367: Role of AI in Club Membership Marketing w/ Golf Life Navigators
Jul 19, 2024
Denny Corby, Jason Becker
Discover how a groundbreaking algorithm is transforming the world of private golf clubs! Jason Becker joins us to reveal how Golf Life Navigators is revolutionizing membership matchmaking by aligning clubs with members who share similar preferences and needs. Inspired by the success of dating algorithms, GLN's tool enhances club culture and reduces attrition rates, providing unparalleled exposure for clubs nationwide.
With an impressive track record, Golf Life Navigators has already assisted 55,000 people in finding their ideal clubs, particularly in the popular Sunbelt regions.
Curious about how clubs can maintain a steady pipeline of qualified leads? We unpack GLN's subscription-based program, which has received rave reviews from clubs of all sizes. With features like "Feature Club Friday" e-blasts and customized microsites, GLN ensures clubs stay visible and connected with prospective members 24/7.
Listen as we explore how this innovative approach is a game-changer for membership directors, integrating seamlessly into their existing marketing strategies to boost membership and club visibility in a competitive landscape.
Discover how a groundbreaking algorithm is transforming the world of private golf clubs! Jason Becker joins us to reveal how Golf Life Navigators is revolutionizing membership matchmaking by aligning clubs with members who share similar preferences and needs. Inspired by the success of dating algorithms, GLN's tool enhances club culture and reduces attrition rates, providing unparalleled exposure for clubs nationwide.
With an impressive track record, Golf Life Navigators has already assisted 55,000 people in finding their ideal clubs, particularly in the popular Sunbelt regions.
Curious about how clubs can maintain a steady pipeline of qualified leads? We unpack GLN's subscription-based program, which has received rave reviews from clubs of all sizes. With features like "Feature Club Friday" e-blasts and customized microsites, GLN ensures clubs stay visible and connected with prospective members 24/7.
Listen as we explore how this innovative approach is a game-changer for membership directors, integrating seamlessly into their existing marketing strategies to boost membership and club visibility in a competitive landscape.
So I happened to be reading a white paper it's probably like 2015 or so on divorce rates in the country. At the time it was 54% of people that got married were getting divorces, but it talked about that the people that got married after meeting on matchmaking algorithms like eHarmony, matchcom, et cetera the divorce rate was 9% and I thought that was very interesting in that, you know, could we create this environment that had a matchmaking algorithm where user A the club could put in what they had to offer and user B the consumer could put in what they're looking for and match is going to occur?
Speaker 2:
Hey everyone, welcome back to the Private Club Radio Show podcast, the industry source for news, trends, updates and conversations all in the world of private golf and country clubs. Whether you're a consummate professional, you've been in the industry for a minute, or you're brand new to the industry, just learning, welcome. We are glad you are all here. This is the show where we go over all the topics. So, whether it's leadership management, general hospitality, marketing over all the topics. So, whether it's leadership management, general hospitality, marketing, branding, anything that has to do with private golf and country clubs. And when we say the clubs, we mean all the privately owned clubs country clubs, city clubs, golf clubs, yacht clubs, athletic clubs, all the clubs. Welcome to the show. I'm your host, denny Corby. Thank you all so much for being here.
Speaker 2:
In this episode we're going to dive a little bit deeper into the world of our friends Golf Life Navigators, because they have something really cool and really special. So Golf Life Navigators offers private clubs unparalleled exposure through a sophisticated matchmaking algorithm that connects them directly with prospective members, based on specific preferences and needs. It's wild and by creating a microsite, as you, as the club, creating a microsite on the golf life navigators platform, you can showcase your amenities and engage with potential members and helping you know to ensure a steady pipeline of qualified leads are coming through to the club Cause, if they're coming, if you're getting matched with them, it's because they match with you and what your amenities are and for the right club is a tremendous fit. And that's what I enjoy do things. Because each club has its own unique goals, its own unique personalities and how it likes to do things and how it does things.
