What Does a Golf Manager Do? A Complete Guide

For a golf supervisor, golf facility administration is like on-course administration. In each situations, you will need to execute towards a frightening array of calls for, variables, priorities and outcomes. Off the course, nonetheless, the stakes are larger.

Shopper habits and golfer expectations are evolving, and day-to-day operations have gotten extra complicated simply as the necessity for effectivity has grow to be extra important. Consequently, what a newly employed or promoted golf supervisor does of their first 90 days is essential for setting requirements, staying aggressive and charting a path for achievement.

With that in thoughts, listed here are six key steps to soak up a golf supervisor’s first three months.

 

What does a golf supervisor do?

A golf supervisor, also called a common supervisor, is answerable for overseeing and offering day-to-day route of all features of a golf course and its amenities. This contains (however will not be restricted to):

• Golf operations
• Retail operations
• Golf course upkeep
• Customer support
• Gross sales and advertising
• Meals and beverage
• Accounting and budgeting
• Human assets

In a company of specialists, the golf supervisor is a generalist. Collaborating carefully with the heads of different departments (relying on the scale of the operation), make strategic choices that affect the complete golf course enterprise and be certain that operations run easily

With this in thoughts, let’s dive into key steps any golf supervisor ought to take to simplify operations, optimize income era, attain extra golfers and ship wonderful buyer experiences.

 

Take your tee sheet to process

As golf course companies evolve, one factor stays true: correct tee sheet administration is the lifeblood of daily-fee and semi-private golf programs. It sounds apparent, however tee occasions are probably the most essential revenue-driver for these amenities, so it’s important to have an efficient method to create, arrange, course of and analyze them.

Any new tenure as a golf supervisor ought to begin with an analysis of your present tee sheet’s workflows. Tee sheets constructed into modern, cloud-based golf course management software include a variety of options that ought to make day-to-day golf operations simpler, even within the face of rising complexity. For this reason it’s so essential to take an goal audit of your tee sheet’s options to grasp whether or not it’s assembly your facility’s wants.

Questions golf managers ought to ask about their tee sheet software program

1. How simple is it to make, take, regulate, cancel, block and refund tee occasions?
2. Is my tee sheet intuitive to navigate and simple to make use of?
3. Does it give me the data I would like, after I want it?
4. Can I arrange dynamic pricing for my tee occasions?
5. What stage of reporting and analytics do I’ve entry to?
6. Can I course of transactions from the tee sheet and does it sync with my POS?
7. Can I handle my tee sheet from anyplace or do I’ve to be within the professional store?
8. Does it seamlessly hook up with an internet reserving module?
9. Can it handle totally different play varieties, codecs and tee time intervals?
10. How do I handle tournaments and particular occasions?
11. Can I create and handle a buyer info database?
12. Does it take care of your members and assist totally different participant varieties?
13. Can I talk with workers and clients instantly from the tee sheet?
14. How simply can I add carts, promos, vary balls and reserving extras to orders?
15. Can I handle a number of tee sheets for a number of golf programs?
16. Are you able to entry 24/7 assist and detailed assets to unravel points?

Let’s take a look at a few of these options and think about their significance.

Dynamic pricing

Dynamic pricing is a pricing technique that makes use of automated pricing adjustments that reply in actual time to produce and demand. Tee sheet software program with built-in automated dynamic pricing can analyze tee sheet knowledge and make pricing changes based mostly on the recognition of sure occasions and the variety of days out sure rounds are booked. This type of automation dramatically reduces the period of time it takes to optimize pricing on a tee sheet.

On-line reserving

At this stage, providing a dependable on-line reserving module is desk stakes for daily-fee golf programs. Your tee sheet and on-line tee time reserving system ought to work seamlessly collectively, replace in actual time, assist you run promotions for sure occasions and permit golfers to e-book and pay on-line 24/7 from their cell gadget or desktop.

Customization

Your tee sheet software program ought to be versatile and designed to work in your facility’s distinctive operational wants. Whether or not you might want to handle occasions for a number of programs, run league and match play with totally different codecs, set totally different tee time intervals on sure days, or must run crossover tee occasions, your tee sheet ought to have intuitive workflows that may make it occur.

