[Steve Okula]

This was posted on the GCSAA web-site forum. It confirms my suspicions.

Golf Digest "Best Customer" Research
Golfer Enjoyment Equates to Golfer Retention
 
GCSAA CEO Steve Mona discusses the implications of the Golf Digest Best Customer Research in his January 2006 CEO's Message.
 
While the apocalypse of Y2K did not happen to anywhere near the extent the doomsayers had predicted, the turn of the century did signify a downturn in the participation rate of golfers.

Since then, rounds played on a nationwide basis have decreased. As a response, the golf industry developed numerous programs to attract more people to the game and to keep them coming back. The early indication is those programs are having a positive impact. But a recent survey from Golf Digest indicates golf facilities might want to reconsider how they invest their resources to retain golfers.

According to the Golf Digest survey of core golfers (8 – 24 rounds played/year) and avid golfers (25 or more rounds played/year), the top factor in driving golfer satisfaction is not necessarily how one plays, but where one plays. Using a 7-point scale (with 7 being most important and 1 being the least important), golfers were asked to rate a battery of factors that led to their enjoyment and satisfaction. The highest rated factor was well-maintained greens and bunkers (6.34), followed by well-maintained fairways and tees.

The survey also revealed that enjoyment is more about conditioning than challenge. Golfers indicated by a nearly 9 to 1 ratio (88% to 12%) that they would prefer to play a course that is in very good condition, but not as challenging as opposed to a course that is in not good condition, but is very challenging.

But are golfers willing to put their money where their collective mouths are? Apparently they are. By a more than 2 to 1 margin (74% to 39%), core and avid golfers responded that they would pay 25 percent more in green fees for a “better conditioned golf course” over a “better designed course layout.”

What does this mean for facility owners, operators and others in the business of golf? It tells us that if customer satisfaction is a desired goal, then investing resources in enhancing course conditions and paying heed to the expertise of the golf course superintendent is the right choice.

Drivers of Golfer Enjoyment:
Conditions, People & Performance
  Total
Mean Score (1-7 Scale)  Best Customers  
Well maintained greens & bunkers
 6.34
 
Well maintained fairways & tees
 6.28
 
The people you play with
 6.24
 
Playing well on the course
 5.84
 
Availability of practice facilities
 5.68
 
Beautiful surroundings and scenery
 5.74
 
Scoring well
 5.65
 
Challenging course
 5.65
 
Fast pace of play
 5.39
 
Knowledgeable marshals and starters
 5.38
 

[Kelly Blake Moran]

Who was the survey designed and administered by:

"This was posted on the GCSAA web-site forum. It confirms my suspicions.

Golf Digest "Best Customer" Research
Golfer Enjoyment Equates to Golfer Retention
 
GCSAA CEO Steve Mona discusses the implications of the Golf Digest Best Customer Research in his January 2006 CEO's Message."

Based upon this I am assuming the GCSAA had some input with Golf Digest in the design of the survey.  Just guessing though.

So what did a survey possibly designed and administered by the GCSAA conclude:

"What does this mean for facility owners, operators and others in the business of golf? It tells us that if customer satisfaction is a desired goal, then investing resources in enhancing course conditions and paying heed to the expertise of the golf course superintendent is the right choice."

Wow, surprising.  This survey is probably half bogus.  I plan to conduct my own survey but first I need to articulate the results I want to get from it before I design the questions.  Do these people think we are that fucking stupid?

[Don_Mahaffey]

Kelly,
It was a survey by Golf Digest.
Could you share your inside information that shows gcsaa designed and administered the survey.

If the results had favored design does that mean the architects assoc. must have designed the survey?

I've seen a number of surveys like this through the years...NGF...crittiden (sp)...CMAA...all had conditioning at the top,or close to it. I believe in the NGF survey price was 1st followed by conditioning.

[Kelly Blake Moran]

Don,

No inside information at all, I said I was assuming.  You may very well be right but I am not just accepting this at face value.  Hyatt Hotels did a survey several years back and a challenging course was the top of the list.  These were CEOs that they surveyed.  So a poll can give somewhat skewed information depending on how it is designed.  Most surveys I have seen golfers were concerned for price and that does not show up in the survey.  The reason for some of my suspisions is because of the way the conclusion was written, it almost sounded like the GCSAA wrote it, and the president of the GCSAA apparently featured it in his CEO message, so that is why I made that connection.  Had it favored design and the president of the ASGCA featured it in his CEO speech I think I would have raised the same questions.  