Speaker 2:
And this is a really special tool for the right club. You know everyone has their own toolbox of things and vendors, people, suppliers everyone has their own special toolbox that they've cultivated and created. And when it comes to, you know, getting new members and membership and marketing, you know every club has its own perspective, its own way of doing things and golf life navigators they have such a cool tool that they are an amazing platform and for the right club man, you can you can really kill it. Uh, and just to be a part of this, because it's advertising without advertising and marketing without marketing and it's a perfect fit. So it's a really innovative approach that not only boosts the membership but also enhances the club's visibility in a competitive market. So please welcome Jason Becker, golf Life Navigators. So for those people who may or may not know what is Golf, Life Navigators.
Speaker 1:
So GLN is an online environment that we built, probably seven years ago now, that consumers could leverage to connect with private clubs across the country so well, mainly in the Sunbelt, but across the country anymore. So the theory or the boy that we saw in the market was that you had someone making a major life financial decision into what club that they're going to retire to, and then you had 154 clubs in Southwest Florida alone to visit and meet with and get information on who could do that, who had time for that that. So on the club side of the model being a club professional throughout a number of years, you always wanted the right member at the club. You didn't want someone that was bought in there and that was not going to be happy and be disgruntled. It's just, it's not good for the culture.
Speaker 1:
So I happened to be reading a white paper it's probably like 2015 or so on divorce rates in the country. At the time it was 54% of people that got married were getting divorces, but it talked about that the people that got married after meeting on matchmaking algorithms like eHarmony, matchcom, et cetera. The divorce rate was 9% and I thought that was very interesting in that, you know, could we create this environment that had a matchmaking algorithm where user A the club could put in what they had to offer and user B the consumer could put in what they're looking for and matches could occur. So it would help the consumer filter the 154 clubs in Southwest Florida. It would help the club connect with like-minded members or prospects. They're going to be good for the culture of the club and in our world attrition rate is big. You don't want a ton of turnover every year because you just have to continually replace those members. So if divorce rate is so low by people connecting through clubs, through GLN, then over time attrition rates would go down at clubs.
Speaker 1:
So that was kind of the theory. Since we launched in 17, we've had 55,000 people use it to match to clubs 55,000. We're now from Palm Springs to hilton head to florida. So any sun golf rich market in the sunbelt the algorithm can filter. Uh that, and you might not know I until we did the research, there's actually 86 markets like that across the country where there's 15 or more private clubs in a given area. So and we have the algorithm can search in Chicago and other metropolitan markets. But primarily why people come to us is to use it to search for a Sunbelt snowbird getaway.
Speaker 2:
Ah, gotcha, so so. So other clubs can, and you do have other clubs throughout the entire country. It just happens to be more of that.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, yeah, we're starting to transition into more of a national message and branding. When we started, it was all really focused on Sunbelt. We had 154 clubs in southwest Florida. There's 177 in Palm Beach County. Florida alone has 600. Florida alone has 600. So when you spread across the country like that, it makes it very, very difficult for a consumer to do all that research, and a lot of private club websites are locked. You can't travel and just visit them all.
Speaker 2:
So the technology was a huge step in innovation for not only the consumer but for the industry. And so with the algorithm, like if I were to go do it, can you have it? So you can just say, hey, here's what I really like.
Speaker 1:
Show me all the clubs in the entire country that match what I want. It would be market specific, so you'd select Sarasota and then put in exact click on what you know exactly what you're looking for and you're going to get matched to clubs. We do have a lot of people that will do multiple markets so they might do Sarasota, tampa, even Jacksonville and just to explore and do research and get familiar with areas. But with the waitlist issue the last several years it's kind of forced consumers to have to take additional what we call a pro guide. That's the questionnaire that gets matched to clubs. So you see a lot of that happening. But as a consumer, yeah, you can use as many times as you want.
Speaker 2:
I was to me like that would just be so cool, just to see like where my, where my dream clubs are, like you know where I match and where it is, and I'm sure that would probably open up the doors to people who are like, oh, I would never think about going there, but that class is nice and the weather seems pretty good. And look at this, I got a good bank for my buck or whatever they're there.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, Interesting. Now how do you?