Members, clients and participant varieties

Your tee sheet software program ought to assist you create and cater to a number of participant varieties: members, visitors, bundle holders, default daily-fee gamers, juniors, seniors and extra:

• Guarantee you might have a robust member administration module that automates billing, permits customized reserving guidelines and that gives a member-facing dashboard.
• Are you able to provide versatile membership and bundle choices that cater to totally different golfers?
  You must have the ability to set totally different costs, promos and privileges for sure participant varieties and make it simple in your workers to use these settings on the tee sheet
• Your tee sheet ought to assist you create a buyer profile database, no matter participant sort, to hurry up cost, reserving and check-in

Processing transactions

Discover golf administration software program with a fully-embedded POS and tee sheet. This manner, these two generally disconnected items of software program/{hardware} work collectively, making processing tee time transactions seamless, whether or not the client is on-line or within the professional store. It additionally:

• Streamlines reporting and accounting
• Helps you join your tee sheet to your retail and restaurant POS, making it simple so as to add reserving extras at checkout
• Makes it simple to establish members and previous golfers when processing gross sales
• Makes checkout extra environment friendly by consolidating transactions

 

Benchmark professional store retail efficiency and set KPIs

As a golf supervisor, working the professional store is a mix of artwork and science. Generally you might want to go on intuition, generally you might want to take a look at the numbers. One other manner of claiming this? Assess your professional store retail operation from the client’s perspective and from the enterprise perspective.

From the client facet of issues, ask your self these 10 questions:

1. Am I maximizing my bodily structure?
2. Do I create a welcoming setting the place folks need to browse?
3. Do I’ve the fitting sort and number of merchandise?
4. The place does my eye go within the retailer? Are issues simple to seek out?
5. What’s the checkout expertise like?
6. Is my workers pleasant and educated concerning the merchandise available?
7. Are sale and promo gadgets on show and simple to seek out?
8. Am I offering a persistently wonderful, environment friendly buyer expertise?
9. Are generally bought upsell gadgets in the fitting place?
10. Do I’ve an ecommerce presence and is the timing proper to create one?

Digging into your professional store accounting and stock knowledge will assist you reply many of those questions extra precisely. However, objectively assessing your pro shop retail experience through instinct and observation is a necessary supplementary train.

Dive into the information to see the place you’re, and the place you might want to get to

No analysis of your retail enterprise is full with out trying on the numbers to grasp the place you’re in relation to professional store key efficiency indicators (KPIs). When you’ve established a benchmark for efficiency, you possibly can perceive the place to make optimizations. However which professional store retail KPIs do you have to think about?

Benchmarking your financials is essential and it goes with out saying that professional store retail is just one a part of the equation at a golf course. With so many various components of the enterprise answerable for revenues and liabilities, it’s important for a golf supervisor to work with powerful, flexible accounting software and a extremely competent crew.

1. Gross revenue margin and web revenue margin

Whereas gross sales are clearly nice to have, the true purpose folks open up a retailer is to earn earnings. Gross margin lets you know the way a lot revenue you’re making when shopping for and promoting stock with out together with working prices akin to wages, lease, or advertising. It’s usually expressed as a share.

In a fast instance, say a professional store offered $500,000 value of merchandise final season. The price of stocking that merchandise got here to $250,000. Gross revenue involves $250,000, leading to a gross margin of 0.5 or 50%.

Gross revenue solely tells a part of the story. When you consider working prices akin to wages, lease, professional store advertising initiatives, utilities, and many others, you find yourself with the web revenue margin.

When you consider working bills, say $210,000 on this instance, whole value balloon to $460,000. This leads to a web revenue margin of 8%.

It’s essential to keep in mind that the retail sector tends to have, on average, lower profit margins and is subjected to a lot of volatility. To place in perspective, Walmart is the biggest retailer on the planet and their revenue margin as of October 2023 was 2.55%, in accordance with Investopedia.