[Stu Grant]

I'm surprised that pace of play wasn't more a highly rated concern versus other categories (especially versus something trivial like whether the starter is knowledgable, given that you only see the starter for about 5-10 minutes in total).  

Or perhaps that is the sad reality...that most golfers don't care if a round takes over four-and-a-half hours?

[Doug Siebert]

That rating scale of 1-7 makes me think they actually asked them to rate via words (most important, somewhat important, not very important, that kind of thing) and later translated them into numbers.  No one would ask a question and ask people to answer it on a numeric scale of 1-7!

Additionally, it seems like there isn't much of a gap between the most and least important items.  Even the least important items were almost closer to a perfect 7 than an average 4, so it sounds like they weren't willing to concede anything is even remotely close to being UNimportant.

I also find it interesting they didn't mention price, which will surely go up to keep this very demanding group of golfers happy.

I would have preferred to see a survey where they list various factors and ask them to perhaps choose the three most important and rank them.  They could have done some regression analysis on it and found that people who think conditioning is important never think price is important, or people who think pace of play is important also think knowledgeable starters and marshals are important, etc.

[A_Clay_Man]

Isn't it a given that the general public knows as much about conditionong as they do design?

[Dave Bourgeois]

Isn't it a given that the general public knows as much about conditioning as they do design?

It’s been talked about here often enough that most equate lush, green, and manicured with good.  Also, the average golfer may find design that we might cherish, such as well contoured greens, as "tricked up". Furthermore, I don't think the average golfer really looks at design as anything more than ascetics, or at least they may not be able to articulate what makes a hole or course good.  This is my own opinion from my experiences playing with folks out and around.

I would love to see a spread of handicaps and age along with the # of rounds played as well.  I would tend to believe the results based on my own assumptions, but with surveys it’s tough to cover all of the bases.

[Pat Jones]

In case you're interested, here's the URL for the full study presentation.  

http://www.gcsaa.org/news/special/golfdigestavidgolferresearch.asp

This is actually kind of old news...came of of the Golf 20/20 meeting a couple of months ago.  

By the way, the suggestion that Digest or anyone else "skewed" the results of this survey to make GCSAA happy practically made me crap my pants laughing.  Great organization, wonderful people but, to put it very crudely, Golf Digest (or the networks, or the Tour) wouldn't bother to piss on GCSAA if they were on fire.

These kind of results are nothing new.  Virtually every golfer satisfaction study done in the past couple of decades indicates that "conditioning quality for the dollar" (or some variation on that idea) ranks first among golfer expectations.

In short, the average player wants Dom Perignon conditions for the price of a bottle of Mad Dog.  No different than any other consumer.

With all due respect, you guys are like the children in Garrison Keillor's Lake Wobegon: all above average.  For example, I'll bet that nearly everyone who reads this has a relatively current USGA handicap well under 20.  But, only a small percentage (way less than 10 percent, I think) of all 25 million mythical "players" are even registered on GHIN.  And, even among those few serious players who carry a card, the average handicap is around 24 or 25.  Bottom line: the huge majority of "golfers" are Joe and Susie Sixpack types who occasionally plunk down $12 to play nine holes are orgasmic if they break 50.

The moral of the story is...well, there isn't one.  I just felt like being Mr. Reality Check this morning.

Yours from relatively balmy Cleveland...

Pat

   

[Rob_Waldron]

The results of the survey were presented at the 20/20 confererence last fall.

The Golf Digest has accumulated a large group of golf enthusiasts via their website. I signed up several years ago. Occasionally they do surveys. Unknown to me I participated in this survey. My understanding is that there were approximatley 15,000 participants.

 

[Garland Bayley]

The results of the survey were presented at the 20/20 confererence last fall.

The Golf Digest has accumulated a large group of golf enthusiasts via their website. I signed up several years ago. Occasionally they do surveys. Unknown to me I participated in this survey. My understanding is that there were approximatley 15,000 participants.

Not hardly a scientific survey then.

[W.H. Cosgrove]

Rob please share how you participated without knowing it?  

And we worry about the NSA!

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