Speaker 2:
get, oh good.
Speaker 1:
Well, I'm just going to say that if someone already knew where they were going to join, they wouldn't use us. So they come to our platform to just do what you said to be able to search and get information and tell. We do a lot with the national media in terms of providing data and information on what's driving the private club network or market, what the future private club members saying today, and so that all gets out there organically. So people they're reading the wall street journal like huh, I wonder what that's all about. And they come to our website and eventually get connected to a club. That's awesome.
Speaker 2:
Now, how do clubs get involved with?
Speaker 1:
GLN of amenities do you have? Do you have 36 holes of golf? Do you have like a sports bar setting in the dining room? Full practice facility takes about two minutes to complete. That populates a search engine, uh, and so the club's information is in the system.
Speaker 1:
Now for the clubs that are looking for added exposure, uh, or to maybe continue the pipeline of waitlisted members that they have, or just to display accurate information out there. So there's no rumors or misconceptions about a club. A lot of that happens in the real estate world. So real estate agents will use the internet to get information for their clients on specific clubs, and so they'll come to our website, go to that club and it's all there. And they know that it's accurate because the membership director or the club official has updated that link.
Speaker 1:
So in our feature club program we just position the club in a way that they can communicate directly with that match. So if you took a pro guide for Sarasota and you got matched to six clubs, as soon as you hit enter their messaging that will come to you from us. It says hey, denny, you're a match to these six great facilities. Be on the lookout from the membership director soon and they'll send over information in regards to the club or, by all means, pick up the phone and give them a call and so, as soon as you hit, enter, that club official is notified and they'll have your profile and the things that you're looking for. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:
The things that you're looking for. And the best part of all this is the motivation as to why you're looking for a club to begin with. So in the pro guide, which would take you on average, about 12 minutes to complete it's lengthy and it was designed that way for a reason the algorithm is embedded into the pro guide, so it's just seven or eight questions to make the search engine work. But when we start asking you, hey, denny, what's motivating you to look for a club in Sarasota? Well, I'm looking for a healthier lifestyle. That's really important to me or the financial investment of the club is super important to me, or being recognized as an important member not important to me at all. I want to get away from that.
Speaker 1:
So, as a membership director, when you see that Denny has said that a healthier lifestyle is very important, it's like instant conversation starter. Hey, denny, we just upgraded our fitness facilities. We have group fitness classes. We have a smoothie bar out front. It's fantastic. You'll love it when you come visit. So instead of the membership director just getting your name and your email address and reaching out almost cold calling there, you're expecting them to call and you're expecting to get them on the phone and have a conversation with them. So it's a pretty cool system that we've we've built for both sides of the equation.
Speaker 2:
Oh, I like that. That is fun. What? What's been the response like from the clubs that are plugged into the program?
Speaker 1:
oh, they love it. I mean we've had clubs that are entering their seventh year with us, um, continually. So when a club signs up it's for 12 months, so it's just subscription. Subscription fee that um, like anything else, there's there's no additional fees on if somebody closes a membership that the club owes Golf Life Navigator something. It ranges from $1,500 to $4,000 for the year and it's market-based because there's markets across the country that see more organic lead volume than others.
Speaker 1:
So if you're a club in a smaller area in South Carolina you wouldn't be paying the same subscription fee as a club in Palm Beach, florida. So we've got it balanced that way and basically, once they're plugged in, they're 24-7, 365. And basically once they're plugged in, they're 24-7, 365. So those people are on our website researching, connecting. At 2 in the morning You're out there, your club is being present. And the way that I like to describe GLN is we're not a marketing big package of any sort, we're just a spoke in the marketing wheel. So if you can do all your other marketing programs, but signing up with GLN just makes a lot of sense out of the gate for any new membership director or any club that again wants to connect with people extend a waitlist pipeline or have accurate information displayed to buyers and real estate agents.
Speaker 2:
So when somebody fills out that that the the guide, they put in all their information, how, how so the the club then gets all that info about that person?
