• Kedron Wavell Services Club
• Tewantin-Noosa RSL
• Southport Yacht Club
• Royal Prince Alfred Yacht Club
• Sandringham Yacht Club
• Sanctuary Cove Golf Club

While these clubs serve very different membership needs, they were all looking for a solution to help them improve operational efficiencies and enhance revenue.  Micropower was able to provide that solution and we look forward to continuing to be the complete software system provider for clubs.

We have also upgraded Marina Focus Marina Management System (MMS) to SQL server.  This was done as part of Micropower’s policy of continually updating our products and providing Marinas and Yacht Clubs with “Solutions for Life”.  This upgrade puts Marina Focus MMS on a solid database management platform providing peace of mind that data is being stored in a secure, stable environment.

An added feature to our Marina Focus products is the ability to email invoices and statements to anyone in your database.  The system comes with a number of predefined email templates that you can customise to suit your business.  This enhancement will make marina operations even more stream-lined and efficient.

Feel free to contact us if you have any questions or for more information about these products.

i) Set up a way to track website traffic and statistics.  The easiest way is to use Google analytics and, best of all, it’s free.  If you have a Micropower Club Space website, your website is already set up to track this data (for more information about this process, log into the Customer Service Centre and search for “Google analytics”).  If not, check with your website provider.  Once you are set up, the sky’s the limit.  To start with, you’ll probably want to focus on how much traffic you are getting and where it is coming from.  Traffic analysis is the cornerstone upon which to manage all of your marketing efforts.  The Google Analytics page has a lot of reports that are pre-populated but you can easily customise these to suit your requirements.  There is also a lot of help online so there is no excuse not to get started.

ii) Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) is the process of getting your website recognised when people do searches on sites such as Google, Bing or Yahoo.  Better SEO rankings mean your website is seen by more people, resulting in increased traffic.  There are 3 easy ways to increase your SEO rankings.

Keywords – By selectively using keywords related to your club in your website, you can increase your SEO rankings.  One way to find which keywords are most important to your target audience is to use the Google Keyword Tool.  This tool will help you see how many people searched on a certain keyword/phrase and how much competition there is for that word/s.  You can also see similar keywords that might be useful.  Once you know which keywords are most relevant, you can put them to work.  Use them in places like the titles of pages, headlines of articles and content that is towards the top of the page.

Inbound Links – These build your credibility among search engines (and potential customers).  They also allow search engines to find and rank you as well as get you on search lists.  Set up links from all of your own domains such as your social media accounts.  You can also ask partners and affiliates (such as reciprocal clubs) to add links to their websites.  Of course, you should also return the favour by including their links on your site.

Local Search Listings – If you haven’t already done so, make sure your club is listed on Google places.  Go to www.google.com/places and select “Add New Business”.  Here you can add all of your contact details such as address, business information and more.  Google will send you a postcard to verify your address.

All of the above tips will help you to ensure that your website is easily found by customers looking for your type of business.  By regularly reviewing your Google analytics, you can see what is, and isn’t, working on your website and develop a plan to make any necessary changes.

Of course, having a great website is just the beginning.  It’s also important to have an integrated social media presence so make sure you include buttons for people to ‘like’ your Facebook page and ‘follow’ your Twitter and LinkedIn profiles.  If you aren’t sure how to set these up, check out some of our previous news articles here and here.  Finally, a great way to get people to come back to your site regularly is to have an e-newsletter strategy in place.  Make sure you have a sign up form on your website that’s easy to find and straight-forward to complete.

If you want to find out how Micropower’s Club Space CMS can enhance your online presence or to find out about any of our integrated solutions for your club, feel free to contact us or find us on Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter or Google+.

What draws your attention?  Most visitors to your website will only have a short attention span so make sure your website draws them in straight away.  This doesn’t mean to have lots of garish, flashing images across the page; it does mean having compelling content and interesting imagery.

Do you know what the website is about?  Again, you only have a short amount of time to get people’s attention before they will lose interest so make sure they know what the website is about on the home page.  For example, if you’re a golf club, include hero shots of the course to attract people’s interest.  Obscure stock images of people “having fun” in an unidentified location will just turn people off so try to avoid them at all costs.

Is it easy to navigate to different pages?  If people can’t easily move between pages to find the information they are looking for, they will just leave your site and look elsewhere so make sure your pages are appropriately titled and the navigation is easy to find.  Again, people don’t want to waste time trying to find about your business so make it as easy as possible for them.

