How are golfers and golf courses using social media & mobile?

[Pat Coyle]

I have to speak to a group of golf course owners next week, and I'd like to show them examples of how social media and mobile are being best utilized in golf industry.

Does anyone know of any case studies? Or if you are a golfer, how are you using new media? Are you following any golf courses on Twitter to get discounts on greens fees? Do you use an iPhone app to judge distance to the pin? What's cool? What's hot? What's not? Help me if you can...I'm doing this talk pro bono :-)

[Jerome Harrison]

Pat I'm sure you already have a substantial list of Golf Courses using Twitter, but here are a couple anyways:

http://www.socialsearchmarketer.com/1689/follow-friday-golf-courses...

http://www.danperry.com/blog/twitter-golf-courses/

Most of the promotions I have seen on Twitter are for discounts on Greens fees and Tournament fees. Occasional discounts on apparel. The following tweet is an interesting way to drive people to the golf course's website for booking tee-times:

http://twitter.com/StonebrookeGolf/status/2211317119

[Ian Hall]

I think the GPS-enabled golf course navigation projects are incredible. Products like Skycaddy that provide all types of location-based benefits on the course seem to be taking off, and I'm always envious of people in my group who are using them. They're not cheap ($200+ for the device as well as an annual fee), which is why I think the golf navigation iPhone app (and others to follow) are so attractive. Although they don't have all the bells and whistles of products like SkyCaddy, I believe it's about $30 for the app - money well spent for the avid golfer without having to lug around another device. Mobile greens fees "couponing" is interesting to me, as long as I'm getting a better deal than I would on-line. This typically isn't an "impulse buy", so I can certainly wait until I'm back in front of my computer if the benefit is the same.

[Aslan Avdi]

Hey Pat,

I've never been one to know what's cool/hot, but an interesting stat is that more people around the world now access the internet via their cellphones/mobilephones than by their pc's/laptops/notebooks etc.

So to aid and capitalize on this process, 'dot mobi' (.mobi) was created by a bunch of people, including Google, Sony and Visa to name just a few.

.mobi sites, (unlike .com, .co.uk etc) are optimized for mobile web access.

Thus making golf sites with a .mobi address the most obvious way to access golf stuff online.

Here are just a few golf .mobi sites: (and for transparency - I have nothing to do with any of them. I don't get a nickel.)

http://www.prosessiongolf.mobi
http://www.metrogolf.mobi
http://www.phoenixgolf.mobi
http://resortgolf.mobi

And you'll see a range of other sites here: http://www.mobisite.org/famousbrands.html

I wish you well for your gig.

Ciao,
Aslan

[Gijsbregt Brouwer]

Pat,
the future of sports is in the mobile area and the gyrometer/accelerometer add to the fun.
Best golf example on the iPhone is this: http://bit.ly/1va3Ky
It lets you play golf where ever you are, like the Wii but then with the iPhone. Be careful not to let is slip in the middle of the swing though...
grtz

[jim Orenberg]

Pat,
Although this may not help with the "social" portion of the question, I thought this was pretty interesting. Golf Digest, in their October issue used Microsoft Tags to allow users to interact with the print on their mobile phones. A picture of Tiger with a code next to it. Scan the code with my phone, get to see the video. Pretty cool stuff.

http://www.golfdigest.com/magazine/ms_tag_help_section

[Jason Peck]

Bubba Watson just joined Twitter in September and seems to be doing a good job with it (http://twitter.com/bubbawatson) - engaging fans, responding to them and posting informal pictures and videos (http://tweetreel.com/bubbawatson) to help fans get to know him better.

Stewart Cink (http://twitter.com/stewartcink) appears to be doing a great job on Twitter as well (joined in February and has over 1 million followers).

The USGA did some great things around the US Open Championship--including letting employees tweet from inside the ropes. You can read more about some other things they did with digital technologies here - http://www.businessweek.com/lifestyle/content/jun2009/bw20090618_57...

[Amy Martin]

Pat,

I represent a few PGA golfers from a social media standpoint and have recently formed social media endorsements with the athletes the I rep (some of which in PGA) and national brand clients. Please reach out directly if you'd like more info. [e-mail]

Also, one of my clients (athlete) and I we'll be streaming live at the Ping Factory this Friday . . .

Best,
Amy

[Miklós Breitner]

The usage of social media in product communication is not a novelty for golf industry, especially for golf equipment manufacturers. However very few golf courses (e.g. Palmetto Dunes Oceanfront Resort) are adopting social media as a communication channel. The reason why golf courses should consider and implement social media is the fact that customers/consumers will continue gain more power over content. Fewer will pay for the content they want to consume. Thus it is not a big surprise that golf and other magazines' circulation number and subscription numbers are declining.

It is more important than ever to reach consumers where they want, when they want and how they want. Therefore, we should micro-segment our target audience. For younger target audience, age 18-34, we can use heavily social networking sites, user generated content sites (UGC). (Source: http://golfbusinessmonitor.typepad.com/golf_industry/2009/10/golf-c...)