Ask the members of any sports club what they check on the website and the answer is rarely the history page or the photo of the pitch. It is: what is on tonight, is there a place, who is coaching and what does it cost?
Yet most sports club websites are built the other way round. A large photo, a welcome message, a membership form and a timetable buried three clicks away, often as a PDF that was last updated in spring. Clubs on X regularly post that their new timetable is "now available on our academy website", which tells you how often members have to go looking for it.
This guide covers what a sports club website needs, and why the week's sessions should come first.
What members check most often
A club website has two audiences: current members and people thinking of joining. Their questions overlap more than you might expect.
Current members want:
- What sessions are on today and this week
- Whether there are places left
- Changes and cancellations
- Club news, fixtures and results
Prospective members want:
- What sports and sessions the club offers
- Who coaches them, and their experience
- What membership costs
- How to join or book a trial
Both groups are looking at the same thing first: the weekly schedule. Put it on the front page.
The weekly board
A weekly board shows sessions by day, with:
- Time
- Sport or activity
- Level, such as beginners, juniors, intermediate or open
- Coach
- Availability, including when a session is full
Showing when a session is full is useful in two ways. It saves members a wasted trip or message, and it tells prospective members the club is busy and popular.
If you use a booking system to manage sessions and places, link each session to the right booking page. The website shows the week; the booking system holds the real availability. Make sure the two are kept in step, or members will lose trust in the board.
A page for every sport
If your club offers several sports, give each one its own page. A single "Activities" page with a paragraph on each does not help anyone who is searching for one sport in particular.
Each sport page should include:
- What the sessions involve and who they are for
- Levels and age groups
- Days and times
- Coaches for that sport
- Equipment needed, and whether the club provides it
- How to try a first session
Separate pages also help people find you. Someone searching for "junior tennis coaching" near your town is more likely to land on a page about junior tennis than on a general club homepage.
A page for every coach
Coaches are a big part of why people choose a club, especially parents choosing for their children. Give each coach a short page with:
- A photo
- Which sports and sessions they coach
- Their coaching qualifications and experience
- A line or two in their own words
Only list qualifications coaches actually hold, and check them. For coaches working with children, many clubs also mention safeguarding checks. Follow the guidance from your national governing body on what to publish.
Memberships priced in the open
Hiding membership prices behind "contact us for details" puts people off. Most people comparing clubs want to see the price before they get in touch.
Show each membership option with:
- Price per month or per year, and when the price was set
- What it includes, such as sessions, court time, facilities or discounts
- Who it is for, such as adults, juniors, families or off-peak
- Any joining fee or minimum term
Put the join form right next to the prices, so someone who has decided does not have to hunt for it.
News that shows the club is alive
A news section with match reports, new sessions, coach announcements and social events shows that the club is active. It also gives members a reason to come back and gives search engines fresh content to index.
Keep news short and regular. A paragraph and a photo after each fixture or event is enough. If the most recent post is a year old, visitors will wonder whether the club is still running.
Many clubs rely on volunteers to keep the website going, and posts from clubs recruiting help with "website management" are common. A site where news, coaches and sports are added through simple forms, without editing page layouts, makes that volunteer role much easier to fill.
Setting up Fixture
Fixture is a free Framer template for a sports club, a leisure centre or an academy, built around the week. Its first screen is a weekly board where sessions flip in by day and sell out to FULL, so a member sees tonight's places before anything else.
It includes a home page with the weekly board, sports, facilities, coaches, memberships, news and contact. There is a page for each of four sports and each of four coaches, and four sample news posts, all on the CMS. Three memberships are priced next to a join form. A start-here guide and a 404 page are included, with desktop, tablet and phone layouts, and it is written in British English.
To set it up:
1. Replace the four sports with your own, adding or removing CMS entries as needed.
2. Add your coaches with real photos and qualifications.
3. Set your memberships and prices, with the date they apply from.
4. Update the weekly board with your current sessions and link each to your booking system.
5. Add a few recent news posts.
6. Connect the join form and send a test.
The weekly board is a display. Live availability comes from your booking system, so decide who updates the board and how often. Fixture is free to remix, but publishing on your own domain needs a paid Framer plan. Read what is the Framer CMS? for how the collections work, and see free Framer templates for others.
A sports club website does not need to be clever. It needs to tell members what is on tonight and tell newcomers how to join. Put the week first and the rest will follow.