For most players, kicking off the recruitment process starts with an email. When you’re ready to start a conversation with a college coach, you’ll want to make sure you are putting your best foot forward. Here is a quick guide to crafting personalized, professional emails to coaches.

Recently, the ECNL published a study that found college coaches preferred to be contacted by Email compared to SMS and Phone calls.  

The Subject Line

The first thing a coach will see in their inbox is the subject line. To make sure they open the email, make the subject line informative. Always include your name and graduating class. You can also add your club team name and position.

Example:

The Body

Now that you have the coach’s attention, you need to make sure to get them the essential information about you quickly.

You can break up the body into three sections.

Section 1: General Introduction

The general introduction should further elaborate on your Subject Line. Give the coach a bit more information about you as a player. Be sure to include your graduation year, the names of your club and high school teams, position(s) and jersey number.

Example:

My name is Christina Ordonez. I am a Center Back (#5) with NSA Fury and graduate in May 2022.

Section 2: The Why

In this next section, you should describe why you’re a fit for this coach, their program, and school. It’s essential to convey The Why to the coach — they should be intrigued by you, and want to learn more. Be sure to personalize this part of the email. That means providing specifics about yourself (bonus points for including a good GPA!), but you should also make it clear that you are familiar with the coach, their program, and the school in general.

Example:

I have watched many Michigan games this season and believe my skill set is a great fit for the team’s 4-3-3 formation. I have been playing center-back in a 4-3-3 with my club team, and my ability to read the game and distribute out of the back would help the Michigan backline excel. I also know that Michigan has an amazing pre-med program, and with a 3.9 GPA I plan on entering the medical field post-college.

Section 3: Upcoming Schedule & Trace iD / Game Film

The final component of your email is giving the coach a way to see your game moments, alongside tournaments, showcases and ID camps where they might be able to catch you in person. Keep in mind that most coaches will not have the time or bandwidth to watch entire games, so you should provide a more accessible way to see you in action.

If you’re using Trace iD, this is where you’ll drop the link to your iD along with some instructions on how they can see and explore your moments. With Trace iD, the coach can quickly jump into the full game from any moment to provide even more context of your play. They’ll see up-to-date stats across all of your matches. And anytime you add a new moment to your iD, the coach will have access to that immediately. Check out this sample Trace iD, created by a Trace athlete from FC Dallas who recently committed to Clemson.

If you’re not using Trace iD, you’ll want to attach some game film. We have a few do’s to get recruited for college soccer through game film.

Example:

My team will be attending ECNL Vegas from March 12-14, and I’ve included our schedule here. [OR I’ll be attending Michigan’s ID camp next month and am very excited to meet the coaching staff.] I have included the link to my Trace iD (HERE). My team uses Trace to automatically film and edit our games, and I’ve included some of the moments that I feel best represent me as a player in my Trace iD. Feel free to click the “jump to full game” option to watch a larger portion of that game or head to my “matches” tab to check out my most recent 5 games.

Here is the full email example:

To: coach@dreamcollege.edu
Subject: Christina Ordonez – Class of 2020
Dear Coach Berhalter,

My name is Christina Ordonez. I am a Center Back (#5) with NSA Fury and graduate in May 2022.

I have watched many Michigan games this season and believe my skill set is a great fit for the team’s 4-3-3 formation. I have been playing center-back in a 4-3-3 with my club team, and my ability to read the game and distribute out of the back would help the Michigan backline excel. I also know that Michigan has an amazing pre-med program, and with a 3.9 GPA I plan on entering the medical field post-college.

My team will be attending ECNL Vegas from March 12-14, and I’ve included our schedule here. [OR I’ll be attending Michigan’s ID camp next month and am very excited to meet the coaching staff.] I have included the link to my Trace iD (HERE). My team uses Trace to automatically film and edit our games, and I’ve included some of the moments that I feel best represent me as a player in my Trace iD. Feel free to click the “jump to full game” option to watch a larger portion of that game or head to my “matches” tab to check out my most recent 5 games.

I am really excited about the possibility of playing for you at the University of Michigan, and I hope to have the opportunity to show you that I would make a great fit for the team.

Thank you,
Christina

When to follow up

Once you send this initial email, it’s important to know when to follow up. If you never heard back from the coach, following up can help remind them to review the initial email as they might have been busy when they first received it. If they did respond but haven’t given you any next steps, following-up is a great way to re-ignite the conversation.

The best way to follow up is to make sure you have something new to offer them. And follow up by replying to the first email you sent, so that they can see the full context of the conversation and you can demonstrate ongoing interest.

Example:

Hey Coach!

I wanted to let you know that I added a few more moments to my Trace iD, it now includes a few more set pieces and attacking transitions. You can see those new moments by clicking here: (insert your Trace iD URL here)

Thank you,

Christina