Homecoming Scotland – Drive It Home
Scotland’s biggest ever golf promotion
1) Background to Homecoming Scotland: Homecoming Scotland 2009 is inspired by the 250th birth
anniversary of national poet Robert Burns and designed to stimulate Scotland’s tourism prospects by
reaching out to the many people worldwide with Scots ancestry and those with a passion for Scotland.
The core themes of Homecoming Scotland celebrate our nation’s great contributions to the world; Golf,
Whisky, Burns and Great Minds and Innovation. Homecoming Scotland 2009 is project-managed by Event
Scotland in partnership with VisitScotland.
2) Home of Golf Promotion – Overview: VisitScotland developed ‘Drive It Home’ as Scotland’s lead
international golf promotion for 2009. Reaching our best golfer prospects in our leading international golf
markets, USA, Canada and Sweden, ‘Drive It Home’ will entice them with a two compelling incentives to
book a golf trip to Scotland; a free four-ball at selected courses across Scotland and a voucher for up to
$100 off when booking a Scotland golf package.
Golfers who claim a free four-ball, and subsequently travel to Scotland for a golf vacation, are anticipated
to stay an average five days and four nights in Scotland playing paid-for golf the rest of the time; whether
booked independently or via golf tour operators. There will be strict enforcement of a minimum ONE free
four-ball per group of golfers to avoid abuse and ensure the promotion delivers incremental revenues to
golf clubs and makes a positive economic impact on Scotland’s golf and tourism industry during the
Homecoming year.
3) Promotional Idea: Utilise un-reserved tee times (i.e. downtime) across SGU & SLGA affiliated golf
courses as promotional collateral and combine with a great value for money deals from Scotland’s golf
tour operators to create Scotland’s biggest ever golf promotion during Homecoming Scotland 2009.
The free four-balls and value-for-money deals are the ‘bait’ to lure high-yield golfer prospects; to get
them considering Scotland, telling their ‘buddies’ about Scotland and to ultimately convert their interest
into a booking to travel to Scotland on a golf vacation.
4) Promotional Objectives:
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Drive incremental revenue to participating golf clubs, golf tour operators, accommodation
providers and the wider Scottish economy
Ensure stand-out of our Golf marketing in support of Homecoming Scotland 2009
Force consideration (of Scotland) and provide detailed information on where to play in Scotland
and bookable product at the point of interest
A means of securing partnerships with VisitScotland’s airline and trade partners to secure
additional investment in the promotion
Registration of 30,000 international golfer prospects to claim a ‘free four-ball’
Recruitment into VisitScotland’s Golfer e-crm programme to receive frequent Homecoming
Scotland/Golf e-newsletters
Lead generation for golf operators and other participating golf businesses
Mass referral (viral) through ‘golf buddy’ networks
5) How Does It Work? The promotion works in three phases; registration, set-up and fulfilment.
Described in sequence thus:
5.1) Stage I; Registration:
- golfer prospect responds to ‘Drive It Home’ ad in golf interest media, i.e. pgatour.com. The ad links to
a promotional website; www.driveithome2009.com
- golfer registers on promotional website to claim a “ free four-ball for you and your golf buddies at the
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Home of Golf in 2009”
“It could be the Old Course at St Andrew’s, a classic links course like the new
Machrihanish Dunes, the majestic PGA Centenary course at Gleneagles or one of
Scotland’s many hidden gems such as Craigielaw in East Lothian?”
Upon submission of their email address, country, state, age/gender and golf club, the website returns
a ‘free’ round of golf e-voucher, revealing the Scottish course our golfer and his partner/buddies can
play for free
N.B. the registrant doesn’t choose a course to play. Instead he’s given a (four-ball) e-voucher
from our database and in line with the inventory available to us
Alongside his voucher, the claimant is served rich information on the course, the surrounding area
and nearby golf courses
We encourage the golfer to excite his golf buddies via email and thus;
‘Homecoming Scotland in 2009 celebrates Scotland as the birthplace of golf. I’ve just
claimed a free round in Scotland at XXXX course during the Homecoming year. And you
can join me. It’s the trip of a lifetime to the Home of Golf and there are loads of special
Homecoming golf packages to help us start planning our trip.’