Is it easy to find your contact details?  A good policy is to have contact details in your header or footer as well as having a contact page that is easy to get to and has all of your contact details listed.  At a minimum, you should have a general email address and/or contact form as well as street or postal address and general phone and fax numbers.  It is important to ensure that this information is kept up to date; there is nothing worse than trying to call a number listed on a website only to find that it has been disconnected.

Are there enough images to create interest without making it look too ‘busy’?  Whilst it’s true that a “picture can paint a thousand words”, having too many images on your site will distract people from the key messages you are trying to get across.  So, keep your images relevant and make sure they are good quality; blurry, pixelated images do not belong on a corporate website.

You can also try one of the many automated website assessors such as HubSpot’s Marketing Grader.  While these are not perfect, they can be a good starting place to look at what is and isn’t working on your website.  You can also check your site against one or two of your competitors’.

Once you have made your assessment, it is time to implement any changes you found necessary.  If you think your website needs a complete overhaul, why not contact Micropower to find out how easy-to-use and cost-effective our Club Space CMS (Website Content Management System) is.

1. Publish more visual content.  The Timeline design places more emphasis on visual content such as photos and videos so use this to your advantage.  Images will now appear larger and more prominently on your page so make the effort to make your content visually appealing.
2. Feature custom tabs in the Views & Apps toolbar.  As mentioned in our previous post, you can no longer use a custom landing tab for your page.  All page visitors are automatically directed to your timeline.  However, you can feature the “welcome” app along with others in the Views & Apps toolbar located below the cover photo.  Just make sure you rearrange the Views & Apps icons to highlight the tabs you want to feature such as events, Facebook competitions, etc.
3. Edit images that appear in the Views & Apps bar.  Make these images eye-catching and relevant so that you can draw the attention of visitors to your page.
4. Make sure your best posts appear on your Timeline.  Highlight the most important posts by pinning or starring them, as discussed in the previous article.
5. Pin new featured promotions regularly.  This ensures the posts/promotions you want to highlight remain visible.

You have until 30 March to publish your new look page so feel free to experiment with how it looks.  Micropower will be updating our Facebook page soon so keep an eye out at Facebook.com/Micropower.  What do you think of Timeline?  Do you know anyone who’s using it well?  Let us know what you think.

1. Create a cover photo.  The cover photo can be anything that best represents your brand, so be creative.  The size of the cover photo is 851×315 pixels and takes up a lot of the screen space so make the most of it.  If the image you use is not the right size, it will be stretched to fit so you might need to engage the help of a designer to do this.  You can change the image regularly so you might like to include seasonal imagery or highlight special events.  However, Facebook does have some fairly strict policies in place regarding what cover images cannot include:

• Price or purchase information, such as “10% off” or “limited time offer!”
• Contact information which should be included in the about section such as phone number or web address.
• References to any Facebook actions such as ‘like’ or ‘share’ or arrows from the cover image pointing to these.
• Calls-to-action such as “Tell your friends” or “buy now”.

2. Set your profile picture.  This is the image that will appear next to each of your updates on your wall as well as in users’ news feeds.  Your logo is your best bet but again anything that represents your brand will do.

3. Organise your Views & Apps.  With the new design, photos, likes and apps appear at the top of the page below the cover image.  Photos are automatically featured in the first spot, but you can arrange the rest to feature the most important ones first.  A total of 12 apps can be shown here and page administrators can customise the images that get shown for each one so you can use this to highlight your calls-to-action, such as your contact form, restaurant booking form, etc.

4. Star, Pin or Hide items in your timeline.  You now have the option to highlight, hide or delete posts on your wall.  A great new feature is the ability to pin a story to the top of your Timeline for up to 7 days.  This is a great way to highlight special promotions or events and goes some way to compensate for the fact that you can no longer have custom landing tabs to highlight promotions.  You can also “star” a story.  This enables you to highlight a story without pinning it to the top of the page.  When you “star” a story, it expands to fit the width of the page, enabling you to highlight images or video so they stand out from the rest of your posts.

5. Enable messages.  A new feature for business pages is the ability for users to send personal messages.  This is handy for when you want to discuss a complaint or other issue in more depth and not make the conversation public for all to see.  Though we don’t recommend it, you also have the option to turn off messaging via the admin panel.

So, that’s all there is to it.  You don’t have to publish the new format straight away so feel free to experiment with cover images and highlighted posts until you are happy with the results.  There are some other new features that will also come in handy.

Friend Activity – This great new feature is what makes Facebook’s Timeline for pages even more social.  When people visit your page, they will have a more personalised experience because they’ll see how their friends have interacted with your page.  For instance, if someone tags one of your posts or checks-in at your club’s location, their friends will see these interactions in your Timeline.  This will make them more likely to stick around and like your page.

