When I talk to families or meet them for the first time about volleyball recruiting, I often find that there is a struggle on several fronts to avoid several consistent mistakes.

There is still this overwhelming notion that, "If I'm good enough college coaches will find me, contact me and give me an offer." It's not always said in that exact way, but the expectations that are communicated follow this same pattern. We often have a passive mindset when it comes to the recruiting process. We often think we need to be doing very little in order to get recruited.

In reality though the opposite is usually the case. Even with those athletes that are being HIGHLY recruited, it makes a difference in their process when they are proactive.

Here are a few examples of what I'm talking about:

Posting your club schedule on Instagram

In general there is nothing wrong with posting your club schedule on Instagram. The issue here is the thought process. We are thinking that, "I will just post it on Instagram and then college coaches will be able to FIND or KNOW which qualifiers I am attending." The mistakes being made here are that A) college coaches are going to Instagram to do any sort of recruiting, and B) that during that process they will just happen across your profile, see your schedule posted and then go through the process of marking you down to watch at some point during the season. Why would a coach go through all that trouble (and it's always possible they will) when they have countless of other athletes showing specific interest in their university and emailing them every week? So, what's the better option?

Email the coach directly. Put your schedule in the email. Update them the week prior to a tournament and let them know where you are going to be. Have your film easily accessible in all of the emails you are sending so they can watch both your old and new film. Put information in your email signature.

You have a "fall back" school

This is one of my least favorite things to hear. No coach really wants to be the fall-back school. Besides, a college coach will get plenty of emails from athletes saying their school is the #1 school on the athletes list. They don't need to wait for you to "fall back". Something to think about as well - college coaches don't have "fall back" athletes. No one on their recruiting board is the athlete that they will go after if everyone else says no. It's just not something that happens. Even when a school has a 2nd Tier of athletes, they typically aren't offering those athletes a scholarship. I've asked several college coaches over the years, "When was the last time you offered a 4 year scholarship to a 2nd tier athlete on your list?" The answer is, "never". If you aren't a "fall back" for a school, then you should have a "fall back" school.

The other part about this is that I will often hear this before we even start the process. We certainly are going through this process in the wrong way if we are identifying "fall back" schools prior to even sending an email, talking on the phone, or going on a visit.

Auto-Generated Highlights

We often think that a tool, platform, or recruiting event is going to be the next piece of the puzzle for our recruiting process. We put way to much faith in technology in this way. We either think we found the secret path to recruiting success or at least something that is going to streamline the process for us. Whether it is UA, SportsRecruits or Hudl that you think is going to put your recruiting process on "easy mode", just remember that athletes and families have found out the hard way in the years prior to your athlete starting her recruiting process. The Auto-generated highlights are just another "thing" that many families think is going to take part of the load off of their recruiting plate. In reality though, if you are relying on something like auto-generated highlights to impress coaches, you're mistaken. Those highlights don't communicate well with college coaches. The clips are short and hard to create an evaluation. They also aren't putting your BEST out there for coaches to see. Hudl is a great tool. You need to be going in and creating your own highlights.

None of the platforms out there (tools) have really changed what matters in recruiting; knowing which schools you should be targeting and doing the work to put yourself in front of those schools.

That hasn't changed in 20 years. Even University Athlete's ability to track and tell you which conferences are "evaluating" you at tournaments hasn't changed any of this. It's certainly cool. But does it move the needle at all?

Put in the work. Understand where you are going to be the best fit. Don't look for easy ways out of the process. Listen to advice from those that do this hundreds of times every year.

There is no"Easy" button during your recruiting process.

More recently I saw this while I was in SLC and I wondered if any of it actually paid off…