Two Ways Your Golf Course Marketing Can Stand Out
My career golf started in the golf industry, so naturally I enjoying making golf a focus in my marketing career too. Golf is such a vast and inclusive industry, and it’s becoming even more so all the time. The game is welcoming to people of all different backgrounds and demographics and it’s becoming more accessible all the time too.
As the game of golf grows in diversity and popularity, courses and facilities also undergo change. Now more than ever, it’s becoming more inviting to work in the golf industry and its related industries. Golf courses often have restaurants, event venues, racquet sports, and business offices under their roof. Not unlike other industries, but I often feel like marketing and intentional customer acquisition takes a backseat. This could be due to a number of reasons such as budget restrictions, more pressing responsibilities, staff limitations, or just a lack of understanding or planning.
In this article, we’re going to talk about three ways that you can boost marketing efforts at your golf course with just a few hours per week and a few simple strategies. Let’s go!
Be Visible on Social Media
First, we have to talk about social media. As the golf industry grows, much of that grow is from young people taking up the game. Young adults and kids are the future of the game, and so many of these people are on social media! If your golf course doesn’t utilize social media regularly (at least a few times per week), then we need to start here.
Social media is a great way to share information, build an audience around your brand, and communicate with potential customers/future members at your club. It doesn’t take long to create quality content and your audience can grow quickly from your members and people in your community.
When your golf course gets on social media, you need to go where the people are and post what people want to see. There are lots of social media platforms, so you should be on almost all of them. If you think about it, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Twitter, and LinkedIn are all different. They have different audiences and different content formats that they support. It might seem daunting to go from no/little social media to five different platforms, but it can actually be easy to repurpose content for each of them. Plus, your audiences will grow faster!
To get started on social media, you need to create and optimize your accounts first. Create an account on each platform and fill in your account with complete information. Make sure that your account name and basic information is professional and represents your club. Once your accounts are created, we’ll need to start strategizing and creating content. We’ll talk lots more about how to strategize, schedule, and create content in future articles!
Share a REgular Newsletter
While social media is a great way to grow audiences and connect with people outside of your club, sharing a newsletter is a perfect way to share information with members and those at your club. Email newsletters are a tried and true of sharing information and generating buzz around upcoming events and club activities. Everything from golf events and junior golf to restaurant specials and parties can be shared with those most likely to attend. Furthermore, newsletters give your club a voice and let members hear from leaders at the club. Your head pro can share a monthly column, the superintendent can share updates about the course, the head chef can share new specials. Members will appreciate transparency and operations run more smoothly when everyone’s in the loop.
If you don’t have a newsletter, getting started is easy. First, you’ll want to choose an email marketing service to build your email list on and send emails through. I recommend Mailchimp or Hubspot. Both are easy to use and have great free and paid tools depending on your list size. Once you choose a service provider, set up your account and import your email list. Don'‘t have a list of subscribers? If you collect email address from members at your club, that’s a good place to start. To collect new subscribers, you can create subscription forms in Mailchimp and code them into your website. Then people who subscribe on your website will automatically be added to your newsletter list.
We'll get into much more with newsletters, Mailchimp, and actually creating emails in another post.
Wrap it up
Golf course marketing doesn’t have to complicated or take a bunch of time. By implementing a few easy ideas and spending a bit of time setting things up, your club can be positioned to build audiences on social media and through email with potential customers that want to play golf, become members, and be a part of the success at your club!
Want more help? Talk to us. We love working with golf courses to manage and improve their marketing!