Archive for November, 2009
Sunday, November 29th, 2009
One of the first rules of PR is that YOU control what’s being said about you, at least to the degree you can. Even though it’s a personal matter for Tiger, not speaking to the police and failing to make a public statement allows the tabloid rags and exposé shows to run wild, hurting his reputation!
Whatever advice he has had has been bad.
He should meet the police, tell them he was angry, drunk, on medication, running form his wife or make something up, but say something, get it over with and get back to people talking about his golf game!
Silence is not always golden, especially when you are the most famous athlete on the planet!
Posted in Uncategorized | No Comments »
Saturday, November 28th, 2009
Disney has guests, not customers. The Masters golf tournament has patrons, not crowds and I have partners, not clients. (In case you wondered why I used that term earlier.)
What difference does it make what you call the people who pay your bills?
Quite a lot actually!
It makes a difference how your employees react to service requests.
It makes a difference how both parties THINK about the relationship.
Partners help get you business.
Partners ask for advice.
Partners also accept some highs and lows in a relationship.
For a partner you will leverage other relationships and assets to their advantage.
I go out of my way to correct partners who refer to themselves as customers or clients and I feel it really does make a difference.
Positioning is not just about how the outside world sees your business, it’s also the core of how you and your employees see yourself and do business.
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This article may be reproduced or republished provided the main body of text is reproduced as is, without
additional permission, with proper credit to the author and provided that the above resource box remains
intact with the article. Permission to re-publish is herby granted until Dec. 31st, 2012. Author retains all copyrights.
Posted in Cunningly Clever Book, General Marketing | 1 Comment »
Friday, November 27th, 2009
Road an Track Magazine just send me this e-mail, who know where they got my e-mail from. I don’t know, but it was it was not from me signing up on there website.
None the less I opened it, read it, and signed up for their offer.
Why? Because it’s relevant to me. I like cars, I like reading about cars and it was free!
Relevance is the key to online success!
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Posted in Ad Assassin, Digital Marketing, General Marketing | No Comments »
Friday, November 27th, 2009
From The Legend’s Laptop
Currently Located In My Car On The Way
To Georgia, Got a Chauffer for a Change!
WWW.LegendaryMarketing.Com
Dear Reader:
I was watching the Raiders- Cowboys game Thanksgiving Day and was impressed early on with the Raiders Quarterback, Bruce Gradkowsky. He had been a starter at Tampa Bay where after a couple of promising games he performed poorly, and was FIRED!
Tampa’s kicker this year missed three easy field goals in the first few games and he is also gone. So too is the Tampa punt returner, who fumbled the ball once too often, by game five.
When you think about it, the NFL offers the ideal employer/employee relationship.
Top performers can expect to make millions over a very short career (by most business standards) but do so because their play in turn, makes the club multi millions in the form of ticket sales and TV rights!
Where as poor performers, don’t get the typical three written warnings, or the option of a move to another position, they are simply cut from the team! It doesn’t matter if they are a rookie or a ten-year veteran, each is judged play-by-play, game-by-game, week-by-week. Talent, experience, time invested on the job mean little or nothing if the running back drops the ball, the cornerback misses a key tackle or the quarterback sets a new interception record!
It of course is much the same in soccer, baseball and basketball but I don’t think any one of those sports is as quick to react to poor employee performance or reward great performance as the NFL. Football players of course accept this situation, that their individual play effects the outcome of the team, in a way your average employee simply fails to understand.
Every employee on your team is making “plays” at your club and in this economy those plays had better be the right ones! There are too many golfers looking for an excuse to go somewhere else and too many out of work employees looking for jobs, for you to put up with anything less that 110% performance in every area of your operation.
The key word here is performance, many employees confuse activity (or hours spent on site) with productivity, they are of course, not the same thing!
As operations run leaner in these tough times employees don’t necessarily have to work longer hour but they do have to produce greater results in the time they do work.
There are five several keys things you can do to help them accomplish this:
1. Position agreements for every job that specifies RESULTS not just job duties! (Read Management Legend, Bob Devitz, very insightful article on this topic http://lmgmblog.com/2009/07/25/are-you-performance-driven.aspx )
2. Training, continued training that never stops!
3. The adoption of a sales culture at your club to compliment the “service culture” always quoted!
4. Set quantitative and qualitative improvements every quarter, in every department.
5. Fire the dead wood, the nay sayers, the partially committed and the just passing through. Good employees resent poor performing peers even more than management!
