Discovering email marketing is like finding out you won your flight in a golf tournament — and got an invitation to the Masters because of it! Not only would it have any golfer beaming with pride, it’s news they’d want to share with their golf buddies, family, neighbors, and even the grocery clerk. Email marketing simplifies club communication in a way that’s engaging, effective, and budget friendly. If you’re not all in with email, you’re missing out big time.

 

1. Email spurs your members to act
​Email is a powerful tool deliver a message that incites action. You can include a lot of great information (member spotlights, past event photos, and the like), but don’t forget to include clickable calls to action so your members can actually do something with the info you’re providing. Here are some topics you might include in your club newsletter coupled with an appropriate call to action and link.

 

Topic Call to Action Link
Club Event Registration Register Now RSVP for event online
Membership Renewal Renew Today!

Online membership payment form
Stay Connected Follow us on Social Media

Golf Club Social Media Accounts

 

 

2. Significant cost savings to your club
Say goodbye to printing and postage costs or paying for your email marketing tool each month. The NCGA has subsidized the cost of 10,000 emails for your club each month! Instead of printing out your monthly newsletter, why not send an email newsletter that can cover a range of topics? No funds are needed for postage, paper, ink or other print materials. Some clubs pay an extra fee each month for a service that allows them to send member emails, but – here’s a kicker – member emailing is already included for FREE in your memberplanet account! Spend your budget on more important things.

 

3. Track and measure your messages
Another huge benefit of email marketing is the tracking capabilities. Lucky for you, this feature, which can be quite pricey with other email providers, is free with your memberplanet account. We recommend tracking these key metrics:

Open rate
An open rate lets you know how many people are, well, opening your email. Test out different subject lines to see how they affect your open rates.

Click rate
Tracking this number is a great indicator of whether the content you send your members resonates with them. To calculate click rate, take the number of clicks (one per email, even if you have multiple calls to action), divide that by the number of email opens, and multiply that by 100. Example: If 10 people opened your email, and 1 out of 10 clicked a link within it, you’d divide 1 by 10, then multiply the answer by 100. Your click rate is 10%.

Bounces
Bounced emails could be the result of invalid email addresses. If you know which emails aren’t working, you can remove them from your email list (so they don’t keep inflating your bounce rate), use alternate email addresses if your members have provided them, or ask your members to update their profile information by sending a group text using their number on file.
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Once you have an idea of these three metrics for the emails you’re sending, you can further target your message to your specific audience. memberplanet provides open rate, clicks, and bounces – great email marketing tools at your disposal so you can measure how effective your messages are. To further target your emails to recipients based on the data collected on the platform (member levels, event RSVP, donation level, etc.), check out the Smart List feature.

Log in and take advantage of the email tools at your fingertips! Not sure where to start? Check out the Communication Page on the NCGA Success Site, your one-stop shop for all thing Nmemberplanet. We even have a video tutorials to take you through the process step by step!