Introducing: Playoff Predictors Pools
6 min read
At long last, we’ve launched it.
Playoff Predictors Pools is a new product product offering from Playoff Predictors, aiming to provide an easy-to-use and fully integrated NFL Pick’Em Pool experience to our users. If you’re reading this before the season starts, use promo code LASTMINUTERELEASE for 35% off.
We’ve been working on this one for quite a while, and it’s replacing and enhancing the existing Leaderboard feature on Playoff Predictors. Let’s dive in!
What is a Pick’Em Pool?
A Pick’Em pool allows you to pick who you think will win a game, and then based on the actual results of that game, award points to you.
Pick’Em pools are popular in schools, work environments, or just friend groups. They’re a fun way to add some extra meaning to the NFL Season, and are a natural extension of Playoff Predictors intuitive Schedule Picker system.
Since Pick’Em Pools don’t require tiebreakers, we delivered this experience two ways:
Integrated Into The NFL Schedule Picker
Integrated Into Its Own Page
Because not everyone cares about the tiebreaking system, we also peeled the Pools system into its own page
Who can run a pool?
Anyone that chooses to. Private Pools are free for up to 8 participants (including the manager), and you can invite as many people as you want to your pool.
We require a purchase for Pools larger than 8 members, but at $0.85/person/season. This is a one-time fee (per season), and is not a subscription.
After conducting market research, we aimed to price ourselves extremely competitively compared to other Pool systems, and believe this is a price point that’s reasonable for all users.
This price is subject to change in the future; so if you’re reading this from the future, please understand that price discovery is one of the hardest problems to solve as a small business.
This replaces the old Leaderboard?
More correctly, it enhances the Leaderboard system, which remains largely in-tact without change. The existing leaderboard will remain free to enter and will be site-wide, as it has been in past seasons. Participating in the site-wide leaderboard doesn’t impact Private Pools in any way.
How do Pools work?
They work the same way the leaderboard does, but allows users to create private pools that aren’t globally visible.
A Pool Manager can invite users to their pools. If the user doesn’t have an account, an account will be created for them and the user will receive a password by Email.
When the user logs in to Playoff Predictors, they will see the Pool on both the Pool site and the Schedule Picker sites in their Pool dropdown. They can then submit picks to that pool.
Picks are submitted per-pool, and can be different between Pools (including the Public Pool). You can easily submit your picks to each pool via the main Schedule Picker (seen above in “Submit to Pool”)
Picks are graded at the same time as the public pool, so within a few minutes of a NFL game finishing. The scores will be available on the Leaderboard tab shortly after this is done.
I Haven’t Participated in the Leaderboard. Can you explain it more?
The Leaderboard was a season-long voluntary contest on Playoff Predictors. Users selected teams they thought would win, and either lock their picks in on a per-week basis, or on an individual game basis.
You can do this with the Pool system in the same way.
Once a pick is submitted, you can change your pick up until the game starts; after that, the pick will become grayed out.
Once the game is over, your pick will be “resulted”, and if you chose the correct team, you will be awarded one point. Points are awarded for “straight outcome wins”, meaning they don’t take into account point spreads or anything like that.
We keep track of your points on a per-game, per-week, and per-season basis. The Leaderboard is segmented by All (all weeks), or per-week.
What can Pool Managers see and do?
- Pool Managers are responsible for setting the names of Pool participants. This means you may have a different name in the Public pool than a Private pool that you’re part of.
- Pool Managers can see a user’s picks for a week, even if the games have not started yet.
- Pool Managers can remove users from their Pool
- Pool Managers can purchase more seats for their Pool
- Pool Managers can not change a user’s picks for games that haven’t started, and can not change picks for games that have already been played
Can I Run Multiple Pools?
Yes, but you may only have one free pool at any time. If you purchase a subscription for more seats and apply it to a free pool, you may create another free pool.
What About Playoffs?
We will launch the Playoff Pools once the Playoffs are finalized. If you purchased a Pool subscription, the same subscription will cover Playoff Pools.
How Long Will You Keep My Picks?
We will guarantee to store your per-game picks for a period of two years. We will retain your weekly scores indefinitely.
If you do not want for us to retain this data, or want to delete your account entirely, you can email us and have the account deleted. This process is no-questions-asked.
What Happens if a Pool Manager Deletes Their Account?
If the Pool Manager deletes their account, and the NFL season is over, we will delete their account, the pool, and all picks associated with it, even picks that are not the Pool Manager’s.
If the NFL Season is still ongoing, we will delete the Pool Manager’s data and picks, but transfer the Pool and its subscription to a Playoff Predictors-Owned account so members can continue to participate in the Pool.
What Do You Do With This Data?
We do not sell our data, including Emails.
We retain the right to use the Data for internal purposes, though, such as writing PlaySheet posts discussing users that have managed to perform very well against Vegas odds. If we use the data for that purpose, it will be anonymized.
I Purchased a Pool and I’m not Happy with the Product.
I’m really sorry to hear that.
This is a new product offering from us, and we’ve tried to make the initial product offering very strong. I understand that it may not be what everyone needs, though. If you’ve given us a try, and you’re unhappy with the product, please reach out to me and we’ll work something out.
I have some cool ideas that you should add to the Pools!
That’s fantastic! Please contact us and we’d be happy to discuss it. This is the first version of this system, and we expect to iterate on it substantially over the next few seasons to make it as good as we can.
Since the feature JUST launched, and I had a lot of unexpected delays in delivering it, it’s not as polished as I’d like. I have a small internal roadmap of enhancements and nice-to-haves for this module; it’s our hope that it becomes one of the best-in-class systems for Pick’Em and Playoff Pool management.
Will You Add Pools for Other Sports?
I don’t know! Maybe!
It’s within the realm of possibility. Keep an eye out for a Survey link to be added to Playoff Predictors for those sports, and be sure to fill it out; we build products based on what our users want and will use. Surveys are one of the most direct ways for us to do that.
About The Author
