KNVB: Football clubs assist each other in online community

Many football clubs experience the same challenges. With the platform ‘Eén tweetje’, the KNVB connects the different clubs and promotes collaboration.

Board members work together

How do you connect directors of football clubs online and offline? That’s what the KNVB was looking for a solution for. They found it in the community platform ‘Eén tweetje‘. Through this platform, the ‘Board member of the Future’ can exchange knowledge and experiences with other board members. Yunits created the platform and developed a comprehensive online strategy.

Football clubs in practice

Many football clubs face the same challenges. What do you do when members don’t pay their fees? Where do you buy a scoreboard? How good is the quality of the artificial turf fields?

As a club, you can search for the answers yourself, or you can leverage the knowledge of other clubs. In the Netherlands, there are about 2400 amateur football clubs. Chances are, one of them has encountered the same problem before and found a solution.

This is where ‘Eén tweetje’ comes in. With an extensive question-answer module, board members of amateur football clubs can engage in conversations and tap into each other’s knowledge.

Benefits for board members

• Board members of football clubs have a central place to connect with each other.
• Finding easier, more efficient, and better solutions for (sometimes) common problems.
• Helping each other gives a sense of purpose.
• Board members expand their network, both within and outside the region.

Benefits for the KNVB

• Board members become better at what they do.
• Insight into the problems and developments within associations.
• Board members help each other progress. The KNVB merely provides support.

The origins of Eén tweetje

The KNVB wanted to help board members learn from each other. They wanted to use an online environment for this purpose, but how? The football association wasn’t sure.

Yunits investigated what exactly should be included on a potential platform. We did this in strategic sessions together with the KNVB and an advisory group. This advisory group consisted of board members from all over the Netherlands. Together, we addressed questions such as: What components are important? What kind of information do board members want to find there? What valuable knowledge and experience do they bring themselves?

Based on this, Eén-tweetje was created. It has become a community of practice with an engaging, sporty design. User-friendliness is central. For example, board members can easily use the platform during, before, or after a meeting.

Question-answer module highly successful

The question-answer module of Eén tweetje is the most widely used component. The football directors’ community highly appreciates the user-friendly way of asking questions. Directors receive answers to almost all questions quickly. This is proof of the value of Eén tweetje.

“You can’t do anything alone. You have to do it together.” – Johan Cruijff

Results of ‘Eén Tweetje’

During the successful pilot phase, approximately 115 questions were asked and answered. As a result, the KNVB decided to make Eén tweetje available to all board members and committee members of Dutch football clubs. Currently, there are 575 participants, and this number is growing rapidly. New messages are posted every day, and participants continue to help each other further.