Would you actually join your own club?
A five minute audit that could be quietly costing you new members
Here’s an uncomfortable exercise. Open your club’s website right now, and try to look at it as someone who has never heard of you before.
That’s it. That’s the whole test.
Your website should be the beating heart of the club digitally. It’s often the first interaction someone has with your club, before they visit, meet a coach, see the courts, or speak to a member, they’ve likely already searched for tennis in their area and formed an opinion of you. Remember, a lot of potential members, or parents looking for coaching, start by typing “tennis courts near me,” “tennis near me,” or “coaching in XYZ,” that’s the habit now, whether it’s through Google, Maps or AI. It’s also worth remembering that people form an impression of a website in around 0.05 seconds, and that 88% of visitors won’t come back if that first experience puts them off. That means you’re playing a risky game, especially with every sport (never maliciously) competing for people’s genuinely limited time.
In an ideal world, every prospective member would sit down with someone from your club for an hour, over a coffee, with plenty of time to sell them on everything that makes the place special. It would be amazing, right? You’d tell them the history, that legendary BBQ from five years ago people still talk about, the cakes that appear every finals day. You’d share your exciting plans for the courts, new initiatives to welcome families, and of course the tales of the juniors who came through the club and went on to real success. After that hour, chances are they’d want to join, right??
But that’s not realistic. When it comes to finding your club online, whatever those feelings are that you’d want them to carry home with them after that coffee, those need to be captured, I’m sorry to say, in seconds. The good news: that’s very achievable.
We worked with a club a while back that genuinely had one of the best junior programmes in the county, full waiting lists, brilliant coaches, real community feel. But their website still had a homepage banner announcing an open day from eighteen months earlier, and the "Join Us" button led to a broken contact form. On paper, nothing had changed about the club. In reality, they'd been quietly losing every person who discovered them online, because the site was telling a different story to the one happening on court.
So here’s your MOT. Go through it honestly.
First impression
Is it immediately clear who you are and where you are? Seems silly but plenty of clubs don’t actually share the name of their location.
Does the website actually feel like your club? What we mean by this leans a bit into the fundamentals of brand but we can dive into that another time. In short, if your club is all about being family-friendly, welcoming, buzzing, vibrant, inclusive, does the website tell that story? Does it show people smiling? Is it easy to navigate? Is it feel warm and fuzzy. The feeling of the website needs to mirror those values.
Would the members you want to attract immediately this club is for them? Ties into the point above. We talked about those crucial first few seconds, no right or wrong, but a performance academy might want a different impression to community park courts, right? The energy is different, the core values are different, the audience might perhaps be different. Like we say above, that first impression needs to mirror your club’s values.
Does the website actually work? Sounds silly, I know, but remember over 50% of global web traffic is on mobile, so how does your website look on mobile? Is the spacing off? Are the photos too large, or too small? Can you read the headings? These are all HUGE signals, to the user about their experience, and to Google itself. Does your website have too many large images or videos that make it take an age to load? These are surefire ways to get people to click away.
Findability
What happens if you search “tennis club near me”? Do you show up? This has got to be a huge consideration, for many clubs across the country, they are in such high density for sports clubs. And not just tennis and padel, but numerous cricket, rugby, football, golf and hockey clubs within a matter of metres. So when people search those golden words, “tennis near me,” you want to appear there. If you don’t appear, then you need to work on SEO (we’ll cover that in another article), but getting the above right will be a great place to start.
Is your Google Business Profile accurate and up to date? These are easy, quick and free ways to get your business found. You may need to dig out the login details from whoever set it up, but make sure your Google profile has the right name, location, opening times, photos. It’s an easy win!
Navigation
Can someone find membership info in 2 to 3 clicks? Again, user habits in this day and age mean patience is lower than ever, people want answers immediately, and the longer they have to wait, the more likely you are to lose them. It’s frightening really how little time we have to keep attention. Don’t waste a second!
Would a newcomer understand your language, or is it full of internal club speak? This also ties into who your target audience is, but on the whole, making sure language is as open as possible to people both inside and outside the sport is helpful, not only for the user but to Google itself. Remember, your club might have unique quirks and history that mean certain things are a certain way, but don’t let the potential member get bogged down with information that might make them switch off.
Content and imagery
Are your photos recent, or are they still from 2019? This might upset a few people, but in 2026 there is literally no excuse for not having up to date imagery. Everyone has a smartphone, everyone has a top notch camera in their pocket, which means there is no excuse. Whether it’s team matches, social mixers, padel court openings, BBQs, coaching and more, get snapping! And remember, you don’t have to be an award winning photographer, but consider how you will use the images from a website perspective, landscape vs portrait, and our top tip, get nice and close!! People want emotion, not people standing a mile and a half away.
Do you actually show the things you’re proud of? The junior programme, the social tennis, the atmosphere, or just tell people about them? People need to SEE. It’s very easy to slip into the “everyone knows we are amazing at X,” but the reality is, outside of the club, they don’t, I’m afraid. So talk about it up front and centre! This is why we are amazing. No one will judge you for celebrating what you do best!
The final question, and the only one that really matters: if you’d never heard of your club before, landed on this website today, and were looking for somewhere to play tennis or padel... would you join?
If you hesitated, that’s not a failure. It’s information. Most clubs are run by volunteers juggling this alongside actual jobs and genuinely busy lives, this isn’t about criticising what’s gone before, it’s about noticing it with fresh eyes and fixing what’s fixable.
Start with the first impression. That’s usually where the biggest wins are hiding.
If this was useful, Wood & Ham is regularly writing articles to help grassroots sport — real, practical stuff for people running clubs and coaching businesses.