One of the first startups we profiled on StartupNorth was New Brunswick based Yourteamonline. Since then Yourteamonline has launched version 2.0 of their sports team management suite and added a slew of new features. In the meanwhile, Victoria based TeamPages has also risen in prominence.

Both TeamPages and YourTeamOnline provide player pages, statistics, team pages and league interaction. It seems like we have a coast to coast fight for the amateur sports team demographic.

The market for amateur sports related spending in North America alone is $111 billion. More than enough room for two leaders, and even better if they are both from Canada. The amount of targeted advertising dollars up for grabs is staggering. Add on the amount of money that changes hands for local team sponsorships every year, and things are looking up!

The first similarity I noticed was the abundant use of blue on both companies’ websites. The choice of colors is not where the similarities end however. And this is where I start to wonder a little.

Both YourTeamOnline and TeamPages are marketing themselves as a generalized sports team management toolkit. If I were calling the shots here (which I am not!), I would approach each sport differently. YourTeamOnline is starting down this path, they have customized versions for Hockey and Soccer, but their marketing is still focused at a general market, which is going to be tougher to capture. This is the same strategy that every other competitor in the marketplace is using and it is going to be tough to stand out, even with a much better than average offering.

YourTeamOnline and Teampages both focus on letting individuals, teams and leagues build social networks, and each have unique characteristics that, in my opinion, make them the two best team/league platforms out there. Where most competitive packages focus on the minutiae of managing a team, YourTeamOnline and TeamPages focus on the individual users, whether they are coaches, parents or players.

I am also impressed with the roadmaps that both companies allude to on their sites. YourTeamOnline has plans to launch youtube-like video uploading and a feature called “SportsWire” that helps get team statistics out to the public, newspapers, and other consumers of team data.

Is this a clash of the titans? A fight to the death? Jackie Chan vs. Chow Yun Fat? I think it is probably more the result of an overdue idea and a huge market, with scalable revenue opportunities. Will there be one winner, or two? We’ll be watching to find out.

YourTeamOnline and Teampages have each taken early-stage funding.

The finalists have been announced for the New Brunswick startup competition we covered a few months ago.

I have to say, without having seen the actual products, that this list of startups really surprised me. Things are happening in New Brunswick! The mix is as creative, smart, useful and even as frivolous as any mixup of startups I have seen in other regions. Congrats to NBIF for running this contest and getting these startups some exposure.

I am looking forward to seeing how this shakes out and who comes out the winner. Read on for the full list of finalists.
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The New Brunswick Innovation Foundation, another quasi-governmental agency in Atlantic Canada, is running it’s own startup competition for New Brunswick startups.

There aren’t quite as many prizes as in the Innovacorp competition mentioned earlier, but it is still a pretty serious prize package, including a 100,000$ equity investment by NBIF in the winning company along with a mishmash of services that are provided to the various winners.

Submissions are due September 28th, 2007. You can get the submission form here and there is a Participant Handbook you need to read.

These competitions are worth your time whether you are established, just getting started, or even just thinking about getting a startup off the ground. The pressure of developing your business, pitching it and then, hopefully, being rewarded handsomely for your work, is all worthwhile.

Hey, I won one a few years ago and really enjoyed it. That startup, Blogtrack.com, probably wouldn’t have been launched in the end if I hadn’t received the funding that came in due to that competition. It also meant that angel investors came knocking anew. The rest, they say, is history.

Hat tip to Harold Jarche for pointing us towards this.

Yourteamonline.ca is a Saint John, New Brunswick based startup that is building an online sports team management app, which first launched in November 2006. YourTeamOnline allows coaches and teammates to share game plans, schedules, statistics, photos, videos and information with eachother in a central place.

YourTeamOnline generates revenue by providing targetted advertising space to (presumably) both local and national advertisers. Knowing how important hockey is in most Canadian communities, I can see how yourteamonline could become a huge hit, but it will probably also fly under the radar of most people. With over 550,000 minor hockey players just in Canada, there will be a lot of opportunity to grow in the coming years if yourteamonline executes properly.

It’s also important to note that most local advertising is still limited to newspapers, radio and TV. Very few sites can offer targetted advertisement to the minor hockey aged kids and parents in small canadian communities. If Yourteamonline can sell those ads, I think they could do very well.

YourTeamOnline only has 2 employees right now, but have recently taken on seed funding in order to develop their business further, and they are currently seeking Round A funding in the first part of 2008.

With 282 teams already using YourTeamOnline, they are off to a great start and I will be watching their progress in the last half of this year.

Contact Chris Nadeau