Professional outlets are usually smaller retail operations which can be typically seasonal in nature, have excessive bills, promote low margin merchandise and should compete towards bigger retailers who can usually undercut them in value. For this reason it’s important for golf managers to be environment friendly and run a good ship.

So begin with these high-level metrics and critically consider your margins. From there, you possibly can sort out the sensible problems with methods to enhance them: optimizing your stock, trimming working prices, bettering provider relationships, growing transaction sizes and extra.

2. Gross sales and margins by product class

After assessing revenues and earnings on the macro stage, it’s prudent for golf managers to evaluate efficiency on the product stage. Breaking down gross sales by class gives extra element in your whole gross sales figures for the 12 months. Are some classes performing higher than others? What about sure manufacturers?

• It’s essential to take a look at knowledge over an extended time period to make sure you can see altering traits
• Use the rule of ten when making a hierarchy in your merchandise: not more than ten departments, ten lessons or ten sub-classes
• Take the time to correctly arrange your merchandise hierarch
• With out the fitting merchandise classes in place, it will likely be tough to establish actionable info

3. Inventory flip

Inventory flip helps you assess how effectively you’re promoting by way of your stock over a set time period. Given its affect on money move, how typically you’re typically to show stock over is an important metric to trace. Inventory that strikes rapidly off your shelf helps you carry in additional, liberating up money and attractive clients to maintain coming again.

• Inventory Flip charges range relying on the kind of retailer you’re working. Giant low cost retailers turnover stock at a price of seven to eight.75 occasions a 12 months whereas luxurious retailers would possibly flip stock only one.5 occasions a 12 months
• Seasonal retailers, akin to attire and footwear, ought to intention for a flip price of as soon as per season (i.e. 4 occasions a 12 months)

Earlier than you calculate inventory flip, you will need to work out your common month-to-month stock to make sure outlier intervals don’t skew the information. Add up all the start inventories for the 12 months (at retail value), plus your ending stock (at retail value), and divide it by 13.

Now you possibly can calculate inventory flip:

4. Gross Margin Return on Funding (GMROI)

It’s a mouthful, however GMROI is an important metric in your professional store. It tells you the way exhausting your stock is working that will help you earn earnings. GMROI is a key metric to guard money move. Many retailers defend their margins, which is essential.

However bear in mind which you could dwell for some time with out earnings. You can not dwell with out money move.

A low GMROI tells you a product is both shifting too slowly, has inadequate margin, or each. A great GMROI, calculated on an annual foundation, is over 2 or 200%.

First, calculate the Common Price of Items by including up the start month-to-month inventories for the 12 months at value, and divide by 12. You may then use the next components:

5. Gross sales per worker

Monitoring gross sales per worker helps staff perceive what is predicted of and set affordable requirements within the professional store. Issues to bear in mind:

1. Some shifts are busier than others. Be sure you examine apples to apples
2. Each professional store is totally different. When setting benchmarks, use your individual retailer historical past
3. For brand new shops, strive asking comparable retailers that you already know or your native financial institution or credit score union for benchmarks. Be sure you examine your self to shops with comparable merchandise, sq. footage, and foot site visitors
4. Half-timers virtually all the time common greater than full-time staff as they don’t spend as a lot time on non-sales actions, and are often scheduled throughout the busiest intervals

GET A FULL LIST OF KEY PRO SHOP KPIs IN THIS FREE GUIDE

Get retail POS software program that may assist you monitor these metrics

Simply because the tee sheet is the lifeblood of your golf operations, a golf retail POS with built-in reporting and analytics is essential to your retail operations. It does a golf supervisor no good to make use of outdated, fragmented know-how within the professional store.

As of late, profitable commerce comes right down to having readily-accessible knowledge and analytics on-hand that you should use to make optimizations and changes in actual time. Merely put: you might want to have the fitting learn in your retail operations to remain aggressive, keep environment friendly and keep strategic.

 

Consider your POS and stock system

The metrics above will assist you perceive a few of the key efficiency indicators relating to your POS and stock, however how do you have to really handle and optimize it? How are you going to make your complete retail operation intuitive and environment friendly on the again finish?

