In many ways it’s the “same old things”: at a ‘shotgun start’ event everyone tees off at the same time, so that means that everyone is arriving at the course at the same time and there is a level of confusion for the players and a high degree of stress for the organizers.

At check-in, players want to know where their cart is, which hole they’re starting on, rules, and scoring format questions … and they all want this information at the same time!

After the round finished, and while dinner is being served, the organizers are often looking for players to return their scorecards so that they can complete the scoring and have prize presentations ready.  The players are always interested in where they finished … and where their buddies finished too.

Today, often the solution involves “downloading an app”.  But there’s resistance to that because it often means installing something that only gets used once (and then requires updates for years), requires registration, requires learning a new interface; all of these are “frictions” that detract from a positive customer experience.

Pulse Retail Systems (PRS) supplied its SMS/Pro technology, associated strategic consulting, and management of a solution that fulfilled the requirements identified for the event.

There was no ‘app’ required because SMS/text is native to all smartphones, and because it’s the most-used feature on a smartphone, people already know how to use it.

Self-Service
When they checked in, they received a response that would direct them to the next step; directions for cart assignments and rules/format/prize holes.  As an automatic part of this process, it registered their mobile # into a broadcast group so that the organizers could send informational texts to everyone simultaneously.

Also, a few other auto-responses were set up to allow them to download the day’s schedule, see prizes and sponsors, and find out about food and beverage facilities.

Faster Results
A typical problem at golf tournaments is that teams or players forget to submit their scorecards when they finish.  This means that organizers spend unnecessary time and effort finding people.  All that the organizers needed to do was to identify which team was missing and then send a text message to them.  Statistics tell us that almost 100% of people will read a message within 3 minutes, so the problem was solved because players read the message and returned their scorecard. Because organizers aren’t chasing people, it allows them to be able to produce results more quickly.

A Positive Player Experience
The results can be sent via a text broadcast to the entire group.  Players appreciated knowing where they finished and seeing the results of others. We received strong affirmation from the players; they were appreciative that the technology made it easier and faster for them to check-in and get appropriate information as was required.

Feedback
At the end of the event, a request for a short feedback survey was broadcast to the group. Participation far exceeded that of a paper-based survey (or an email/URL link survey) because it was easy and required very little effort.  We had the results of the survey back to the organizers before they left the event that day!

When you compare that to a paper model, it provided results that far exceed expectations.  With a paper-based survey:

• there are printing costs
• errors or adjustments to the survey cannot be accomplished without reprinting (and certainly cannot be accommodated quickly)
• results need to be transcribed (data entry) and then analyzed, so results aren’t available in a timely manner
• participation is poor in most cases because it requires a bit more time and effort

Even with a web-based survey, the participation rate is less because people need to initiate it on their own … and that becomes a barrier. In this case, the survey was automatically sent to each attendee: they didn’t need to do anything to initiate it.

Anything that helps speed up check-in at a golf tournament is welcomed by both players and organizers.  For a player, that frees up time to be able to warm up, practice putting, or greet other players. For an organizer, efficiency means reduced costs, faster results, and a more professional profile … in short, it made the organizing team LOOK GOOD.   The organizers had peace of mind because of Pulse Retail’s knowledge, experience, and competence.

It proved to the organizers that SMS-based technologies were an accepted (and even preferred) method of communication.  Today, organizations are developing mobile apps in effort to be technologically current, but many people are experiencing application fatigue and view an application installation as another unwanted friction.  SMS is a native app on a mobile device, so no additional app installations are required; this makes it effective and accepted while remaining relevant.