#backinthegame

Dear All Club's,

As I am sure you are aware there is a World Cup around the corner, as part of this we also have a warm up game coming to Newcastle on 6thSeptember. As you know we tend to see a rise in our playing numbers around world cups due to the increased amount of press coverage the sports gets by major media channels and then the good work you do to help make those interested feel welcome when they come down to the club.

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We are looking at ways to help support you during this world cup and the lead up to it. We have had some good conversations with clubs that have identified a large amount of people that used to play that no longer come down to the club anymore i.e. old age grade teams, retired senior players, former age grade coaches etc, they are going to use GMS and social media i.e. tagging an image with a whole past team to help re attract these people to the club, whether it’s to play or just have a drink. We as a county and the local RFU team will be using the hash tag “#backinthegame” from 1st July until 10th September on all our promotional material to try and re-engage with people that have walked away from our game. We would love to see you as a club also use this hashtag, hopefully we can create a theme on social media platforms helping us engage with more people.

We are also interested in any projects you are thinking of running at your club that will tie into the England v Italy game at St James park and the extra attention our sport will get. We have some funding available to help clubs re engage with past members or recruit new ones, please send us an email with a brief outline explaining what you are planning on doing and how the county can help. An example of a project being run is;

Boys of 1996!; a former youth coach whose team where born in the year 1996 is using social media to re connect with as many people as possible from that old team, they will then play a one off friendly against a local club. The event is advertised as a re union event and will enable the club to make contact with a load of former members who are now 23/24 years old and remind them of how great rugby and the club is.

So if you have any bright ideas and need a little help please get in touch we would love to help support you!

Please share this information with your club members.

Many thanks Durham County RFU