Questions a golf supervisor ought to ask a couple of POS and stock system:

1. Does my POS software program seamlessly combine with my tee sheet?
2. Can I search, view, add to and regulate buyer knowledge in a centralized database related to my tee sheet?
3. How simple is it to create new gross sales? Can I add gadgets, regulate and apply reductions simply?
4. Does my POS robotically hook up with my present home accounts?
5. Is it simple to take funds rapidly with a wide range of cost choices?
6. Can I create particular orders, layaways, work orders and refunds effectively?
7. How simple is it to carry out searches of my stock database and get granular?
8. Does gross sales and stock knowledge seamlessly move between my bodily professional store and on-line retailer?
9. Does gross sales and stock knowledge seamless move throughout all golf course areas (MCOs)
10. How detailed are my product pages? Can I see gross sales historical past, pictures, pricing data, SKUs, and many others?
11. Can I create computerized reorder factors for all of my merchandise?
12. How simple is it to create, handle and reconcile buy orders and add gadgets to stock?
13. Does my POS and stock system assist me effectively conduct stock counts?
14. Can I create pricing matrixes for various fashions, colours, sizes of the identical product?
15. What number of fundamental and superior stock studies does my system generate?
16. Can I entry a wide range of roll-up studies to grasp gross sales efficiency?
17. Can I see grouped gross sales studies and studies for various product classes?
18. Does my POS software program seamlessly combine with accounting software program like Quickbooks?

Pace, versatility and adaptability are key within the professional store

Many golf programs are fully-staffed amenities with specialised groups devoted to accounting, retail operations, stock, and many others. That mentioned, it’s additionally true that golf managers are sometimes compelled to put on many various hats. For this reason leveraging the fitting retail POS software program is so important:

From managing stock and accounting to gross sales, customer support and member administration, golf managers want software program that helps them simplify operations, carry out a variety of various duties and save time as they attempt to handle a slew of various tasks.

 

Golf managers ought to assess advertising efforts and look forward

It’s a courageous new world for golf course advertising: the sport has exploded in recognition amongst youthful generations, digital advertising is now desk stakes and the necessity to diversify your advertising spend has by no means been extra essential. It’s time to get inventive, refine your efforts and put your course on the market in a daring manner.

Evaluating previous and ongoing advertising is a crucial start line for brand new golf managers. Supplied you might have technique of monitoring and analyzing your return on funding, dig into:

• Whether or not or not your course has an outlined advertising or model technique
• Present advertising finances
• Finances allocation: what channels and initiatives are you investing in?
• The place are you seeing the very best and worst return on funding?
• The efficiency of particular campaigns and promotions
• Are you leveraging buyer knowledge for the needs of focused advertising?
• What’s the state of your on-line presence and are you arrange for efficient digital advertising
• What instruments do you utilize to arrange and execute in your advertising technique

When you’ve taken inventory, you possibly can sit up for the way you need to execute with the crew you might have or with a third-party. Listed below are some key advertising concerns to think about.

How a lot of a golf course finances ought to be spent on advertising?

A report from 2022 means that B2C service corporations ought to spend round 12% of their whole finances on advertising, with simply over half of that going to digital channels. In fact, this could and may fluctuate based mostly on quite a lot of elements particular to your golf course.

Key to your budgeting and planning is knowing your objectives for the 12 months and getting particular. Extra members? Extra social media engagement? Drive extra income within the restaurant/professional store? Extra repeat clients? Scale back buyer acquisition prices?

These are nice beginning factors, nevertheless it’s essential to assign actual metrics to those objectives so you might have one thing to trace. One other key level for golf managers to grasp is the place your objectives match within the advertising funnel:

• Consciousness: Ways to try to make golfers conscious of your golf course
• Consideration: Ways to generate extra curiosity and engagement together with your course and its providers
• Conversion: Ways to drive golfers to take motion and e-book
• Maintain: Ways designed to show one-time golfers into loyal, repeat clients

Every stage of this funnel requires consideration, funding and distinctive advertising methods. As you construct out your advertising plan, allocate time to every of those funnel levels and make sure the techniques for every work collectively to push golfers down the funnel.

