LocalReplay is a free local sports hub/community for leagues, organizations, athletes, coaches, parents and fans. While there are other sports social networks out there in the local sports space, LocalReplay is doing as good a job as any in offering turn-key solutions to people involved at every level of local sports. They also happen to be based in my backyard (North Carolina) so I wanted to offer a few thoughts about the site.
LocalReplay enables anyone and everyone involved in sports (the groups listed above) to create a website/page that others can interact with. When you sign up for the site you can register as a player, team manager(coach), scout, content producer or fan. I'm impressed that the site has such a wide range of uses. For example, a player can create a site and easily share highlight videos, pictures and information to share with friends or anyone they like. A coach or team manager can start a team site that includes schedules, players, statistics, etc, and organizations can create a page to share information about themselves and/or an event they run. LocalReplay seems to have many team, league and organization partners, but one example is their recent partnership with Virginia AAU to provide an integrated interactive solution for all their teams to allow everyone in the organization to easily connect and communicate. You can visit the LocalReplay Virginia AAU page here.
The site includes the standard social networking features (blogs, user-generated content, profiles, videos, pictures, search capabilities) so I won't bore you with that stuff. But I do want to highlight a few interesting features. First, I really like that you don't have to be a registered user to view a lot of the content. This is great because it allows people to get a good taste of the site, instead of alienating potential users by not letting them see what's on the site. I also appreciate how the profiles are set up --click on the thumbnail below for my sample profile. They don't feel cluttered and it's very easy to add pictures and video. I really like that you can easily add videos from YouTube via the YouTube Video Browser.
A few minor changes I'd recommend would be to go one step further with their video tags and make them so people can click on them. I also would consider sprucing up the blogs a bit to include some featured posts/videos and an option to subscribe via email.
According to one of the site's founders, some improvements/new additions they're considering include:
- Virtual training
- Custom media production
- Enhanced team registration management
Overall, I'm impressed with what LocalReplay offers. According to SportsTechNow, they've raised $600,000 in Angel and founder capital and are currently looking at additional potential Angel/VC investors. LocalReplay is currently monetized via advertising on team, league and city pages/sites.