User referred via the website and follow-up email to ‘exclusive’ travel deals to start planning/booking
his Scotland golf vacation
5.2) Stage II; Set-Up:
- Participating clubs commit to providing x30 free tee-off slots to redeem within the 7 month span of
the promotion (April-Oct 08)
- Golfers claiming the free fourball incentive receive an automatic email with their free round voucher
reminding them to check out great deals for golfing in Scotland (links from the email) and to refer
their golf buddies
- User must respond to email to validate the ‘provisional’ status of their voucher (‘click here’ command).
- User given simple instructions to confirm and redeem their free four-ball. Thus:
o Your provisional four-ball booking will be held for 8 weeks, during which time you
and your buddies can organise your golf trip to Scotland
o After 8 weeks we will email asking you to confirm your intentions to travel to
Scotland during 2009.
o If, at this stage, your plans are firmed-up, we will validate your voucher. You will
then be able to contact the club where your voucher is valid to confirm your teeoff day and time – N.B. the club will allocate quieter slots around the dates the
claimant plans to travel
o If your plans are unclear or you have no intention to travel, we’ll cancel your
voucher
o Six weeks prior to your free four-ball tee-off time, we will email you again asking
final confirmation of your plans to travel to Scotland
- All claimants (of free four-balls) receive VisitScotland’s quarterly Home of Golf e-newsletter which
provides further reasons to book Scotland and links to airline and travel trade partners
5.3) Stage III; Fulfilment:
- VisitScotland provide all participating clubs with a report on free round vouchers issued & each
claimants e-voucher unique reference and email address. Initially claims are flagged ‘amber’
- Upon re-contacting golfers 8 weeks after their initial ‘claim’, VisitScotland designates claims as ‘green’
(planning to travel and/or booked) or ‘red’ (not likely to claim). VisitScotland provides all participating
clubs with a status on claims
- Claimants whose voucher status is green are automatically emailed further prompts, in the form of
value for money deals, to contact golf operators and/or accommodation providers
- All tee-off times designated ‘Red’, and so unclaimed, are recycled into the promotion and offered to
fresh claimants
- Claimants planning to travel (and whose vouchers are then designated green) are invited to contact
the participating club directly to arrange a tee-off time compatible with the club’s diary and their
travel dates. Claimants quote their unique voucher ID when calling the club as a check.
- N.B; each club retains the right to amend the tee time in the event of a revenue generating booking
being required at the allocated time.
- Claimants turn up on the designated day/time with print-out of their e-voucher and/or e-voucher
unique reference
- Claimants must produce proof of identity, thus confirming overseas residency, at the point of
redemption
6) What’s In It For SGU Clubs? The core proposition is that all courses are being asked to give a little
to gain a lot; the gain being paid-for golf from the golfer groups who take advantage of the free four-ball
incentive and travel to Scotland for 4-7 nights of golf. If the promotion helps make the difference between
our prospects booking and not bothering to consider Scotland, then Golf Clubs and the tourism sector all
stand to benefit.
- All participating clubs and only those participating will be heavily cross-promoted within the Drive It
Home campaign in order that golfer groups claiming a free four-ball are directed towards booking
paid-for rounds at nearby and featured clubs
- Long-term communications benefit to Scottish golf industry through email opt-in of 30,000 campaign
respondents into VisitScotland’s e-comms programme
- Awareness and trial benefits to all participating courses, not to mention potential repeat and paid-for
rounds from those playing
- Residual spend in Golf Course clubhouse and pro shop from those playing free four-balls
- The promotion seeks not to cannibalise existing or anticipated business but to utilise tee times that
are unlikely to be utilised. Clubs are encouraged to contribute tee times on this basis.