Prioritize digital advertising channels

Digital advertising is one thing no golf supervisor can ignore. E mail advertising, paid social media advertising, natural social media advertising, search advertising—these have grow to be important channels for each enterprise providing any service and golf programs are definitely no exception:

Along with with the ability to precisely monitor and optimize a variety of metrics figuring out ROI, digital advertising is extremely essential on account of effectiveness at guiding clients down the funnel. Person knowledge monitoring makes it far simpler for golf programs and different companies to focus on audiences with the fitting messaging, on the proper time with a lot larger specificity than is feasible in conventional promoting.

Refine your course’s model identification (if you might want to)

Conceiving and sticking to a definite model identification is crucial for golf course companies. Basically, good branding comes right down to:

• Understanding your small business and your facility
• Establishing a character, feel and look that seize and convey your course as clearly and successfully as attainable
• Being constant in the usage of this signifiers in all of your advertising supplies

From course colours, logos and picture styling to how your course is portrayed in images, movies, web site copy and advert copy, understanding the way you need your facility to return throughout and sustaining consistency is essential is establishing a novel model.

Spend money on golf software program with advertising performance

Golf managers typically aren’t capable of dedicate a lot time to advertising duties on account of a backlog of day-to-day operations. The fitting golf software program ought to assist in each of those areas: not solely ought to it provide the instruments you might want to run efficient digital campaigns, it would additionally assist simplify each day operations to the purpose the place you possibly can deal with progress initiatives.

Three kinds of advertising performance to search for:

1. E mail Advertising
2. SMS Advertising
3. Social Media Advertising

With these advertising instruments, you possibly can instantly talk together with your clients. This will embrace messaging about offers/promotions, course info, information, climate updates, upcoming occasions and extra.

Discover digital advertising specialists you possibly can belief

Executing on a digital advertising plan takes time, effort, coordination and strategic pondering to get proper. And whereas the web advertising area has by no means been extra user-friendly to navigate, the necessity for a robust ROI on digital generally requires added help.

The fitting crew of digital advertising specialists will help you get probably the most out of the advertising instruments hooked up to your new golf course administration software program. That is very true for a crew that’s aware of the golf advertising software program you utilize and will help you navigate it:

• Devoted providers: Multi-channel planning, dedicated execution, detailed evaluation
• Information-driven recommendation: Get extra out of your software program and make smarter choices with in-depth reporting, dashboards and insights
• Enhanced on-line presence: From a customized web site and app to focused campaigns, attain golfers at any time when, wherever with messaging that resonates
• A complete strategy: Get outcomes the place they matter: Google, Meta, e mail advertising, web site, cell app, golf suite maximization and extra

 

A golf supervisor should overview memberships and loyalty packages

Buying new clients is 5 occasions costlier than holding an present buyer. So to maintain prices down and drive extra top-line income, holding your present clients glad ought to be a serious precedence. For golf managers, this implies your membership base, subscribers, bundle holders and repeat clients.

Member administration

Taking inventory of your system for managing memberships comes down to 1 query: Does my present system assist me preserve issues organized on the again finish and my members glad on the entrance finish?

The fitting golf software program will prioritize membership administration and assist you simplify issues in your most loyal clients. From consolidating funds between the professional store or restaurant to serving to you handle home accounts, talk with members and robotically renew memberships, it’s important to discover a platform with a variety of capabilities and that gives:

• Automated processes
• Consolidated studies
• Seamless home accounts device
• Straightforward to grasp, automated subscriptions
• A world-class member expertise

Loyalty packages

Whether or not you don’t but have a loyalty program in place otherwise you’re trying to re-tool it, think about the next.

Begin a V.I.P. program: On this system, golfers who spend a specific amount at your course or play a set variety of rounds get entry to sure perks that different clients don’t, akin to bonus rounds, free vary entry, clubhouse, professional store or restaurant perks and/or early entry to tee occasions. The most effective half about this technique is that you simply’re build up your model as a substitute of merely giving issues away.

