#It's not too late

For a group of course designers, builders and shapers who didn’t even know what social media was 5 years ago, we certainly spend a lot of time thinking about it these days. Maybe you’re like we were 18 months ago — determined to do something in that realm (to better communicate with your customers/members) but not at all sure how to go about it.

Well, we’ve learned there are dozens of “right” ways to do it, and we keep developing new strategies as we go along.  We wanted to share a couple of those with you here, and emphasize what believe to be the superintendent’s crucial role.

Let me say first that as superintendents and club/course managers, you have a leg up on us course designers and contractors. We at Lohmann Golf Designs and our sister construction firm, Golf Creations, are doing all the basic things we should:

• Creating a central, “branded” portal — the blog at our website — where colleagues and customers can read our news, be engaged, respond and generally interact;
• Regularly supplying that blog with new content, because visitors should always have something new to read — and because new content is a big component of the Google algorithms that determine where you come up on Internet searches (even if you bid on AdWords placement, Google scores — and ultimately ranks — your web page on things like new content, speed, and optimization mobile for mobile devices).
• Providing via Facebook further, image-centric content that is informational, not sales-driven; and\ Using Facebook and Twitter (along with our traditional e-mailing list) to drive colleagues and customers to our blog/website.

But while we really do avoid “selling” our services via all this content, we are continually seeking out and trying to engage with a disparate community of potential customers. Private golf clubs and daily-fee facilities are lucky — they have their communities ready made. It’s just a matter of how to best engage them via social media.

Follow the leader
I had to laugh the other day when I visited my local gas station, which, like many do, has a convenience store attached. It’s all part of a big chain of gas/convenience stores. There was a sign on the door that urged me “Follow us on Facebook!” Well, I’m not going to follow them on Facebook — I don’t care enough about where I buy gas and soda.

But golf courses are different. If you make an effort to stock your blog and Facebook page with meaningful information about your course, the people who play that course by choice will “like” your page and visit your blog in appreciable numbers. When you’ve rebuilt or moved a bunker, the people who play that golf course will want to know about that!

Most courses have been collecting the email information on members and greens-fee-paying golfers for a long time. Use that list to drive them to your Facebook page and blog. If you provide them meaningful information there, they will come back for more.

Here’s the important bit: It’s our view here at LGD and Golf Creations that the superintendent can and should be the point person for generating that meaningful social media content. He or she is the person who knows the most about what’s happening on the property’s most important asset: the golf course. He or she is also on the course every day, meaning he or she can deliver timely info and pictures for your social media portals, every day.

When there’s wildlife captured on film (okay, digitally), that’s a picture and an FB post.

When you re-edge the bunkers surrounding a particular green, that’s a picture, FB post and maybe a blog entry.

When you’ve drawn up a schedule to punch the greens, that’s something golfers will want to know.

We’ve seen some great “Sunrise Series”, where each week the super features a different hole at sunrise — a beautiful time of day that most golfers don’t experience.

Even quite technical greenkeeping can be featured and explained in this sort of context. We know of supers who will go out and apply a plant growth regulator to really lush areas in front of ladies tees — to increase roll in those areas and lessen the chances of lost balls there. Tell golfers you’ve taken this sort of step — via social media.

Here’s another fun and interesting social-media worthy experiment: One of our superintendent friends purposely didn’t place any tee markers the first two weeks of the season — he wanted to see where people would play the holes from, on their own. Nearly always golfers played more forward than he would have traditionally “marked” them. That’s good info for a superintendent to have, and interesting information to share with golfers.

Of course, in all these cases where you are generating fun imagery, Instagram and PinInterest are two more social media options that are very photo-centric.

Tease, don't force feed
Here’s another approach we stumbled upon with a private club client:

We’ve reoriented they way we work with golf properties. Today we basically dice up a traditional master renovation plans into smaller chunks that can be tackled annually, if the money is there. In this economy, we ‘ve found that clubs are better able to swallow these smaller bites in an orderly, productive, cost-effective fashion. We call this an Asset Management Plan, or AMP.

We’ve formulated an AMP for a semi-private club client in Wisconsin and we’re using social media to communicate the scope of that AMP.

It’s easy to get members or regular golfing patrons to “like” a club’s Facebook page or visit the blog — they’re already interacting with the club online. Instead of asking members and golfers to digest the contents of a 7-year AMP all at once, we’re doling each phase out to them via the blog, and driving traffic to the blog with Facebook posts. One week we discuss tree removal happening on one hole, and use that to discuss the overarching tree removal plans we have for the entire course. The next week we address the ongoing topdressing program, its effect on ball roll, and why these two particular greens aren’t responding and will have to be regrassed.

This approach serves a bunch of really practical purposes:

• It keeps the membership and golfing customer base apprised of what’s happening at their course, in an informational way.
• It demonstrates that investment in the course has been planned out and staged in a logical, cost-efficient way.
•  It provides them the opportunity for feedback, because all these social media portals allow for and inherently encourage that feedback.
• And it gets members in the habit of visiting the website and Facebook page, where there’s lots of other information the club wants to communicate.

The possibilities are pretty much endless, and that’s a good thing because prosecuting this sort of social media campaign is a bit like holding a tiger by the tail. Once you start, you’ve really got to stay with it or interest will fall away (this is especially true for Twitter). We’re not social media experts by any means, but we’ve seen this stuff work. By the same token, we’re starting to get the impression that maybe Facebook is falling a bit out of favor.

No doubt it will adapt or simply be replaced by the next useful social media tool. We’re not sure what that tool will be, but we’re pretty sure a) it will allow clubs dozens of customizable ways to communicate with your golfers, and b) the superintendent should be at the center of it all.

About the author
Todd Quitno is senior architect at Lohmann Golf Course Architects and is responsible for the daily coordination of Lohmann’s design team, and his project involvement includes management of all aspects of design from initial client contact through construction documentation and observation. With a background in the arts, Todd takes responsibility for developing LGD’s promotional material and computer imaging. He is also the primary contact for all of the company’s marketing efforts.