Milestones – This feature allows you to highlight significant events in your club’s history such as grand final victories, new club house openings, etc.  You can add photos and videos and go right back to when the club began.

Admin Panel – The new admin area makes it easier for you view, manage and organise all the posts on your page (even those you choose to hide).  You can also respond to comments, edit settings and even change the name of your page (but not the custom URL).

Email marketing

So, are you making the most of this tool?  Following are our top 10 email marketing tips.

1. Solve a problem.  Your email content should help solve a problem for your members, whether that’s where to go on Friday night for dinner or what the weekend’s competition results are.  By solving a problem, you are more likely to pique your members’ interest and increase their engagement with your club.
2. Keep contact lists clean.  Make sure your members’ contact details are up to date.  Clear out your database on a regular basis to ensure you’re not constantly sending to email addresses that are no longer in use or are bouncing.  ISPs (Internet Service Providers) are becoming more sophisticated in their methods to protect against spammers and if you don’t have a clean contact list your email may be automatically tagged as spam.
3. Pay attention to your ‘from’ name.  The ‘from’ name tells the recipient whether or not they should delete the email so make sure it’s relevant.  You can tailor it for each segment you are emailing to, such as from the ‘Ladies Captain’ or the ‘Functions Manager’, or it can just be from the club.  The important thing is to make sure it’s a name your members will recognise or your email will be deleted without being opened.
4. Pay attention to your subject line.  The subject line tells the recipient whether or not to open the email so make sure it’s applicable.  If you send out a regular newsletter, having a generic subject line such as “March Club News” is fine.  Alternatively, if you send emails out on an ad hoc basis, make sure the subject line is compelling and pertinent to the content, e.g. “Important Information about the AGM”.
5. Improve content with segmentation.  If the content is not relevant, many email recipients will just unsubscribe, so it is imperative to ensure the right information is going to the right people.  Use surveys to find out what your members are interested in and use that information to segment your database.  This will improve the chances of your email being read.
6. Fine tune email frequency.  Deciding how often to email is more of an art than a science.  However, one way of gauging interest is to ask your members how often they would like to hear from you.  If you find you are getting a lot of ‘unsubscribed’, ‘marked as spam’ or ‘unread’ results from your email campaigns, you may be sending them too often.
7. Time your email appropriately.  When to send your emails is a bit easier to establish.  Again, you can just ask your members when they prefer to receive emails.  You can also review your open data.  If you see a spike in opens at 9.00am, schedule your emails to go out at 8.45am.
8. Keep it legal.  It’s important to ensure your emails comply with the relevant legislation.  Go to www.comlaw.gov.au/Details/C2012C00030 for more information.  If in doubt, always seek legal advice.
9. Double check before you send.  Send yourself a test email to make sure there aren’t any spelling or punctuation mistakes.  You should also check that the formatting works in all of the major browsers such as Outlook, Hotmail, Gmail and Yahoo.  Of increasing importance is to check that it’s legible on mobiles.
10. Keep improving.  The final, and most important, point is to continue making improvements to everything from content and layout to timing and frequency.  Conduct A/B testing to see what subject lines get the most open rates.  It’s vital to keep improving to ensure your marketing message is getting to the right people at the right time.

Now it’s over to you.  Which of these tips did you find most useful?  Do you have any of your own that you would like to share?

Micropower’s product testing team has been hard at work reviewing the features of one of our Next Generation suite of products, Club Golf Competitions.  The feedback received so far has been extremely positive with some of the highlights noted below.

1. Creating competitions in this system is very user friendly and intuitive.
2. Players’ handicaps are checked with Golflink as players register to give the most up-to-date information
3. Partnering for team events is straight forward and can be automated or done manually.
4. Club Golf’s prize template feature is excellent and more functional than anything we’ve seen.  Results of multiple competitions can be combined onto one sheet, changes can be made on the fly and the system is fully flexible.
5. Course set-up using Club Golf Competitions is very user friendly with everything done on one screen.  It is fully maintainable by the user and any changes made are clear.

Feedback from our testers is that Club Golf Competitions is easy to use with an intuitive user interface.  It has superior functionality to other systems in terms of setting up courses and managing results.

Micropower is excited about our Next Generation range of products and will be keeping you updated with their progress so stay tuned.

Micropower

You may also have heard that Timeline for Facebook pages is being introduced with 30 March as the deadline.  We will be sending out more information about the implications for your club soon so stay tuned.

Do you have a Facebook page?  If not, here are some tips on how to set one up.

