National Golf Foundation brings on Clayton Morris to drive Database of American Golfers effort

The National Golf Foundation, the industry's leading provider of golf market research, and the keeper of the golf industry's premier databases, announced that Clayton Morris has joined the organization as vice president, and director of the Database of American Golfers.

The Database of American Golfers is NGF's two-pronged effort to help golf businesses improve the reach, targeting and ROI of their direct marketing. The first prong, the American Golf Census, launched on July 4, 2010, focuses on helping businesses build and enhance their email databases. The second prong, the American Golf Co-op, is the first ever golf-specific co-operative consumer mail database. It will launch in the first quarter of this year.

Joe Beditz, NGF's president and CEO commented, "The golf business is driven by 15 million core golfers who account for more than 90% of all rounds and golf spending. We estimate that businesses who sell to golf consumers have access to less than a million unduplicated golfer emails, and maybe four million unduplicated golfer mailing addresses. Golf business development efforts are hindered because only a fraction of our most important customers can be reached, and we wanted to do something about it."

Clayton Morris will be leading NGF's efforts to educate golf businesses on how best to tap into these programs and also how to take advantage of NGF's consumer targeting, data hygiene and list enhancement resources. "We want every golf business to improve their ability to communicate with their customers and prospects", commented Morris.

Prior to joining the NGF, Clayton spent 12 years at Golfweek/Turnstile Publishing, serving the last two years as its president and group publisher when Golfweek experienced significant growth under his leadership. "NGF combines a deep understanding of the golf consumer coupled with the analytical horsepower to improve both the efficiency and the ROI of any company's direct marketing. I'm excited to help golf organizations use these assets to spend less and make more, by doing things just a little bit smarter", says Morris.

Morris will work closely with NGF's senior management including Joe Beditz and Greg Nathan, NGF's senior vice president of membership.