This Crazy Year Has Been Good for Golf. What's Next for the Industry?

2020 has been a crazy year, to put it mildly … and it’s not over, as I write on September 30.

If there’s some good news, it’s that golf has prospered. Golf, for many years, was not really going anywhere. It wasn’t moving up and it wasn’t really going backwards. The situation varied regionally but golf was in stasis. That all changed this year when golf was, for many people, their only way to get outside and have some fun. It’s been very hard to get tee times at thousands of courses around the world. Everyone hates it happen this way … but it happened.

I live in a ski town. We shut down in mid-March and the lifts did not spin. In mid-April, I boldly predicted the town would be a ghost town. It’s been busier than ever this summer and fall … so my predictions are very poor! Shows you how much I know.

What’s going to happen to the golf industry when things get back to normal? Will people leave golf courses for other sports and pastimes? Who knows? Who knows what normal will look like?

However, course operators and others in the business need to use this opportunity to market like crazy. If you’re in the industry, you’re probably thinking, “Why market now? We’re turning people away.

As a direct response copywriter, I’ve worked with top direct marketers. One thing I’ve discovered: they market like crazy when things are going really well. The foot is always on the gas pedal … to use a dreadful cliché.

If you’re involved in some type of golf marketing … use this opportunity to market more than ever. Your efforts will pay off when the golfers who are currently packing our courses start to drift away because they have other opportunities for recreation.

Golf Copywriter on The Power of Direct Response Copy in Golf

Retail stores are closing all over America. Malls are emptying, not of people, but of retailers. A few stores in the golf world are doing well but several chains and independent stores have closed and will never open again.

The retail golf world is going online. No news there. But more saliently, many golf companies are bypassing ‘middlemen’ and going straight to consumer. It’s called direct-to-consumer marketing.

How can you be successful in this space? You have two choices here.

You can use the “branding” approach used by big companies like Titleist and Callaway. Lots of pretty pictures. Expensive endorsement deals. Commercials running during golf tournaments on TV. Everyone looks good but nothing is measured.

Or …

You can use the direct marketing approach. This means going straight after your potential customers with your product or service. Every company in golf, whatever the size of the company and whatever the product, should use direct marketing.

Why?

Direct marketing is measurable to the penny. You discover what works and what doesn’t and direct efforts toward the former. Branding advertising tells you nothing.

Direct marketing is a proven way to market any product or service.

You harness the proven power of direct response copywriting.

You can sell more products and services, more often.

Why doesn’t every company in golf use direct marketing? There are two reasons.

First, people who make golf marketing decisions look at the advertising of Titleist and Callaway and other big names and say, “if they’re doing that, I’m doing that.”

Second, very few people genuinely understand direct marketing or even understand its power. Business schools don’t teach direct marketing. It’s rare to find genuine direct marketing practitioners and experts in large companies.

If you run and/or own a golf company, discover all you can about direct marketing so you can sell directly to the people who want your product or service.