We love it when our clients provide us with the opportunity to provide more innovative service offerings, and that’s exactly what happened with The Trust, an agency linked with one of our clients, the National Football Players Association (NFLPA). AIS previously developed and implemented a new player management system for the NFLPA, and now we’re working with the Trust to develop a website, available on multiple platforms, to maintain active engagement with former NFL players. Read on to learn more, or visit: http://playerstrust.com/.
Background
The National Football League Players Association is the union for professional football players in the National Football League. Established in 1956, the NFLPA has a long history of assuring proper recognition and representation of players’ interests. The Trust is a new agency, operating programs and services that provide former National Football League (NFL) players with the support, skills and tools to help ensure success in life after football. Once a player has moved on from his football career, he continues to receive benefits from The Trust. The current collective bargaining agreement (CBA) guarantees approximately $22 MM per year to support former players.
The Challenge
One of the main goals of this website is to reach as many former players on as many possible devices and mediums as possible. Since we knew that mobility was important, it was established early on that the website must utilize responsive web design principles allowing for content consumption on devices ranging from smartphones to desktops and everything in between. The agency also plans to maintain active engagement via many of the major social networks, so the site would need to be accessible on all major browsers including Internet Explorer 8 and above, Chrome, Firefox and Safari which would require use of modern technologies such as HTML5, CSS3 and JavaScript.
Solution
Our team of experts worked collaboratively with the NFLPA management team in order to deliver a website, hosted in Rackspace, based on ASP.NET MVC4 and SQL Server technologies as requested. We developed the site using Orchard 1.7.1 as the CMS platform allowing non-technical users to be able to manage every aspect of the website. The CMS tool allows authorized staff to modify content using a WYSIWYG editor, while also supporting raw HTML authoring as well as file upload and multimedia storage capabilities. Web editors are be able to create new pages and sections on the fly using the CMS as well.
We used Orchard, a free, open-source content management system (built on the ASP.Net, MVC platform, which meets the NFLPA’s architectural goals) for the following reasons:
- It is backed by Microsoft and built on Microsoft ASP.Net MVC technology and uses industry-standard software development practices.
- It has had a robust community supporting it since 2009.
- It is licensed under BSD.
Business and Technical Achievements
The NFLPA is an organization that ensures the rights of players are protected, and the Trust ensures that former players maintain an active engagement with the league well after their time as active players. It’s important for players and former players to develop a plan for a life and career in the real world after the NFL, particularly given the relatively short career span of most players. The new program is free, and available for any former player (of at least two years in the league); and will include services that provide assistance with travel arrangements, healthcare, financial, nutrition and lifestyle advice and other benefits. Each retiree who reaches out to the organization will be assigned a program manager to find out his needs and information and will walk him step-by-step through the process of getting assistance.
While former players have access to a wide-array of services, we’ve also ensured that the site is user-friendly on the back and front ends with the following features:
- Accessibility across multiple browsers and mobile platforms
- Video playback
- Integration with the Social Solutions ETO product to provide player profile information
- A dynamic site map that utilizes information from the ETO systems
- Support for a chat capability
- An architecture that supports the development of mobile apps to support
Technology
- Orchard 1.7.1
- Rackspace
- Microsoft ASP.Net MVC
- MS SQL