Speaker 1:
Yeah, yeah, and it's nothing personal to the consumer. It's other than name and phone number and email. But the consumer has been briefed that that's what's going to happen here. This is free service for you, but when you connect to these clubs, you wouldn't sit there and take 12 minutes to fill out that form and not want to talk to the clubs that you were matched to. So consumers are very excited to talk to them. So that makes it, you know, an even greater opportunity for the membership director.
Speaker 2:
And for 110 to 400 bucks a month. However you want to look at it, that is. That's a bar to do.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, yeah, there's other deliverables. Yeah, what's called Feature Club Friday, which is our dedicated e-blast to consumers looking in your specific market, so you're constantly touching them, even if you don't have those kind of mechanisms at the club level. And then our data assets that we have always connecting club officials with best practices that are going on across the country. So if you believe that people use the internet to research private clubs which I think that we all would do, all your listeners would then it would just be a whoosie to plug into something like ours and outside of us, I don't know what there is to connect with the marketplace.
Speaker 2:
And it's more than just being listed then place, and it's more than just being listed then. So you think there's other opportunities, there's other pr, there's other ways that clubs get visually seen and get exposure than just filling out.
Speaker 1:
You know, when people fill out the form and like, there it is, oh, wow yeah, yeah, we build out a what's called a micro site, so we basically, just like you would sign up for anything, you're populated with a picture and a logo and a headshot and again with all the data that you want about the club to be in there, and then so all of that, as the consumer, gets matched to that club. If they transition over to that club's website, they're seeing the same pictures, the same logo. Everything is consistent. So we call microsites and membership directors can craft them however they want, if they want a specific tab on real estate or amenities, however they want to do it. The beauty of the microsite is that for clubs who struggle with SEO rankings, which most do these days, they just don't have the personnel to do those types of things.
Speaker 2:
And it's always changing, even right now. Even right now, it's a wild time.
Speaker 1:
It's a full-time position. So having your microsite on GLNcom and then having your clubs existing website, you're attacking Google twice from two different angles. So it helps with the SEO scores for the clubs. You just have two positions online and a lot of the tech savvy membership directors really appreciate that. That asset alone is huge for the club.
Speaker 2:
That one-two punch, that bang-bang, knockout, pop, pop, pop, right right, getting it from all angles, yeah.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, well, it really is At the end of the day is that the consumer needs seven to nine touches before they buy anything, and so they could have been at the club for a member of guests. Oh yeah, these days they saw something read about it in a magazine article. Then they land on GLN and they get matched that club and that's the final. That's all I needed. That was my seventh touch with this club. Clearly it's the one. That's all I needed. That was my seventh touch with this club. Clearly it's the one that's right for me.
Speaker 1:
So again, yeah, it's just a, we're just a spoke in the overall marketing wheel. And, um, the one thing I would say is that there's a lot of clubs out there and I've been at these facilities that really pride themselves on exclusivity, and the beauty about GLN is you can still have that because you're not going to get matched to a consumer unless they put in what the club has to offer. So they're the ideal prospective member and membership director will get your bio and then they make the decision of do I want to reach out to this person or not? So you still can control. You're not blasting out nationwide exposure on behalf of the club, you're. You're keeping that, that exclusivity feel, but just kind of tempering it. You know is a lead. If you want to call it that, come in. Okay, we're going to call denny. He looks like our type of guy so it's like advertising without advertising.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, it's, it's, uh, you'd be surprised how many really high end private clubs are logged into our system and that's the only advertising they do and that, if that's how they label it on their, on their budget. But because it's just a good way to to still be connected with the buyers, uh, without again doing major national campaigns.
Speaker 2:
So what about? What about the clubs that have wait lists? You know I'm trying to play devil's advocate a little bit, like times are crazy right now. Like if a club has a wait list, why would they still want to be a part?
Speaker 1:
Well, a couple of reasons. Number one the average transition time for anybody that uses our system is 12 to 18 months. So these aren't people that are ready to purchase immediately. Now there's a good segment of those that are, but for the most part this is a year out, which makes a lot of sense. So for a club to continue to build that pipeline is key.
