As a golf course marketer, there is nothing that can help sell rounds of golf better than amazing photos. I have found that you can offer a lot of things to golfers to get them to come out to the course (Free drinks, Free Lunch, Sleeves of Golf Balls, Discounted rounds), but the one thing that will get people to come out is course conditions.
What I have found with the golf courses that I have worked with is they do not have enough good photos to promote the course properly. I have asked for photos of the course and all of them are from 12 years ago when the trees are shorter and the holes are unrecognizable. If they do have something more recent, it is from ground level and does not attract any attention to photo.
The issue that I have found is that most golf professionals are course operators. They find the best way to operate the golf course and provide a service that makes members and guests happy to play golf with them. They efficiently use their staff to keep the course running smoothly, carts are clean, tournaments are scored, and the nightly till is balanced. That is what we were trained to do as golf professionals.
Unfortunately, this focus on operations does not lend any extra time to develop marketing strategy and developing content. A monthly newsletter and some posted event flyers are usually the extent of the marketing that these operators have time for.
But IT IS IMPERATIVE to take advantage of great course conditions. For public golf courses, you will lose about 15-20% of your players every year. If you do not attract new players, in 5 years you will have a small group of golfers playing a golf course that you can not afford to maintain. Every golf course has a “perfect time” for conditions. Here in Charlotte, NC, it is from April 20 through June 15. In the south, it late February to late March and the north is June through July. The difficulty for operators is that this is the BUSIEST time at the facility. By the time they get through the busy season, it is too late for good photos and video.
If operators do get the chance to sneak away for some photos, the images are usually from ground level (sometimes with a phone) and don’t really do justice to the hole that you are wanting to promote. For example, here is a photo from ground level.
As you can see, there is a lot of fairway between the camera and the area of attention. The 2 dimensional view truly limits what you can see in the photo.
At Rockhold & Associates, we use an aerial photography and videography business, Rock Solid Aerial, to help introduce the viewpoint that exposes the hole for what it is. By getting up 75 to 100 ft, the perspective change allows for the camera to catch more of the holes character. (Below)
In this example, you can now see the whole green, water behind the green, how large the bunker is, and where you can miss the green without to much trouble. In addition to course playability, the viewer can soak in the beauty of the entire hole which is clearly not able to happen from ground level in this shot.
Our marketing position, at Rockhold & Associates, Inc. is to gain interest from potential guests by illuminating an amazing experience. Photos that can create a desire to play are the only ones that you can use for marketing. IF YOU ARE NOT PRESENTING A DESIRABLE SITUATION IN YOUR MARKETING PHOTOGRAPHY, YOU HAVE FAILED.
We can all draw on our own experiences with this. If you watch something online or on television and it achieves two things: Gets your attention and creates a Desire to Go, your marketing has done its job.
Getting out to the course and taking photos and video when the course is looking it’s best is how you can set yourself ahead of the other courses that do not focus on the new wave of marketing. Customers take photos of your golf course throughout the year and most are when the course is not at its best. They post them online to Yelp, Facebook, Twitter, and many other sites that Google actually pulls from. These photos are online representing your course. Have you taken a look lately?
If you need help, give us a call or stop by our website. We can help you in your entire marketing strategy and help you implement campaigns and initiatives to allow you to focus on the business and the customer once they are at the golf course.