Maintaining a loyal customer base is crucial for the long-term success of any golf course. Offering a loyalty program can be a game-changer, but the key lies in thoughtful implementation. Gallus' Loyalty Programs module is here to transform the way you approach customer loyalty.
In this blog post, we'll explore three key benefits of Gallus Golf's Loyalty Programs module: training customer behavior, digitizing the tracking process, and adding fresh content to your marketing campaigns.
Gallus Golf has given our club a great way to interact with our customers through the use of push notifications, the loyalty program, and the news section. Being able to send frost delays and course updates directly to the app through a push notification has been very beneficial to us. We have 1,806 participants who enjoy the benefits of the loyalty program. These features keep our users engaged and active with the app!
Tanya McGee
Club Manager, Ballantrae Golf Club
Training Customer Behavior
One of the primary challenges in any loyalty program is incentivizing customers to change their behavior and choose your golf course over others consistently. Gallus Golf's Loyalty Programs module simplifies this process by offering a user-friendly, customizable platform that rewards golfers for frequenting your facility.
Rewards can be customized using two different program structures: punches and points. Let’s take a look at examples of guiding customer behavior using each:
Punch Cards: Straightforward Rewards
Every facility has facets of their operation that rely on repeat business. From the driving range to food & beverage, regulars are the lifeblood of the revenue stream. To get more repeat business, many of our customers have created a simple punch card program to track purchases.
These can be configured to have a set number of punches required to earn a specific reward. If a facility was looking to get more activity on their range, creating a, “Buy 10 buckets of range balls, get the 11th free” program could be the push customers need to keep coming back to your facility instead of others in the area.
Points Programs: Flexibility
While some facilities choose to focus on repeat business, others would like to push regulars from one part of the operation that’s commonly full (golf, anyone?) to different areas like the pro shop, food & beverage, or lessons. In this case, we commonly recommend creating a points loyalty program.
The beauty of points programs is they track all of the revenue spent at your facility, so customers aren’t limited to one specific type of purchase. App admins can then create as many rewards as they’d like (for different values) in order to incentivize different parts of the business.
For instance, a facility that’s looking to get more diners to sit down in their restaurant can create a reward for a free appetizer, requiring a low number of points for redemption, which will naturally draw more customers to use that reward. They can then create other rewards for lesser-used areas of the business and make the value of the top rewards much higher.
This creates a win-win situation: either the user redeems for the reward you wanted them to (for less points) or holds out and ends up spending more money on a top-dollar incentive.
Fresh Content Throughout The Year
While some level of consistency is helpful for customers that frequent your business, the goal of any golf facility should be to keep things new and exciting to increase your pool of regulars. This results in a larger audience that you can count on for monthly revenue.
Instead of creating a points loyalty program with the same rewards and sticking with it throughout the year, try something different by adding in a wild-card reward once per month while removing a reward. This serves a few purposes:
Adding a new reward creates a topic for a marketing campaign to your customers. These are always beneficial as it gives a new piece of information to send out via Push Notification, Pop-Up, News item, Page, or through your other social channels.
Adding and removing a reward periodically provides a set date to analyze how the different facets of your business are performing- departments that are exceeding expectations and those that need some help. You are then able to make changes on the fly to push customers to the proper department (as discussed in the first section of this blog post).
Set a time at least once per month to analyze your loyalty program’s performance and watch your facility’s revenue exceed expectations.
Digitizing The Tracking Process
Loyalty Programs traditionally rely on punch cards or paper-based systems, making tracking customer behavior cumbersome and prone to errors. Gallus Golf's Loyalty Programs module eliminates these hassles by digitizing the entire process.
An online dashboard updates balances immediately, allowing for simple tracking on the admin side. Customers benefit by always being able to view their rewards status, which in turn takes pressure off the pro shop staff as they don’t need to manually check balances.
When a customer would like to earn, staff can access an online portal, input how many punches or points they’d like to award, and generate a three-digit code for the customer to input on their device. Reward redemption is even simpler as customers can select their reward on their own device, redeem it, and show staff a confirmation page (complete with timestamp) for confirmation. Accounts are updated immediately and everyone walks away satisfied.
Conclusion
Maintaining a loyal customer base is paramount for the long-term success of any golf course. Implementing an effective loyalty program can be the key to achieving this, and Gallus Golf's Loyalty Programs module is the ultimate solution for transforming your approach to customer loyalty.
We've explored three essential benefits of Gallus Golf's Loyalty Programs module: shaping customer behavior, digitalizing the tracking process, and encouraging repeat business. By effectively training customer behavior, you can create a golf community that keeps coming back to your course, whether through punch card programs that incentivize repeat purchases or points programs that encourage spending across various facilities.
Incorporating Gallus' Loyalty Programs module into your golf course's operations isn't just about implementing a loyalty program; it's about enhancing the overall customer experience and building lasting relationships. Don't miss out on the opportunity to revolutionize your golf course's success by incentivizing customers. Start shaping customer behavior, digitizing your tracking process, and encouraging repeat business today, and watch your golf course thrive like never before.
