W i n t e r 2 0 0 9 G O L F B U S I N E S S C A N A D A27

G O L F B U S I N E S S C A N A D A W i n t e r 2 0 0 926

BUSINESS ADVISOR STEVE BAREHAM

ly with the recipients of your message.• Instant response: People are at their

computers every day and can accessand/or respond to your informationimmediately.

• Rich media: E-mail marketing can beplain text, HTML, or it can be sent tolook like a newsletter by saving andinserting desktop designed publications.

• Drive inbound traffic: E-mail can alsobe effective to drive people back to yourwebsite. You may want to link readersto your website with a compelling teasere-mail if you can’t include all the infor-mation in the actual e-mail.

TARGETED AUDIENCEAidan Blunt, General Manager of PointeWest Golf Club in Ontario says his clubmakes extensive use of email lists: “Toour membership we issue a weekly E-Letter, which includes an upcoming14-day calendar as well as details on special events. We include details on ourdinner food specials, upcoming golf andclubhouse events, as well as attached flyers and our monthly newsletter.”

Blunt says his club has securedalmost 90% of its members’ e-mailaddresses and “we find this medium to bean incredibly effective and low costmethod to promote our products, programsand services to our membership. To non-members we’ve created a database ofe-mail addresses for individuals who have

In Part One of the Web- based mar-keting special (Fall 2009) you exploredwebsites, search engine optimization andweblogs. Part Two of the Web- basedmarketing special will focus on:• e-mail (for marketing)• pictures and video online (YouTube

and Flickr) • online viral marketing

POWERFUL MARKETING TOOLE-mail marketing is a crucial componentof online marketing given that more than251 million of about 341 million NorthAmericans are active Internet and e-mailusers1.

A comprehensive e-mail marketingstrategy must consider the type of mes-sage you want to send (special promo-tions, information updates etc.) andany data from your message that youwant to track. Once your strategy isbuilt, and a comprehensive e-mail listdatabase is in place, you have a verypowerful sales force and marketingchannel that is virtually free.

Here are some of the strengths of e-mail:• Low cost: Pennies per email compared to

$1 to $3 or more for each direct mail piece.• Reach: Instant outreach to your client base.

One e-mail sent to 10,000 people takesless time than one in-person sales call.

• Personalization: Communicate direct-

at some point taken an interest in ourclub, whether from a social or golfingperspective.”

Blunt notes, “on a monthly basis inthe peak interest months, March, April, Mayand June we send out a short e-letterexplaining the membership opportunitiesthe club offers. The beauty of this system isthat we can see who reads our informationand who does not, and are able to amendour marketing strategy because of that.”

Taking it even one step further isprecision e-mail marketing that analysescustomer profiles, purchasing habits andhistory to ensure your messages are ontarget in terms of real value needs andwants. When you combine a customer whovoluntarily opts to receive your messageswith emails tailored to that customer’s spe-cific interests, you have a potent sales toolthat can enjoy very high buy rates.Companies report up to a fivefoldincrease in response rates and tenfoldlower conversion costs than direct mail.

E-MAIL NEWSLETTERSWant to save time and money? Forget printnewsletters! They cost too much to printand to send, and they sacrifice trees need-lessly. It’s far cheaper and just as effectiveto take your newsletter online. Where itused to cost thousands of dollars to get anewsletter designed, printed, and mailed,an online version can be done, in house,saving you time and expenses.

Part Two of TwoTechnology is essential to every golf

course operation and althoughkeeping on top of the latest trends

can seem like a daunting task, itgives you the opportunity to

deliver premium customerservice to your clientele.Armed with the knowl-edge of the latest technol-ogy you will be able toassess the resourcesavailable to you anddetermine their use-fulness to youroperation.

28 W i n t e r 2 0 0 9 G O L F B U S I N E S S C A N A D A

Anyone who can use MicrosoftWord can quickly get up to speed withMicrosoft Publisher [in the OfficeProfessional suite]. With Publisher youcan produce high quality newsletters, e-mail messages, websites, and brochureswith attractive, easy-to-use templates. If youhave Publisher on your computer, open itand take a look at the newsletter templatesthat are literally all designed for you – justinsert text and photos and save it as a PDF,then send it to your e-mail lists.

If you wish to create an E-mailnewsletter using HTML you may wantto use an online marketing companysuch as icontact.com. It gives you theoption to create the template for your E-newsletter and upload it to their onlinesystem or select one of their templates.

You will have the option to add inany text, images or links and you can alsopersonalize your message. Upload yourrecipient list, schedule your message fordelivery and you’re done! The system willsend out your message to the designatedrecipients and provide you with trackingreports where you can view exactly whois opening your email and clicking onyour links. This data will help determinethe best time to send out your communi-cations and what offers generate the mostinterest in your customers.

