We help people manage and run their weekly pickup hockey game with their players. All our games are basically private, curated rosters that are fully managed by the organizer. Our organizers are pretty protective about who is invited and in what order.

Having said that, we often have games that need to grow their roster because they aren’t getting 20 skaters out every week. I’m one of those people as my new weekly game has only soldout a handful of times.

Here’s my list of top 5 things to do if you need more rookies in your weekly pickup hockey game… Ok, so step 0 is of course to make sure your game is simple to share, ie use 20Skaters! Sorry but if you aren’t currently using our platform then this post isn’t quite as helpful.

1. Ask Current Players

Your current players know your game, what skill level and type of players you’re looking for. They know other hockey players, and it’s always nice to be able to invite your buddies for a good skate. Make sure your current players know that you want to grow the list of subs and encourage them to invite their friends. Until you ask, players are often not sure that they’re allowed to invite others.

Tell your players to point their friends directly to your upcoming game page. If you’re doing this, have us setup a permanent url(facility page) for your lineup, if you don’t have it already. You can see an example here with my game, which is 20skaters.com/brydon. This page will always show my upcoming game and allow someone to register to be invited to all upcoming games. So it works today, or a few weeks from now when they get around to clicking it.

2. Ask Us

When players register with our platform, they can fill in a form that indicates they are looking for more hockey. We can email that list for your city and let them know about your game. As well, we’ll happily post to our Facebook page. Just contact us and send us a few sentences that describes your game to a player considering it.

3. Get Social

Post your game’s permanent url to the social networks you use. Make sure to tag your friends who play hockey, tag your city as well, and of course tag us @20Skaters. In the post, Ask your hockey playing friends to share and tag their hockey playing friends.

4. Classifieds

In my area it would be Kijiji but it could be Craig’s list or whatever the hawt classified site is in your area. Post you permanent url along with those few sentences to help a potential player decide if they would fit in well.

The challenge here is you are opening it up to random strangers but the risk is low. If you get a player out who is a poor fit for your game, you can just move them to inactive in your lineup and they won’t be invited to any more games.

5. Post In Your Rink

This one’s a long shot but it can work. Most rinks have boards that you can post old school ads on. Print out that description and game url and post it to your rink board.

5b. Bordering Games

A bonus, if there are pickup games playing before or after you, ask that organizer if they’re alright with you inviting their players. Some players may be interested in playing back to back games some weeks. Make sure to ask the organizers permission as you don’t want them thinking you’re trying to steal their players.

Good luck! If we missed any key tricks and techniques, just let us know and we’ll share it up.