Ad network can generate significant revenue

Massive Central Ohio Youth Baseball League makes $9K a year.

World domination was never Doug Hare’s intention. Shoot, he doesn’t even want control of Ohio. Not all of it, anyway.

The founder of the massive Central Ohio Youth Baseball League is perfectly happy with what he has, which is plenty: about 420 teams and some 5,000 players are COYBL members.

“My goal has never been to be the biggest league, my goal was to be the best league,” the affable Hare said. “I wanted to offer a quality program for the kids from top to bottom in central Ohio.”

As the league’s founder, president and webmaster (“The only thing I don’t do is windows,” he joked) Hare’s fingerprints are on most everything related to COYBL. 

“I guess I am kind of a hands-on guy,” he said.

Surprisingly, one thing Hare said he never has paid much attention to is Google analytics reports for the league’s website, even though his site is one of the most heavily trafficked on the Sport Ngin platform. With so many regular viewers, COYBL was an obvious candidate to use Sport Ngin’s ad network. Still, Hare said he was hesitant at first about the idea of flipping the switch and having ads appear on his site.

“I was open to it, with a little hesitation about maybe what kind of ads would be on there,” Hare said. “One thing we definitely didn’t want to do was have pop ups right in the middle of our screen and kind of distracting from the league itself. But they assured me everything was in good taste and specific to what people look for.”

Hare, who estimates the site makes $8,000 to $9,000 per year off advertising, said he has only seen one ad objectionable enough for him to voice a complaint.

“I don’t even recall what it was, but it was something I didn’t want on my site,” Hare said. “And I contacted support and they took it right off. It has never shown up again."

The ad revenue pays for the site and allows Hare to have a mobile app without charging his members extra fees.

“That’s huge, no matter how you look at it,” Hare said about the extra cash flow. “Every little bit helps when you run a league.”