Have you noticed a lot of strange-looking black-and-white images popping up in restaurants and shops lately? What you are seeing is called a QR-Code and golf courses can use this technology to promote your marketing efforts and engage with your customers with images or videos.
During the Covid-19 pandemic, QR codes saw a resurgence and are being used now more than ever to promote digital experiences and reduce printed items like brochures and menus. Moving away from printed materials creates new ways to connect to your consumers on your website and track the success of your marketing efforts easily.
What is a QR Code?
QR is short for Quick Response. They are square-shaped black-and-white symbols that can be scanned by cell phones to learn more about a product or service. QR Codes have been around for over 10 years. When they debuted, most people did not know what to do with them and didn’t have a scanning app on their phones to use them. Now, most modern cell phones have scanning built-in so using a QR Code is simple and easy for you and your customers.
One QR Code, Many Options
QR Codes are versatile. Opening a website is only one of the many applications for QR Codes. Test any of the codes yourself using your phone.
URL QR Codes
The vast majority of QR Codes include a URL and link to a website. This could be your home page or your tee time booking page. Users scan the QR Code and are redirected to any page on the web you want to promote. URL QR Codes are ideal for print marketing materials because users can open your link without the hassle of typing it themselves.
URL QR Code Golf Course Marketing Ideas:
vCard QR Codes
A vCard is also known as a “virtual contact card” and is used to share contact details on mobile devices. The vCard QR Code stores basic information such as your course name, address info, phone numbers, and your website URL. Quickly share a “virtual business card” with your contact details that will quickly find their way into the address book of your customers – without the hassle of typing.
vCard QR Code Golf Course Marketing Ideas:
Social Media QR Codes
A Facebook, Twitter, or YouTube QR Code connects to your social media profiles and summarizes your business with a clear and mobile-friendly page. Social Media QR Codes are perfect for connecting print marketing materials with your social media pages with just a quick QR Code scan.
Social Media QR Code Golf Course Marketing Ideas:
SMS QR Codes
SMS stands for ‘short message service’ and is used for text messaging between mobile devices. SMS QR Codes can send an SMS to a target phone number with a pre-filled text message already generated. Customers can send you feedback or suggestions to your golf course easily with just a scan.
SMS QR Code Golf Course Marketing Ideas:
Dynamic vs Static Codes
When creating a QR Code, you have a choice to create a static or dynamic code. Static codes are created and can never be updated. They are free and can be created on any number of QR Code generation sites. If you want to track clicks and conversions, you can do that by adding campaign tracking to your URLs before you create the code. You will need to have Google Analytics installed on your site first though.
A dynamic code is generated once and can be updated over time. This saves you time and money. You can adjust your links while they are running without having to reprint the codes themselves. Dynamic codes also provide in-depth reporting on how many codes were scanned and by what devices. Dynamic codes are not free and come with a subscription to the code generation site you choose.
QR Code Generators
Many sites can generate a free static QR code. Most offer monthly plans that will get you better reporting and dynamic code capabilities. Prices range from a few dollars a month to over $30 if you need more capabilities. Most offer free trials as well. Here are a few to review:
How Sagacity Golf is using QR Codes to grow revenue for our courses
When a golf course launches with our dynamic pricing solution, we provide a detailed marketing kit customized to the course with graphics and copy to get their program running and creating value immediately.
Here are a few examples of cart and shop signs that we use to promote the courses’ daily deals program.
Each QR Code has tracking so we can report back on clicks and tee time bookings coming from the QR Code. This tracking is part of the marketing support we provide to our golf course partners.
Ready to unlock revenue at your course? Reach out and contact us or get a demo.
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