Big-program energy on a small-program budget.
D-II, D-III, NAIA, JUCO. No marketing department, no five-figure software contract. Fill the stands, grow your booster list, and prove engagement to your AD — with a free tool one person can run.
The Challenge
Small programs do big-program work with none of the staff.
You’re a one-person athletics office wearing six hats. You run game-day ops, post on social, chase the local paper, and somehow still need to grow attendance and keep boosters giving. The Power Four schools have departments for each of those. You have a Tuesday afternoon.
Ticketing platforms are built for stadiums you don’t have. CRM tools cost more than your marketing line. And every spring the AD asks for engagement numbers you have no way to actually measure.
Game Set Engage is built for your size. Free to start, fast to set up, and simple enough that a work-study student can run it. You get the attendance data, the booster list, and the engagement proof — without the big-school price tag.
Built for Small Athletics
Everything a lean program needs. Nothing it doesn’t.
Fill the stands, grow your supporter list, and show your AD the numbers — all from one free dashboard.
Turn students into a student section.
Students open the app at the gym, field, or rink and check in. Their phone’s location confirms they’re actually in the building, so stadium points only land when they show up. Set bigger point rewards for rivalry and homecoming games, and post a points race from your dashboard each week to turn your regulars into your loudest section.
No turnstiles, no scanners, nothing to install at the gate. The whole check-in lives in the app.
Example data
Every fan in the stands is a future supporter.
Parents, alumni, and local fans all check in too — and now you have a profile for each one, their attendance history, and a reason to reach out. Turn a packed homecoming into a booster pipeline.
Run a fan survey, a local-business deal code, or a points auction for signed gear. Every fan who joins is tracked back to a real person — the data your development office actually needs.
Example data
Walk into the budget meeting with receipts.
When your AD asks “is this working?”, you have an answer. Participations, active and repeat fans, fan growth and any venue-partnership fees are live in your dashboard, and you can export a fan’s history as CSV (or a segment, on the City plan).
Those are the numbers that justify next year’s budget and open a conversation with a title sponsor.
Deciding what to run first? Our field guide to NCAA fan engagement initiatives covers the ones that moved attendance, with a playbook for programs without a Power Four budget.
Local partners fund what ticket sales can’t.
D-II, D-III, NAIA and JUCO programs run on smaller budgets than anyone. The coffee shop by campus, the pizza place near the gym, the diner students already go to: they ask to partner, join your campaigns, and pay a fee your program sets on every confirmed check-in and offer redemption.
Game Set Engage invoices the venues monthly, and you keep 70 to 90% of it depending on your plan. Partners can run offers any day of the week, in season or out, so the fees keep coming when there’s no game on the calendar.
Weighing your options? See how we compare to FanMaker, or see how a department could turn Tuesday volleyball into a named leaderboard and rivalry week into partner deals fans use.
Example data, illustrative only
How It Works
Live before your next home game.
Add your schedule
Add your games across every sport and upload your school logo. It takes minutes.
Open check-in
Start the game-day check-in and set the points. Check-in opens in the app an hour before the game starts.
Fans check in
Students, alumni and families check in from the app, location-verified at the venue, and earn points. You watch it live.
Report & grow
Pull the season numbers together for your AD and your sponsors, and export a fan’s history as CSV (or a segment, on the City plan). Then do it all again next season, bigger.
FAQ
Questions from small programs.
Yes. The Local plan is free for up to 1,000 active fans, with every core feature included: check-ins, points, campaigns and your dashboard. No credit card, no trial. If your fan base stays under 1,000, you can run a whole season free. The City plan ($199/month, up to 10,000 fans) is there if you grow past it.
No hardware at all. Fans check in from their own phones in the Game Set Engage app, and the app uses their location to confirm they’re actually at the game. You set the points: the most at your venue, and fewer at home if you switch the home tier on. You set up and watch everything from a laptop or your phone, with nothing to install at the gate.
It’s built for exactly that. Setup takes an afternoon, and once a game’s check-in is live, fans do the rest from their phones and your dashboard fills in as they do. A work-study student or a single staffer can manage it across every sport.
Yes. Add your full schedule across every sport: basketball, volleyball, soccer, baseball and more. Each game gets its own check-in campaign, and every check-in adds to the same points balance per fan and the same fan ranking in your dashboard.
A live dashboard with participations, active and repeat fans, fan growth and any venue-partnership fees, plus CSV exports of a fan’s history (and of a segment, on the City plan). It’s the proof your AD needs for budget meetings and the data sponsors ask for before they sign.
Explore More
More for college athletics.
College Athletics
The full college playbook — check-ins, points, and fan data across every program size.
Revenue Growth
Partner with local venues so every confirmed partner-venue check-in and offer redemption brings a little money back to your program.
Data & Analytics
Participations, active and repeat fans, and a live dashboard for your AD.
Your season starts now
Pack the stands this season.
Set up check-in before your next home game. Free for up to 1,000 fans — no contract, no hardware.