Case study results at a glance
# of manual processes combined into 1 form
3
Decrease in time spent ordering team uniforms
92%
# of members served
44,000+
Bowls, or lawn bowling, isn’t just a game in Australia — it’s part of the culture. Local bowls clubhouses serve as social hubs for whole communities, offering a gathering place with bars, live music, and a range of other entertainment.
Bowls New South Wales (NSW) is the governing body for the sport in New South Wales. There are 44,000 members and 450 clubs across Australia’s most populous state. In addition to supporting local clubs, Bowls NSW provides education for members to become accredited officials for the sport, and runs over 20 annual championship events as part of its elite player pathways.
“We’re one of those traditional sports that’s in a current state of flux, actually, where we’re really trying to modernize and appeal to new audiences,” says Billy Johnson, the communications and commercial manager for Bowls NSW. “We want to make sure that we can help our clubs remain open and continue contributing to their local communities all across the state.”
Until recently, though, the association wasn’t reflecting the goal of modernization in its own operations. It was using paper forms to register new members, collect fees, organize tournaments — basically for all its activities.
The problem: “Dead” spreadsheets, paper forms, and version-control nightmares
“You would be stunned at the amount of paper forms that we had,” says Johnson. Members would send in physical forms to join the organization, order uniforms, sign up for competitions, sign up for officials’ training — you name it.
We were creating so many more work hours just by not sharing information and basically working blind. Jotform has just completely fixed that for us.
Billy Johnson, Communications and Commercial Manager, Bowls NSW
On top of that, staff members were tracking the information they collected in different versions of static spreadsheets, so there was no way to access information for the organization as a whole. “We were copying spreadsheets and then using different versions,” says Johnson, making any attempt at version control a nightmare.
Then a couple of years ago, Tim Rowe came on board as the new CEO and initiated a review of all of Bowls NSW’s systems and operations. Johnson says Rowe quickly realized that teams were operating in isolation with no central source of information, leading to duplicated effort. Johnson says, “We were creating so many more work hours just by not sharing that information and basically working blind.”
The team decided to give Jotform a try to improve how it collected and managed data.
The results
Once staff began using Jotform Enterprise, they realized how much more information they could collect — and put to use. But most of all, they were able to save hundreds of hours of staff time while serving their members more quickly and efficiently.
Johnson says Jotform Enterprise led to “annually hundreds of hours, thousands of dollars saved.”
Here’s a look at some of the specific ways Bowls NSW modernized its operations with Jotform Enterprise.
Collecting accurate information from clubs and regions
With 450 volunteer-run clubs spread across 16 regions, the organization struggled to maintain updated records of the clubs’ and regions’ leaders, facilities, history, and other information.
Since each club is required to pay an annual membership fee, Bowls NSW decided to combine the annual fee payment with a form to collect details about each club. That way, it can ensure that records are updated annually.
What Jotform has done for us is to help us look at what else we can do better — to think differently about the way that we operate.
Billy Johnson, Communications and Commercial Manager, Bowls NSW
Segmenting members for better, more efficient communication
Before Jotform Enterprise, Bowls NSW had a list of all its members but couldn’t easily segment contacts by region, club, age bracket, or other criteria. If the membership team wanted to communicate with female athletes in the over-60 age bracket, it had no way to easily contact just that demographic.
Using Jotform Enterprise, the staff created region-specific membership forms, tailored to each region’s needs. This change also made it easier to communicate with particular regions.
Now, teams can sort and filter membership data by a number of criteria, allowing them to get specific feedback from the appropriate people without sending email blasts to their entire audience.
Combining multiple processes in a single form
In the past, Bowls NSW used a simple form to collect the names and email addresses of people who were interested in competing on state teams. Then a staff member would contact applicants to follow up.
With Jotform, the Bowls NSW team has easily added more sections to the form to combine multiple processes into one. First, they added a section for applicants to agree to the league’s code of conduct. This document used to be a PDF that the applicant had to sign and email back. Now, they can read through it within the form and just check a box to agree to the code.
Bowls NSW also added images of uniform sizes to the form so players can choose the right one up front. If an applicant is selected for a team, the Bowls NSW team already has their uniform size.
“We just started to realize, the more and more information we could get, it really started to help us,” says Johnson. “It’s really just streamlined so much.”
Playing as a team
Now that the Bowls NSW team has a central source of information, they’ve saved countless hours.
“It’s just saved so much time and money for us,” he says. “It is unbelievable. Having worked in such a siloed environment prior, we now all of a sudden have all this time to be able to look at other processes.”
Aside from the gains in efficiency and cost savings, though, Johnson says Jotform Enterprise has also helped the Bowls NSW team reimagine how the organization works. “What Jotform has done for us is to help us look at what else we can do better — to think differently about the way that we operate,” he says.
By digitizing and automating its processes and working as one team with Jotform Enterprise, Bowls NSW is better equipped to meet its goal of modernizing the sport while supporting the members who love the game. Learn more about how Jotform Enterprise can help your membership organization increase its value for members.
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