The Pellucid Perspective - June 2016 - (Page 7)

GOLF PERFORMANCE BENCHMARKING Benchmarking key to industry progress, but needs more components By Stuart Lindsay I n April, we published NGCOA Executive Director Jay Kar- and no real insight to be gained. Without real insight, the golf en's call to benchmarking action in order to replace the PGA's industry will continue to flounder in a sea of guesswork on marPerformanceTrak efforts that stopped at the end of 2015. In keting, pricing, demand and a host of other issues. May, we talked about some of the ingredients of rounds and revOne of the main problems with benchmarking is that it forces enue that need to be exported into a new benchmarking process. a golf course to face the reality of its comparative performance Since then, Jay has invited 12 leading Tee Sheet and POS - nobody wants to be in the bottom half of their class. Consevendors to a meeting to discuss how to create a new benchmark- quently, it is generally the stronger performers that comprise the ing initiative. We have also proceeded with our efforts to further reporting base. Again, a well designed system should reveal that. our capabilities to deliver our weather capacity data and popuIt's a little like going to the doctor - you have a 50% chance late a template with rounds and revenue data inputs. We have that your doctor graduated in the bottom half of his or her med also sought out and gotten some input from a notable firm that school class. Fortunately, most of us realize how hard it was to delivers well regarded benchmarking services in another related get into med school in the first place and most doctors are good industry. enough that we don't notice or care. Last month, we pointed out the need for a "standard export" Harvard students have the same problem. Just to make sure format from the technology vendors. In addition, there are some we understand how smart Harvard students generally are, the adother hurdles in terms of local price ministration sees that about 85% segmentation and the need to "balof Harvard students earn various ance" the sample size by course departmental honors - including Participation is type. One of the reasons the Perat least 35% of those who graduate formanceTrak system broke down in the bottom half of their class. really the key ingredient was not only dwindling participaThe need for good benchmark- without a representative tion, but that the reporting courses ing is critical. If I'm an owner, I were not "balanced" by either gewant to know if my management number of reporting ography or course type - e.g. they is performing and/or that my courses, there is nothing to had a much higher percentage of market is really significantly overprivate courses reporting than the supplied or had unusual weather. balance and no 27% of private courses in the US. If I'm a management company, real insight to be This resulted in "rounds played esI want to evaluate my individual timates" that were about 20% bemanagers against both their regained. low those estimated by Datatech, spective markets and their relative NGF and Pellucid. performance within the company We would also point out that the valuable benchmarking sur- portfolio. If I'm a manager, I want to have the ammunition to veys conducted by the GCSAA on course profitability also suffer support my results. from both poor participation and data that is over-weighted by Even more beneficial is the creation of a comparative perprivate course respondents. It's clear that any benchmarking ini- formance resource that will help evaluate the success of changes tiative will have to address both participation and methodology made in marketing, pricing, conditioning and all the other manato be a more successful and informative replacement for Perfor- gerial decisions we make to try and improve course performance. manceTrak. In the end, a well designed benchmarking system will be the best The good news is that course segmentation by geography, barometer of how well we improved our ability to provide a good price and type is readily available. We have it on both the Pel- value experience to our golfers. lucid Golf Local Market Analyzer and through our access to the The creation of a good benchmarking system is going to be new IGDB database. In the past, we have also licensed the NGF complex and require participation from the technology providers Golf Course Directory and been able to enhance it for our pur- and golf course owners and managers alike. The art of making poses. It's not easy to "balance" based on DMA, weather region the input simple and the output easy to understand is critical. or degree of difficulty, but it is being done and can be adapted to To paraphrase the comment of a benchmarking expert in one a benchmarking initiative. of our recent meetings, "The essence of what we do is make the Participation is really the key ingredient - without a represen- complexity of our analytics invisible to the participants, but still tative number of reporting courses, there is nothing to balance deliver accurate and meaningful insights to them." n www.PellucidCorp.com The Pellucid PersPecTive 7 http://www.PellucidcorP.com

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of The Pellucid Perspective - June 2016

TOC
Fair warning to clubs and courses on classifying workers
This SNAG is growing the game, not distracting it
Benchmarking key to industry progress, but needs more components
PGA TOUR leapfrogs golf industry in applying analysis to improve performance
May golf weather impact: Flat nationally; April utilization gains
Minneapolis high on golfers, even higher on courses
Cracking the code on Millennials

The Pellucid Perspective - June 2016