Pickleball
Tournament
The Usual Turnout: 8-12 Players
The Current Turnout: 0-4 Players
Project Timeline
Defining the Problem
Brainstorming Solutions
Compiling Common Complaints
Finalizing Solutions
Creating Website Goals
Lo Fi Wireframes
Defining the CTA Buttons & Site Map
Creating the UI Kit
High Fi Wireframes & Testing
Launching the Website
Fixing the Website
Overcoming the Reschedule
Tournament Feedback
My Reflection
Anyone Playing Today?
It's the common question in the local pickleball group chat. Who wants to play today? Usually everyone (& literally even their mom), would reply and the courts would be packed. That was no longer the case. People just weren’t playing anymore.
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My goal was to get the community playing and drive more people to the courts. My solution was to create a pickleball tournament.
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On top of that, I partnered with the local elementary school, so that the tournament funds would be donated to the Peer Helper Club.
My Role
Timeline
4 days for the website
1 week for all tournament materials
Project Type
Responsive Website(Mainly Mobile)
My Role
User Research, Research Analysis, Usability Testing, Wireframing, Brand Creation, Graphic Design, and Tournament Director
Team
Solo project with guidance from senior tennis players
Tools
Figma, Photoshop, Illustrator, Google Gemini, Google Forms, Mural, Whimsical, Wix and Miro
The Complaints of Past Local Tournaments
The first thing I did was write down common complaints and categorize them by how much they would affect tournament registration. To go back to my goal, I want to increase the number of local players on the courts. If people didn't sign up. then they were definitely not going to practice/play at the courts. Almost all these complaints were said daily when we would play casual games. Others were said during tournaments that I attended for support, or to play in.
"We Want....."
***The circle size represents how many singular individuals expressed that particular complaint
Direct Quotes and Participant Observation
Because I had such a quick turnaround, I wrote down quick solutions and picked the best ones. With 1 day spent, and knowing that I had user testing lined up, I wasn't too worried about dwelling on multiple solutions. Below I visualized everything that came up in conversation, that people always agreed with. Players would always bring up these topics while practicing and during other tournaments. If I could get rid of these problems, I would most likely get more sign-ups in my tournament.
Player Types
These three players types are what I most commonly found at the courts and at other tournaments. Using these three types, I made I created copy that would influence the three to sign up. With this in mind, there were certain situations/stories I wanted to avoid.
Ex Tennis Players
- Has a ton of experience from playing in tournaments from their past tennis life
- Mainly plays for a good challenge and to show off fancy skills.
Tournament Newbies
- Any skill level of pickleball player, but has never played in a tournament
- Wants to experience good competition, but not feel overwhelmed by rules and regulations
Intermediate Players
- Casual players you count on to be at the courts
- Might have played in a local tournament
- Remembers being new, and likes to help beginners
Stories to Avoid
Paul
He played in over 50 tennis tournaments in his life and switched to playing pickleball as he got older. He saw there was a local tournament, but when he tried to find information about the gameplay, there was none. With little info, he decided not to sign up.
Jan
She had only played pickleball twice. She saw a local tournament was being help and wanted to sign up. She got scared of looking like a fool around the good players, so she never signed up.
Lily
She loves playing three times a week with friends. She saw a local tournament had open registration, but it didn't look challenging enough, so she didn't sign up.
My End Goals
By addressing the main problems, potential players would feel more optimistic about signing up for the tournament. This would lead to more people practicing on the courts and would ensure that I raise more money for the kids.
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Using this information, I can start creating lo fi wireframes. By creating more stories to avoid, I can better understand what the users will need, and how much it might influence the registration.
Lo Fi Wireframes
At this point it was day two of my four-day turnaround. I knew time was ticking, and I needed to be quick. I jotted down TWO quick sketches and had to just go with it. I knew it needed to be simple anyway, so users could just scan for the info they needed. I
Landing Page
Info Page
Fixing the Landing Page
While there isn't much wrong with the initial design above, it would take users more time to find the information they are looking for.
Ideal Scenario
Jess heard about a local pickleball tournament and wanted to sign up. While taking a break at work, she finds this one. Seeing the date, registration, deadlines, and other information, she can sign up for the tournament within seconds.
By putting crucial information as the first thing users see, they can scan the landing page. Quickly, they can see if they have the availability to sign up.
A Simple UI
Since it's a pickleball tournament, why not have a pickle as the mascot? With a quick turnaround, I used AI prompts to give me an angry pickle. From there, I edited it in photoshop and Illustrator so I could get an SVG. I extracted colors from the pickle to use for the CTA buttons and additional information packets. At this point I had two days left until the launch, so I kept things simple.
Hi Fi Wireframes & Testing
Starting on the simplest pages first, I quickly created the landing page and the donate page.