Speaker 1:
One of the assets or one of the reasons why they would sign up with GLN. The other is to display the accurate information about the waitlists or the waitlist procedures about the club, because every club is different how they manage waitlists. Some clubs denny you might be able to play the golf course after two o'clock being on the waitlist. Others you are not allowed to play at all, you can't even use the fitness center, but others you can. So for a consumer who's not overly enthused about joining a waitlist because we have data on that they can at least see on that club's microsite what I get and what I don't get if I go on and what's the anticipated timeframe if I did join the club on the wait list that I can expect to be a full member. So that's a big reason.
Speaker 1:
We did a survey last year to our database of buyers and consumers and said you know, what do you? How do you feel about wait lists? Would you join a club with a wait list of more than two years? Would you put a deposit down? You know, would you join a club that didn't have any real estate available in that community for you that you liked and go on a wait list? And clearly the data that came back was saying that consumers are not a fan of it and they would rather look elsewhere. And so elsewhere, meaning I want to be in Naples I want to be a specific club. They have a three-year wait list.
Speaker 1:
I guess we're going to have to go to Sarasota because I don't want to wait. I don't like the dynamics of putting a $25,000 deposit down and maybe getting in two years. So clubs can, by displaying that information, kind of get ahead of that and also, by connecting with these folks, continue to build that pipeline. Just in case people do drop off the waitlist, decide to go to other markets, especially at clubs that don't have a deposit, those folks might not even call you to let you know. Hey, I just bought in Vero Beach, you can remove me for the waitlist. If they've got no check written, there's no reason for them to do that. So, based upon those survey results, we expect to see quite a bit of dilution of weightless set clubs in the years coming.
Speaker 2:
Interesting Sounds like another episode.
Speaker 1:
No, it is there's so much to talk about on it and yeah that. So those it's there's so much to talk about on it and yeah, so those. It's connecting to GLN and the Feature Club program there's deliverables there and connecting with consumers. But then there's the data side, there's the Intel side and there's just so many little moving parts to it that clubs can leverage, and that's why clubs stay with us year on and year out, because they don't want to lose that.
Speaker 2:
I mean, you get. You get one good member from it. It pays itself in dividends.
Speaker 1:
Like yeah, well, yeah, I mean one member, theoretically, is going to be at the club, 10 to 15 years, and they're paying $10,000 a year in dues. It's a $200,000, you know, new member. So, and, more importantly, it's not just anybody with a checkbook, it's someone that's right for the club and that's what means more.
Speaker 2:
And someone who took the time to put in the information to do all of that. Everyone's so vested.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, they're serious too. They're high quality. Most of the folks that use our platform are already members of clubs up north. Most of the folks that use our platform are already members of clubs up north, so they're either going to be snowbirds or relocate permanently. But they understand the private club world. They know they want to be somewhere.
Speaker 2:
They just don't know how to get there until they find us. If clubs want to learn more, if they want to get plugged in, if they want to sign up, what's the next steps for them?
Speaker 1:
Go to our website and look around first and you'll see. You get a really good feel how it operates from the consumer side and the club side. And then under our Contact Us box, they can fill out a form there and we'll reach out and send any collateral over. Have a call or just email me, jason at golflifenavigatorscom. I'm happy to pass along a free copy of our buying trends report which we just released yesterday. You got your copy right.
Speaker 2:
Oh yeah, hot off the press.
Speaker 1:
Waiting to do it, so I'll be happy to share that over and just answer any questions you have about the program. I love it. Thanks for being on.
Speaker 2:
I appreciate it.
Speaker 1:
I appreciate it too.
Speaker 2:
Hope you all enjoyed that episode. If you would like to learn more, head on over to golflifenavigatorscom. Fill out the form, set up a call with Jason or someone from the team, tell them you're coming because of Private Club Radio and they are going to treat you like royalty, like gold. They're the best over there. Hope you all enjoyed it. That's this episode. I'm your host, denny Corby. If you're enjoying the content, like share, subscribe. It means the world. Until next time, catch you on the Flippity Flip.