YOUTUBE PHENOMENONYouTube is one of the most populardraws on the Internet with tens of mil-lions of viewers and users who uploadnearly 50,000 new videos each day.YouTube has quickly become the leadingInternet provider of online videos, aheadof Yahoo! and Google.

Why does YouTube work? Peoplelove to create quirky videos, upload themand then tell everybody they know totake a look; the viral marketing impact isincredible with some very simple videosgetting millions of views.

Rod Uhl, General Manager ofSparwood Golf Club in BritishColumbia, suggests “posting golf lessonson YouTube is a great way to gain expo-sure for the club and the instructor.Posting a video tour of your course willalso garner increased awareness of your

club. Sales promotions and other types ofinformation may also be posted. If possi-ble, post something truly spectacular orimpressive and you will generate morevisits. Consider a contest to see who hasthe worst golf swing at your club andpost the finalists on YouTube, with thewinner (or loser) receiving free lessonswhich could also be posted.”

FLICKR.COMWhere social networking communitiesform, savvy marketers will follow andharness the exposure. One such site isFlickr.com, a photo sharing site. Flickr isa concept perfectly suited for people whohave a passion for still photography (andnow video, too), but who also want tomarket their businesses.

Boasting more than two billionimages, Flickr is widely used by bloggersas a photo repository, and its applicabili-ty to marketing comes from the fact thatphotos can be tagged for searching byplace name or subject matter.

It should be noted that it is againstFlickr policy to host overt marketing or,as the company notes: to “exploit for anycommercial purposes” the Flickr/Yahooservice. Still, by being a smart, activecontributor, you can get increased mar-keting exposure. For example, use yourweb site address as your Flickr screenname, which is attached to every photoyou upload and to every message youpost in a Group discussion. Thus, yourscreen name advertises your web siteURL. Every time you upload a photo,add search keywords that describe thephoto, and a description of the image -the perfect opportunity to mention yourbusiness name and web site address.

Uhl suggests: “Invite golfers to takephotos of the course and post them onFlickr. Why not hold a contest for thebest photo submitted, as this mightencourage people to take more photos ofthe club. This can be a great way for peopleto see what your course looks like, andhopefully they will see something theylike, and visit the course. The club itselfcan post photos as well. This allows forconsiderably more photos of the club tobe seen as compared to the club’s website.”

VIRAL MARKETINGViral marketing is defined as a phenomenonthat facilitates and encourages people topass along a marketing message. While viralmarketing used to rely on word of mouth tospread, there are far more impressive gainsmade today via the Internet—simple, butclever concepts can get millions of hits.Typically this is done via games, jokes, pho-tos, videos, anything entertaining.Here are three strategic elements to viralmarketing:• Give away products or services: “Free”

is still one of the most powerful words inmarketing.

• Effortless transfer: People will not go tomuch trouble to spread your idea, so youhave to make it easy, i.e. one click to for-ward the email or something similar.

• Appeal to and exploit “pass on” action:This is where creativity comes in. Toidentify that “right” idea, hold a commu-nity contest, or brainstorm with staff.The final ideas you implement, though,

BUSINESS ADVISOR

G O L F B U S I N E S S C A N A D A W i n t e r 2 0 0 9

must be good enough that people wantto share them.

Jayne Ingalls, General Manager ofSussex Golf & Curling Club in NewBrunswick, has an idea for a simple viralmarketing strategy. “Find a really funnygolf video online and send it to membersvia a member distribution list. I wouldsimply craft an introductory line; add adirect link to the video, and an opportu-nity to sign up for a free e-bulletin in thebody of the e-mail. In the subject line, Iwould include our website address in thisway ‘a REALLY FUNNY golf video’from www.sussexgolfandcurlingclub.ca.”

THE RIGHT F IT As golf club operators, you want to keepyour golfers happy and improve yourbottom line. Email marketing, YouTube,Flickr and Viral marketing are technolo-gies that can help your club gain maxi-mum exposure, while providing qualitycustomer service. These resources are defi-

nitely worth your time to both explore andevaluate their usefulness to your facility.1 “United States of America Internet Usage andBroadband Usage Report.” Internet World Stats. n.d.17 September 2009. <http://www.internetworld-stats.com/am/us.htm>.

Steve Bareham is an instructorwith the School of Hospitalityand Tourism at Selkirk College,and for the College’s Golf ClubOperations Online CertificateProgram. He has served in publicrelations and marketing capaci-ties for Simon Fraser Universityand the B.C. School TrusteesAssociation. Steve is also editorof www.golfcolleges.ca.

STEVEBAREHAM

29

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