Landing Page
Originally, I left out location, Deadline, and Follow sections, but after user testing, I added them for users who weren't local.
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At the bottom I added different ways that people could pay, so it could be all online. This allowed an easy way for non-locals to sign up.
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I also added the Register Now CTA below more info, to help those who aren't as tech savvy on their phone.
Donation Page
This page is for users who want to know more about the peer helpers and what they do. Even if people choose not to sign up, they could still donate.
Information Page
The only changes from the user testing were some math I added up incorrectly, on the example score cards.
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This page has a mock schedule for potential players to assess if they could play within the timeframe. I also have a PDF of a condensed visual schedule.
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I created a real schedule after I had all the players sign up.
Registration Page
This page is for players to sign up their teams. They enter a team name, each team members name, birthday (for age requirement), and one phone number to contact the team.
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After submitting, the checklist will appear of everything else that needs to be complete. I added that after user testing, since many didn't know what else to do after signing up.
The Launch
The launch of the website was very successful from my standpoint. When the tournament was finished, I had a gross profit of $540 and 17 teams sign up. I even had to reschedule the tournament, but was able to keep the majority of previously registered teams.
354 Total Site Sessions in 57 Days
With 225 unique visitors, I had traffic coming from 10 different states just from sharing on Facebook. The average session duration was 4 min 19s.
Success in My Eyes
Even though I had tons of visitors, I had to take into account how many of those visitors were actually going to be able to participate in the tournament.
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Of the 31% who could have signed up, they would have to meet all of the requirements, be free the morning of the event, and have a partner who could play with them. Based on that, a reschedule, only having mixed doubles teams, I met my target goal of at least 12 teams registered.
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Leading up to the tournament, more players were practicing, and the courts were full! My main objective had been fulfilled.
Navigation Flows
After adding the "Register Now" CTA to the landing page, I was able to redirect some traffic to the registration page straight from the landing page. These are the first three steps visitors took on the website, after I added the CTA to the landing page.
Main Challanges
Tournament Reschedule
Due to rain, I had to reschedule the tournament for an entirely different month. Some were mad, and the weather ended up clearing, but it was for the best.
Organizing the Pools
Creating the actual bracket with an unequal number of teams was the hardest part. I had to make sure teams wouldn't need much direction from me (the tournament director) and utalize all the courts. Before everytone finished their assesment forms, I created a simple algorithm that I could then plug teams into as I got scores.
17 Teams, 6 Courts........and need to wrap up by noon
8:00 - 8:40
8:45 - 9:25
9:30 - 10:10
10:15 - 10:55
11:00 - 11:40
COURTS 1 -3
Team A vs. Team B
Team A vs. Team C
Team B vs. Team D
Team A vs. Team D
Team B vs. Team C
Team E vs. Team F
Team G vs. Team H
Team E vs. Team G
Team F vs. Team G
Team E vs. Team H
Team I vs. Team J
Team K vs. Team L
Team I vs. Team K
Team J vs. Team L
Team I vs. Team L
8:00 - 8:40
8:45 - 9:25
9:30 - 10:10
10:15 - 10:55
11:00 - 11:40
COURTS 4 -6
Team C vs. Team D
FREEPLAY
Team F vs. Team H
Team I vs. Team K
FREEPLAY
Team M vs. Team N
Team O vs. Team M
Team P vs. Team O
Team M vs. Team P
Team Q vs. Team O
Team Q vs. Team P
Team N vs. Team Q
Team M vs. Team Q
Team N vs. Team O
Team N vs. Team P
Making it User Friendly for the Non-tech Savy
I had gotten a general idea of who was interested in a tournament before I even organized it, and with this, I realized that many potential users were not tech savvy. Simple things as using a navigation bar, and dropdowns were confusing for them to use, so I created two quick links on the landing page. Little navigation was needed.
Participants wouldn't Fill out the Team Ranking Assesment
After signing their teams up, users would forget to do the Team Ranking Assessment which prevented me from organizing the pools. I tried different methods to remind people to fill it out, until I eventually had to send a direct link to everyone. It read "In order to create the pools and send out the brackets, all players must fill out the assessment." The anticipation was what finally made all players fill out the form.
Conclusion
The tournament was an astounding success. Only two players had a question, and I was able to both play and run the tournament in a smooth manner.
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​Moving forward, I took into consideration the needs of the locals. It was difficult for people to create mixed teams, so in the future, I plan to host a women's double, and men's doubles co-tournament. It will have to be a smaller pool of teams but allows everyone who wanted to play in the past tournament, a chance.
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The best compliment I received was from a team who travels the state, playing tournaments, who told me(unprompted) that I "had the most organized and well thought out tournament, that they had ever attended."