If you saw the year to date participation figures in Golf Business Magazine recently you should have cause for alarm! Yes, I know the winter was bad, the economy is bad and discounting is hurting everyone but that’s not the real reason the golf business is in the toilet!
Today I went to 10 random golf websites, not one had a blog, not one was Tweeting and only one had a Facebook page.
So I kept surfing, eventually, after another 15 minutes I did find a couple of clubs that had all three. None had been updated recently thereby missing the whole point of the social media revolution. For that’s what it is my friends a revolution, people today, (under 40) just don’t get information the same way we did!
Even my own clients often give up blogging and tweeting before they really start. Too busy, no immediate feedback, not that type of club, take your pick of excuses…
Then of course you have the big management companies, who are simply scared of social media! What if people bad mouth a course or insult a staff member? What, no control, no way! All tweets will go to corporate first to make sure the spelling is correct, blogging will be done from a central location and in corporate speak only!
But the golf industry’s general disregard for social media is only a small part of a MUCH bigger problem.
I just came out with a killer loyalty program. Open rates and pass around on our first e-mail where staggering, in some case 300-400% higher than normal. Can you really afford to IGNORE those kinds of numbers? I hope not, go ahead and sign up now its $99 a month and all you have to do is send me a picture and a logo… That’s it, you’re done, a years worth of contests, downloads, data building campaigns, viral campaigns and entertainment for your customers, DONE!
http://www.LegendaryLoyalty.com
BUY NOW, cancel any time… reap the rewards forever!
The time it takes to play is a problem; a big problem that most owners agree has to be tackled… Personally I have rarely, in thirty years, seen a ranger demand the group behind be allowed to go through or heaven forbid they actually throw someone of the course, for playing quicker than wounded snail!
We could talk about sales training, I frequently do. It’s something they do in just about every industry, especially industries that compete with us like professional sports (entertainment) but I have NEVER, been to a club where a professional sales system was in place (other than a couple I put in) or where sales training of any kind was even considered.
Because no club actually invests time or effort in sales training the industry as a whole is sadly lacking in professional sales people. The very people we need to grow memberships, book events and sell tee times. But even this is just another symptom in a far bigger problem.
I know people are busy. I know they are short staffed, I know money is tight and I know it’s hard out there but the real reason golf is in the hole is apathy. There I said it.
APATHY
Apathy to change, apathy to marketing, apathy to sales training, apathy to social media and apathy to new technology or even new ideas!
If we want to grow golf again the industry has to be:
More open to change
More open to adopting new technology
More open to marketing aggressively
More open to professional sales
More proactive in fixing problems like slow play
Less up tight about typos in an e-mail and more
proactive in providing entertainment for our
customers!
Think I’m wrong? Then go ahead and flail me in the discussion forum here (best place) or e-me, all responses will be posted!
The Facebook thing is key. There’s a cosmetic dentist I’m working with here in Charlotte. He LOVES direct response and uses as many techniques as possible. And they are doing very well at his practice. He got over 500 people to become Facebook fans in about a month and routinely uses Facebook to fill appointment spots. At its core, Facebook for businesses is a way to build a highly qualified database.