As PGA of America General Managers, your role goes beyond the financials and the forecasting - it’s also about the fun. With many facilities having great amenities, both golf- and non-golf-related, the difference from club to club is often how creative you can be. What unique experiences and opportunities are you providing your members?
This month’s edition of An Outside Voice represents a first for us at PGA General Managers Monthly. At the time of publication, our Outside Voice, Brian Williams, is the proud business owner of Mind Body Swing in Prairieville, Louisiana. When he implemented the ideas he shares in this month’s issue, however, he was the PGA of America Director of Golf at the Country Club of Louisiana in Baton Rouge, a role he vacated just a few weeks ago to open his academy. Let’s talk about his creative engagement ideas.
With renovations on the driving range and golf course coming to his previous facility in the next few years, it’s going to take creativity and innovation to keep members engaged and also maintain revenues across the club. Williams implemented a unique event last year that was a hugely creative success - Wednesday Range Games. Williams says that Wednesday Range Games always fostered a festive atmosphere on the practice range.
“There’d be a full bar, margarita machine and merchandise from the golf shop displayed for sale,” he explains. “We used Trackman to facilitate long drive, straightest drive, closest-to-the-pin and short-game and putting challenges.”
Wednesday Range Games was an idea that he and his GM at the time first considered last summer as a way of offering members a special social golf experience. After all, with many of their members leaving town for cooler climates during the summer, they wanted to implement some new ideas to keep those who stayed local engaged for a half hour or an hour at a time, rather than expecting them to withstand the Louisiana heat for more than four hours on the course.
“We also implemented this weekly gathering so members could spend time together in a more social setting and simply be present at the club when the summer heat might otherwise have kept them away,” Williams adds. “We figure games and cocktails might do the trick.”
Creativity was the secret to making Wednesday Range Games a success. It was something members hadn’t seen before.
“We’d have a tent set up with music playing, light hors d’oeuvres and fresh fruit being passed by staff and displays set up to show off some of the great merchandise we carried in the golf shop,” Williams detailed. “What started as a way to get members to the club during the heat of the summer turned into a demand for these events during the subsequent beautiful fall weather.”
A second cool idea he put in place was a series of video tips he’d post online every Friday.
“We used Instagram and Facebook extensively to promote club events, member accomplishments, golf shop specials and to share the smiling faces of our many members,” Williams recalls. “One way I used social media in my coaching is through a weekly feature I called Fairway Fridays - swing tip videos for members to view, share and emulate to improve many facets of their game.”
After initiating this new virtual engagement, Fairway Fridays grew ever more popular to include off-course instruction and tips and on-course advice. Williams was able to demonstrate his expertise and promote his golf instruction and player development programming.
“We used hitting bays, the practice range, short game area, practice putting green and the golf course itself in these 1-2-minute videos,” he adds. “As a self-proclaimed extrovert, I want to get people excited about the game and improve their skills. I put a lot of energy and motivation into those short videos so members could see my desire to teach and would want to experience more of that in their quest for lower scores.”
Most pros understand that when you offer free advice that members can implement in their game, your lesson business is sure to flourish. And with almost 10,000 views in some cases, this free marketing tool can work for any golf professional, regardless of the type of facility he or she calls home.
“I have always had a strong desire to impact people in positive ways and feel this is an easy and engaging way of adding to the enjoyment members derive from the game,” says Williams. “People want something fast and quick, rather than the complicated and complex golf instruction of the past. They’re always on their phones anyway, so you can say I was delivering my golf instruction right to them every Friday! As a result, my already busy lesson schedule got even busier, including golfers from outside of the club. With that success, I was able to branch off and start my own academy.”
Once a Director of Golf, now business owner Williams has many ideas we plan to share in future issues of General Managers Monthly. We look forward to collaborating again and learning all about his new golf academy - Mind Body Swing.
Brian Williams, the 2023 Gulf States PGA Section Merchandiser of the Year for Private Facilities, is the PGA of America Owner/Operator of Mind Body Swing in Prairieville, Louisiana.