports, we’re doubling down on that vision. Keep your eyes peeled over the coming weeks and months as we introduce our launch partners, including the best-of-the-best in:
Fundraising
Social Media
Scheduling
Event Ticketing
Registration, Rosters and Injury Tracking
Game Highlights
Athlete Recruiting Tools
With the top companies in the industry working together to make life easier and more streamlined in the Athletic Department, the future of high school sports is a connected one. We look forward to it.