7) Marketing Considerations; VisitScotland plans a heavyweight golf campaign spanning the
‘consideration and booking’ period Nov 08-Feb 09. The campaign will run earlier (Nov 08) in markets with
the longest booking lead-times – US and Canada – and later (Jan/Feb 09) in Sweden. At this stage, the
campaign looks like:
- Online-only ad campaign targeting our best performing golf media, i.e. sportsillustrated.com, pga.com
and golf.se. Circa £100K spend on media
- Email push to VisitScotland’s databases of golfer prospects and loyalists in each market. Est 40,000
contacts
- PR campaign targeting golf media
- Prominent placements across all VisitScotland’s country market websites, i.e. cometoscotland.com
(US), and on main homecomingscotland.com website
- ‘referral’ from golfers registering to their ‘buddies’ – it’s a great locker-room talking point; “guess
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what, I just claimed a free fourball at The Glen; a links course in Scotland. We’ve always
talked about playing golf in Scotland and now the Scots’ have a Homecoming year which
celebrates golf’s birthplace, what more excuse do we need? Why don’t we plan a golf trip
around this?”
The marketing campaign and the promotion’s website will carry airline and specialist golf tour
operator branding as a means of generating leads from motivated golfers
VisitScotland will create a ‘Rest Of The World’ version of the website to which it will drive golfer
prospects from All other overseas markets (Japan, India, Australia, Italy etc) via PR activity and ecomms
8) What Do We Want From SGU & SLGA Affiliated Clubs?
Our target is to secure 3000 free tee times for up to four players from downtime which can be predicted
from annual patterns. In addition, we seek Clubs’ assistance with:
- consider developing exclusive but simple value for money propositions to attract paid-for bookings
from golfers
- Clubs to nominate a point of contact to receive and process email correspondence from VisitScotland
confirming fourball bookings
9) How Do We Ensure The Promotion is not open to abuse?
- By confining the promotion to international markets, we ensure claimants are most likely to travel for
extended stays of 3 nights or more, with 5-7 night stays typical of our long-haul travellers – thus
benefiting golf tourism through accommodation, dinning and travel spend along with paid-for golf at golf
clubs
- We strictly apply a one free fourball per group rule, i.e. claimants and their nominated ‘buddies’ for
a free fourball can only have one free fourball between them
10) Rationale:
- An early ambition is to have circa 20K golfers register for a free fourball, with a 5% conversion to
book ratio. And to see these 1K golfers travel to Scotland with an average of x2 playing partners,
staying an average x5 nights, spending circa £140/day/head (incl accommodation); so a potential
£2.1M economic impact.
- Promotion targets Scotland’s best high-yield golfer prospects in our leading international golf markets;
US, Canada and Sweden
- Keeps Scotland; Home of Golf front of mind in the face of fierce competition for Golfer travel dollars
from new Golf destinations in Mexico, domestic US, Asia and Europe
- A ‘big-ticket’ offer to ensure our ‘Home of Golf’ advertising stands-out on limited media spend
- Promotes repeat business amongst lapsed golfers and been-there-done-that ‘trophy-hunters’ by
forcing consideration of Scotland’s wide and varied golf offering, i.e. 550 courses, new Championship
standard courses, hidden gems
- golfers availing themselves of a free fourball will most likely spend money in the golf club pro-shop
and bar/lounge
- golfers claiming a free fourball will be well disposed to booking paid rounds in nearby golf clubs
- the central premise – a free four-ball – is very straightforward and so easily accessible offer. Its
strength is its simplicity
- lead generation for participating golf operators
- educational benefits about Scotland’s hidden gems, the accessibility of golf in Scotland and the
range/depth of golf courses across Scotland
- compelling reason to refer to golf buddies and so taps into golfer networks
- mass email acquisition for VisitScotland’s golf e-comms program
- A means of messaging Turnberry Open 2009, St Andrew’s Open 2010 and Ryder Cup 2014