I will shortly be announcing a new service that will make training your club’s employees simple, easy and cheap!
Follow me on Twitter http://twitter.com/cunninglyclever to get the news first!
Regards,
Andrew Wood
Marketing Legend
P.S. Knowledge is Power, use it!
Andrew Wood is the world’s leading expert on golf, resort and real estate marketing, although his successes reach far beyond those industries. He is the author of over 20 books on sales and marketing including Cunningly Clever Marketing and The Golf Marketing Bible. Andrew speaks worldwide on sales and marketing topics and is in high demand as a copywriter and marketing consultant, while actively running his advertising agency, Legendary Marketing. He can be reached at (352) 266 2099 or andrew@LegendaryMarketing.com, http://www.LegendaryMarketing.com
Syndication Rights
This article may be reproduced or republished provided the main body of text is reproduced as is, without
additional permission, with proper credit to the author and provided that the above resource box remains
intact with the article. Permission to re-publish is herby granted until Dec. 31st, 2012. Author retains all copyrights.
Posted in Golf Management, Motivation, Success | No Comments »
Friday, November 27th, 2009
In the nineties the Japanese company, Yonnex had a little run with a graphite-headed golf club that was selling well. They also had one other thing going for them. They signed one of the PGA Tour’s most popular players and the world’s undisputed best left-handed golfer, Phil Mickelson.
I spent almost a year trying to convince them that their USP should be “The world’s best left-handed golf clubs.” Statistically 10% of the 27 million people who play golf are left handed. (In Canada, 50% or more of the population are left handed.) No one in the world had ever claimed to be the world’s best left-handed golf clubs, so the position was OPEN!
HELLO!
AN OPEN UNIQUE SELLING PROPOSITION in this over-crowded marketing world!!!!
This was and still is a serious marketing opportunity!!!
But the wise people of Yonnex thought that .000000001% or whatever they have of the right-handed market was better than total DOMINATION of the left-handed market!! They just couldn’t see pigeonholing their market like that!!!
Why be the undisputed leader in a US market of 3 million left-handers, and a worldwide market of 30 million or so, when instead you can be a nobody in the worldwide market of 150 million right-handers? HELLO!!!
You will eat better being a big fish in a small pond!
Posted in Branding, Cunningly Clever Book, General Marketing, Golf Marketing, Uncategorized | No Comments »
Tuesday, November 24th, 2009
From The Legend’s Laptop
Currently Located in The Air Over Denver
WWW.LegendaryMarketing.Com
Dear Reader:
In all the seminars and consulting I have done I have never been to a club yet that could answer one of the most important questions is golf management and marketing.
What is a member, outing or daily fee player’s average lifetime value, worth to your club?
Here is another great question what would you pay me right now to introduce a NEW member to your club?
$500, 1,500, $3,000 how about $10,000? Because 10 grand is a number that’s a lot more exciting to me!
Ridiculous you say, preposterous you cry, we can’t afford such foolishness shout the board in unison
Oh really….
Perhaps you can’t afford not to, but either way you can afford to come up with anything in the name of marketing or rewarding referrals until you know the answer to the critical question I posed at the start. What is the LTV of a member, player or outing?
Let’s use me as an example, since give or take a few grand I can tell you exactly what I have been worth over the last 11 years, to my golf club.
$30,000 joining fee
$3,000 in dues for 5 years
$6,000 in dues for four years
$12,000 in dues for two year
Total dues, trail and joining fees $93,000 but that’s just the tip of the iceberg!
Now lets figure in food, drinks and guest fees. The occasional shirt, dozens of Pro V’s and the odd driver or putter. I don’t have an exact figure on this but lets just say very conservatory it started out about $500 a month and graduated to about $1000, so lets call it $102,000.
We are now at $195,000 in direct spend and we are still not done!
Through a seminar I did for the PGA, Jack Hoskins, a PGA pro, from Nebraska found out about the development bought a home and joined the club. He just left this year having been there as an active member for a decade. Since both he and his wife played I think you can easily say he out spent me but lets just give him the same $195,000 I spent. Now there are most likely others at the club whose initial interest came from me, or a golf pro, I hosted but I’m only going to claim one, as Jack always used to say “It was my fault he was here!”