About 40% of a club’s membership visits their club less frequently than the regular member. These occasional visitors spend the same amount of money in the clubhouse per visit as a loyal member but will go to the club not more than 10 – 15 times a year. Occasional members stand outside the social fabric of the club and tend to feel more like visitors than members. The club is less central to their lives than the regular member. Occasional members are far less likely to refer a friend than regular members.

The remaining 25% of a club’s membership base is made up of irregular members who will visit the club a couple of times a year. Again, they will spend roughly the same amount of money per visit as the occasional and regular member but the club is relatively remote from their lives.

A key challenge for clubs is not only to retain the loyal member base but also to convert occasional visitors into regular members. In a typical golf club, marina or private club of 1,100 members, one additional visit a year from occasional members would generate incremental revenues in the order of $15,000 to $20,000. A larger club of 4,000 members would increase income by $60,000 to $80,000. In recent years we have seen progressive clubs use loyalty strategies creatively to underpin regular member loyalty but also to drive occasional member visits.

Club Loyalty

In general, loyalty programs aim to enhance the perceived value of a business and are used as differentiators in competitively intensive markets. For example, food retailers such as Coles and Woolworths both run loyalty schemes. The Coles FlyBuys program has over 10 million subscribers while the Woolworths Everyday Rewards scheme has 5.1 million cardholders. Airlines such as Qantas and Virgin Australia invest significantly in Qantas Frequent Flyer and Velocity programs respectively.  Additionally, all Australian banks offer reward programs associated with credit card products.

These programs share in common a direct link between spend and reward. The cardholder or “member” makes purchases which are rewarded with an allocation of points. These points may then be redeemed for goods and services. The more the member buys, the greater the potential rewards. Members then feel that they are getting something extra for their loyalty to the business be it a grocery chain, airline or bank. These rewards must be desirable so many programs foster partnerships with providers to ensure there is a broad range of “valuable” rewards on offer.

Member Discounts

Clubs are not new to loyalty and have been running programs for years. The most basic club loyalty program is the Member Discount. In this case, a price concession is applied on presentation of a membership card. These discounts are usually applied to food and beverage purchases. Although this approach is relatively simple to operate, it does not differentiate between member types. The member who uses and pays for a broad range of club facilities is rewarded in the same way as an irregular member. Additionally, these types of schemes and associated prices tend to become the accepted norm in the club which erode margin and do not foster loyalty.

Rewards

Many clubs operate reward schemes where members are awarded points for purchases. These points accumulate and may be redeemed for rewards such as club merchandise and/or items promoted by the club such as televisions, electrical appliances and holidays. Rewards programs are often used by clubs to differentiate themselves from the competition by offering outstanding prizes.

Rewards schemes are easy for members to understand and suit well if the club has limited offerings. However, they do require administration time to manage the program, particularly if it is manually operated. It’s important to refresh the rewards constantly.

Tiered Loyalty

A tiered loyalty program is designed for clubs that want to reward their most valuable members. Members collect points and at certain thresholds the reward, discount or promotion escalates. Once a member climbs the loyalty ladder their club is firmly on their mind.

Tiered loyalty programs are effective at encouraging repeat visitations and spend, particularly when linked to outbound personalised targeted marketing campaigns. They also reward the most loyal members as well as encouraging spend in the club rather than in the general retail market.

Good tiered loyalty programs require integrated systems to capture transactions which are then assigned to members where points are attributed. There are IT infrastructure costs associated with setting up a tiered loyalty system.

Partnership Reward

Partnership programs extend the tiered loyalty concept to partners which offer goods and services as rewards. This broadens the number and depth of the rewards available which makes the program more appealing, particularly in a retail environment. These programs are attractive to members and promote the club in the community. They are complex to administer requiring sophisticated infrastructure and time-consuming administration. While compelling for members, the major risk for clubs is that redemptions are often made outside the club at other retail outlets. This dilutes the value of the scheme to the club.

Successful Club Loyalty Programs

From our experience in dealing with over 400 membership clubs around the country and drawing from the various types of schemes, the most successful club loyalty programs have the following characteristics, including:

• Targets loyal and occasional members;
• Contains personalised outbound communication triggers;
• Simple for members and staff to understand and operate;
• High perceived value – targeted rewards for club members;
• Reinforces value for the regular member;
• Targets and draws in occasional members ;
• Rewards are within reach; and
• Rewards are frequently refreshed.

Summary of Loyalty Program Types

There are many ways a club can reward a member. In our view, tiered loyalty strikes the right balance between value for members and payback for clubs since redemption occurs in the club. This type of loyalty program incentivises occasional members to return while giving regular members additional value.

To find out more about how Micropower’s integrated systems enable loyalty and reward schemes, please fill out the contact form.

Richard Berry, Micropower