As many clubs have hopefully seen reflected in their own club Permanent or Virtual Course statistics - in the months since COVID19, Permanent and Virtual Orienteering Courses have seen a large increase in usage and many new courses have been registered after the integration of virtual GPS courses onto the portal. There are now nearly 900 courses listed on the portal compared to 574 in the Spring.

In the months since the Permanent and Virtual Orienteering Courses marketing ‘Outdoor Adventure’ campaign (June - December 2020), registered participation has risen 80%  and the overall download figures for the last two years show a fantastic overall increase of 95% (25,266 in 2020 compared to 12,985 downloads in 2019).  British Orienteering has therefore identified Permanent Orienteering Courses and Virtual Orienteering Courses as an asset to maximise to reach a potential wider audience and as a result, are now looking into creating a new platform and webpage for Permanent and Virtual Orienteering Courses to be hosted.

The Vision

• To have a centralised online platform to make Permanent and Virtual Orienteering more accessible to those not already in the sport
• Maintain a level of service and functionality to clubs and members
• Provide an easy to use, interactive platform with map / listings / filters to look and feel slicker and friendlier
• To target active, outdoorsy, adventurous families and recreational runners who are newcomers to the sport
• To improve the information and display of course profile pages

This innovation with GPS courses that clubs have embraced significantly increases the provision of accessible and beginner friendly Orienteering courses available across the UK and the numbers and download / participation statistics reflect a period of excellent development by the Orienteering community.

This creation of a new website for the summer not only has the chance to bring Orienteering to a far wider audience, but it will increase opportunities for deliver the sport to a variety of target markets whilst at the same time encouraging our Orienteering clubs and community organisations to use the platform to list their Permanent Orienteering Courses and Virtual Orienteering Courses to use as a powerful asset to get as many people Orienteering as we can.

We are currently therefore seeking declarations of interest from organisations or individuals with experience of website creation and design. We have a budget of 5k + VAT.  The full briefing document is available to read below. 

If this project is of interest please reply to Natalie Weir nweir@britishorienteering.org.uk by Friday 19th Feb outlining which of essential and desirable elements listed in the briefing document you would consider to be able to create for our budget and suggested delivery timescales. For discussion Tel 07891 091662.

The contributions and feedback of clubs and members over these months has been invaluable and will continue to be so, and in order to help bring this vision forward for a new POC & VOC portal website and ensure that it is going to meet the needs of our clubs, members and potential new participants please do share with anyone you think may be interested in this project.

As a reminder the current ‘portal’ is being hosted at https://www.britishorienteering.org.uk/pocs