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For great information on how to price and package for maximum success, along with hundreds of new and innovative ways to generate more leads for you club, read WWW.CunninglyCleverMarketing.com
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Running total $390,000 of direct income to the club, from Andrew Wood!
Now it gets a little fuzzier here, but through my 100 plus talks to the PGA, Golf Owners, club managers and independent speaking engagements I have brought hundreds of people to Black Diamond to play as guests of others or a favors to others I host guests who pay their own bills and so don’t show up on my statements!
Let’s credit me with 20 players a year although I suspect the number to be far larger. Green fees and drinks alone and that’s another $200 a head and they all buy hats and shirts so lets say $5000 a year, times 11 for another $65,000 in income to the club!
Running total, $455,000 of income to the club, directly from Andrew Wood!
In my seminars and in my newsletters I constantly tell people how great the course is(and recently what a lackluster job Troon is doing) and increase their web traffic, branding and awareness. In fact I end most of my newsletters by inviting people to be my guest at the club.
Let’s call that branding a mere $100 a month in value adding another $13,100, to my total
Now here we are with a rough though close to accurate figure of my direct worth as member, $468,000!
Now what would you pay to get a member like that?
What would you be willing to do to keep a member like that involved in your club? (Nothing apparently in my case)
Once you figure out how much the average member is worth and how long the average member stays it becomes a whole lot easier to come up with an irresistible offer to attract more members or incentivize existing members to bring in new blood!
Whatever it is my guess and it’s just a guess is it’s not what your club is doing right now!
NEED help getting more members FAST?
Call me Direct, 266 2099, 7 days a week, 8-8, I actually answer my own phone. Try getting the CEO, of your current management company!
Regards,
Andrew Wood
Marketing Legend
P.S. Now I didn’t even mention my home, chalk up another 1.2 million, even in this economy!
PPS. Need real and different answers to your clubs sales, marketing and management issues click here WWW.LegendaryGolfManagment.com a Revenue Generation Company!
Posted in Uncategorized | No Comments »
Sunday, November 22nd, 2009
I just came across Bodega Harbor Golf Links while driving up the California Coast, so my friend and I stopped in for Lunch. Instead of the usual club fare we had a wonderful meal with a breathtaking view of the course and the ocean. The staff including Tiffany, Bob and Amanda, (I didn’t catch the lady in the pro shop) could not have been more helpful and accommodating. Amanda shared with me some of the marketing they were doing with various vineyards to create events ….all good stuff!
I took a quick look at the back nine, which has several holes along the breaking surf and it looked like a great little layout. Well worth a stop if you find yourself North of San Francisco on the Sonoma Coast!
Posted in Golf Management, Golf Travel | No Comments »
Wednesday, November 18th, 2009
It astonishes me how much money companies will spend on logos and just how bad most of them are! Remember the Lucent Technologies, million-dollar circle that looked like the stain from a coffee cup?
Which name and logo do you think sold more apparel?
Hunters Pointe Golf Club or Loch Ness Links
Now that wasn’t rocket science was it? A simple change that exploited the fame of Loch Ness opened up hundreds more possibilities for cunningly clever marketing. It did not hurt that the course and clubhouse had a very Scottish links style feel and a giant lake in front of the clubhouse.
The San Jose Sharks were for the longest time the best selling logo in the NHL. I am sure my team the Tampa Bay Buccaneers quadrupled their apparel sales when they dropped the old fashioned buccaneer in favor of a much cooler pirate style skull and crossbones logo.
I have three simple rules for designing logos:
- Unless you have unlimited funds try and make the logo a pictorial representation of what you do. A hammer squashing a bug for pest control.
- Try to make it appealing enough that people – like your employee and customers – would want to actually wear it on their shirt rather than giving it away to the high school golf event. (Thus, in the bug example it would probably have to be humorous.)
- Use colors and type styles that are easy to read and make sense in your industry. Failing that, use colors that no one in your industry uses to stand out!
You can change your logo! And you don’t have to spend a fortune with fancy design firms to come up with a winner.
Syndication Rights
This article may be reproduced or republished provided the main body of text is reproduced as is, without
additional permission, with proper credit to the author and provided that the above resource box remains
intact with the article. Permission to re-publish is herby granted until Dec. 31st, 2012. Author retains all copyrights.
