NASSM - North American Society for Sport Management

This week I'm reviewing the NASSM website. This is more of a scholarly website, and not much use unless you are a member of NASSM, which I happen to be a student member.

Aesthetics/Design
The NASSM homepage is a clean white layout, with neutral black, maroon, and blue text that is easy to read. The very simple layout is mainly text-based, with a few photos and graphics. The site also makes use of frames on either side. The left frame is a site contents frame with some links, and the right hand frame has a member login, search, and number of users/guests online. The links are intuitive and easy to find.

Content
I find the content for the NASSM site to be sadly lacking unless you are trying to join or renew membership, or gain information about attending or presenting at one of their conferences. While I'm sure this is a useful function for some, it does not help me out (except for when I was joining). Also available were minutes from Annual General meetings. Information on the Journal of Sport Management is also available, along with the current issue table of contents. However, beyond very basic information, this website is not very useful at all unless you are searching for accredited sport management programs, or student or professional member lists. There are also a few lonely forums for general information, student comments, and one on accreditation. For all the information it seems to have on conferences, I could only find information on the most recent conferences.

Links
I found very few external links on this page. Further links to more academic sport management information would have been vital.

Price
The website itself is free to access, but paid membership is required to access member lists, forums, and other information. I'm okay with this since it is a professional organization and I wouldn't want my information being available to any random person on the internet.

Overall
This is a basic website with some good information if you are just joining or looking for information about NASSM Conferences. Beyond that, I was not very impressed. However, this site was apparently just redesigned and largely improved. Improvement is always good, so I give them points for updating from whatever it was before. Additionally, there is a survey and email link for feedback on improvements, so it is clear that they are striving to become a better website. Bravo to improvement! Let me know when it's ready!