Level rewards program: Factors are given out in trade for purchases. These incentive packages are so efficient as a result of they’re simple to speak. Loyalty packages do an incredible job of retaining your present golfers, as individuals are prone to preserve returning to your small business to maintain racking up factors, as a substitute of making an attempt out a competing course.

Use software program to maintain issues easy: Loyalty software program will assist you goal your advertising based mostly on particular actions that clients take. You may ship out totally different provides relying on if a buyer buys a sure product, brings a buddy to your course, or offers a referral to a different golfer. Tailoring your advertising based mostly on habits will result in a lot larger engagement charges.

 

Take inventory of your golf meals and beverage operation

Whether or not your course operates a bar or restaurant, a midway home, on-course cart service or all the above, full a full overview of your operations to make sure you’re providing the very best service attainable whereas sustaining sustainable funds.

Keep in mind: The sort of F&B service you provide issues lower than the high quality of that service. Some golf programs will do higher if they provide tremendous eating, others will fare higher with an informal bar-style restaurant and a few will do finest with quick-serve, grab-and-go choices. The choices you select ought to depend upon what your goal clients are searching for once they play your course.

• Discover a stability between manufacturing pace, meals prices and high quality
• Workers appropriately, prioritize meals security and be lifelike with menu decisions
• Maintain your F&B menu up to date with picks your clients care about
• Do your analysis, survey golfers and take heed to workers to study how one can enhance service

Key restaurant KPIs to bear in mind

Listed below are some restaurant-specific KPIs you need to monitor to benchmark efficiency and discover alternatives to enhance monetary efficiency.

1. Meals value share

Meals value share represents the portion of whole gross sales income spent on meals substances. In the event you’re trying to assess the cost-effectiveness of your menu gadgets and preserve your pricing technique in test, it is a key metric to observe.

2. Money move

Money move is the web amount of money and cash-equivalents shifting out and in of your restaurant enterprise. This restaurant KPI is essential for assessing your operation’s total monetary well being. Basically, it’s a take a look at cash in versus cash out.

3. Common test dimension

Also called common ticket dimension, the typical test dimension measures the typical quantity spent by clients on every transaction at your institution. This restaurant metric gives perception into buyer spending habits and menu pricing effectiveness. By analyzing and optimizing the typical test dimension, you possibly can strategically implement upselling or cross-selling strategies to drive extra income per buyer.

FOR MORE KEY RESTAURANT KPIs CLICK HERE

Choosing the proper restaurant POS in your facility

Lengthy gone are the times of taking orders with pen and paper, and damaged traces of communication between the service workers and the kitchen. Upgrading your restaurant POS will assist you pace up service, keep extra organized, flip extra tables and be certain that golfers go away glad. What ought to this POS system have the ability to do?

• Cost payments to accommodate accounts
• Create optimized ground plans
• Take orders and ship them on to the kitchen
• Use a self-ordering system within the type of a kiosk
• Comply with gamers from the course to the restaurant with a tee sheet to POS integration

The primary perform is very essential in case your course requires foods and drinks minimums. By charging the home accounts, you possibly can simply pull up studies for any visitor enquiring after their working totals.

 

A golf supervisor has quite a bit on their plate, so lean on nice software program and nice groups

Golf programs are giant, complicated companies that require stable technique and execution throughout a wide range of departments (and we didn’t even dive into golf course upkeep and operations).

Whereas many golf managers could have giant groups who’re answerable for the day-to-day execution of the duties listed above, many don’t. And regardless, it is a demanding place that calls for group, management, multi-tasking and sound enterprise judgment. With the intention to excel on this position within the first 90 days and past, golf managers should leverage the fitting instruments and the fitting personnel.

Working with the fitting know-how companion is vital that will help you study, strategize and execute. At Lightspeed, we’re dedicated to serving formidable golf programs who need to succeed and thrive—now and sooner or later. Speak to one of our experts today to study extra about how Lightspeed will help you stage up your golf facility.