Posted in Cunningly Clever Book, General Marketing, Uncategorized | 2 Comments »
Friday, November 13th, 2009
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From The Legend’s Laptop
Currently Located @
Oak Terrace Resort & Spa
http://www.legendarymarketing.com/
Are You Scared About Losing
More Members Next Year?
| Dear Reader:
Halloween may have come and gone but these are still scary times for most clubs! After the 5-15% drop in memberships most clubs saw at the beginning of this year many are wondering if they are looking at more of the same in January 2010?
Unfortunately based on my informal survey at my own club, another 5% loss is going to be the norm. At my club 14 people I know are going to resign, with another 10-20 at least on the fence.
What is my Troon run club doing about it?
Talking about it, which is what they have been doing for almost a year. My club offers ONE category of “equity” (we have no rights, as the developer controls the majority of the lots) membership, FULL, Family membership, at roughly $12,000 a year, including cart. And while it’s not apples to apples the next highest club in the county is $3,800.
My club offers:
- No single membership for people like me whose wife and kids don’t play.
- No junior executive membership for people under 40.
- No junior memberships for actual juniors in the community.
- No seasonal memberships, 60% of our members reside out of state.
- No five-day memberships, very popular in Europe.
- No sporting memberships to allow no golfers to utilize the fitness center and pool!
I have of course suggested all these ideas to the powers that be, but nothing actually happens. Well not nothing, they passed a new Super Senior Membership category that gives reduced dues to people over 80!!!
Now that’s some forward think guys!!!
In fairness, my club, is no different than thousands of clubs across the country, they are paralyzed by FEAR!
- Fear of change
- Fear of loss
- Fear of upsetting the existing members
So instead they do nothing but talk and grow from weakness, to weakness until one day soon it will be too late to save.
Radical times call for radical thinking and action, the more radical the changes the more chance you have of attracting attention and ultimately success!
Such changes rarely come from with in, nor do they come from monolithic management groups, you must look outside the norm for solutions…
There are solutions, even in this economy.
Or Call Bob Devitz @ 727-424-2434 or me for a chat about quickly improving your club’s situation 352 266 2099.
Regards,
Andrew Wood
Marketing Legend
P.S. It’s getting cold up north let me know if you want to swing by the office for a game at Black Diamond.
For more Cunningly Clever Strategies to Increase Your Business and Become a Marketing Legend in Your Spare Time Take the Following Action:
Read My Legendary Marketing Blog
Read Bob’s Golf Management Blog
Subscribe to my weekly e-mails
Join The Marketing Vault
Read or Listen to Cunningly Clever Marketing
Read or Listen to The Golf Marketing Bible
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Call your digital marketing team leader at 800-827-1663 or call me, Andrew Wood, at 352 266 2099, 7 days a week! |
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Posted in Golf Management, Golf Marketing, UK Golf Marketing, Uncategorized | No Comments »
Monday, November 9th, 2009
What is unique, truly unique about your business, unique enough among the common clutter of shared features and benefits to get me to spend my money with you?
Let’s switch for a moment and get you thinking in another direction about this very same topic. Within a given price range what’s the difference between one hotel and another?
No much! But sometimes even something small is enough to influence a person’s purchasing decision. I now try to book my stays at Westin Hotels, not because they are particularly better in any respect from other higher end hotels but they offer and MARKET very cozy beds. They call them “heavenly beds,” but whatever they call them I can tell you this, it’s the closet thing I can come to sleeping in my own bed when I am on the road. What’s more I’m willing to travel a little further out of my way and pay a little more to get it!
At a lower price point, and for say driving cross country, I would choose Wingate Inns. In this case I would choose them because I KNOW they will have working high speed Internet access for free! It astonishes me that ALL hotels these days don’t, but they don’t so why get stuck?
There is another hotel chain that struck a deal with the NBA by buying longer beds!
Motel Six is the clear leader in the perception of cheap!
At Holiday Inn kids stay and eat free!
These all are simple yet potent examples of positioning yourself as better and different in an incredibly crowded market!
So what ONE Unique SELLING Proposition (USP) are you going to build on and CHAMPION in your marketplace? All it takes is ONE, but without it you are just another business saying how good your service is …and they all do that!
Posted in Cunningly Clever Book, General Marketing, Uncategorized | No Comments »
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Andrew Wood is the world’s leading expert on golf, resort and real estate marketing, although his successes reach far beyond those industries. He is the author of over 20 books on sales and marketing including, 
