Member-Guest tournaments are often among the most important events on a club’s calendar, and flawless execution results in happy members and delighted guests.
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This type of event typically consists of a number of flights with six teams in each flight. Each team plays a round-robin schedule of matches within their flight, earning points as they win holes and matches.

In this Spotlight, we will detail the features and some best practices that can make your Member-Guest tournaments truly outstanding.

For a complete step-by-step tutorial on setting up this type of event, Click Here.

The process begins with Member-Guest registration. Important information such as names and nicknames, guest clubs, Handicap Service IDs, contact details, and often things like shirt or shoe sizes and other information need to be captured. Furthermore, because of the popularity of this kind of event, registration may often require managing a waiting list. Managing the registration process manually can be cumbersome, time-consuming and error-prone. That’s why we suggest using Event and League registration, our robust and comprehensive online registration feature.

With Golf Genius, members can register their team online and enter any and all information that is required about themselves and their guests. The player roster and waitlist is then formed in an orderly manner, ready to be used for setup.

Click Here for full details on online registration.

The event experience can extend beyond the boundaries of your club property. With an online event portal customized for your specific Member-Guest, you can present a creative and informative website prior to the event. Not only is the portal a useful way to communicate information, it will definitely raise the excitement level. Participants can also relive the memorable experience by visiting the portal post-event. In addition to tee times and full leaderboard, here are some additional suggestions for creative portal pages:

For full details about customizing your portal, Click Here.

Communication with members and guests before, during, and after the event is critical. Team/Flight changes, weather delays, round robin schedules, and mobile app instructions are just some of the informational emails that may be sent throughout the event. You can easily compose and send these emails through our software with an attractive customized banner. If using Event and League Registration, you can also collect email addresses from guests and communicate directly with them as well.

For full details on sending emails, Click Here.

Also known as “Cross 9s”, this scheduling tactic creates an efficient process that will save some valuable time for cocktail hour. Rather than playing either the front 9 or back 9, matches can be played over certain 9-hole stretches of the golf course. For instance, a 9-hole match may be played from Hole #2 to Hole #10. After a match is complete, each team will meet with their next opponents (usually finishing at a nearby hole) to play their next match. This sequence removes the need for the playing field to re-group after each match, thereby saving everybody time.

For more details on Course Rotations, Click Here.

Why limit your format of play to just match play? Mixing in an Aggregate Skins tournament will increase the excitement and keep everyone’s interest high (even the teams who may not be fairing well in their matches). In most schedules (Course Rotations excluded), teams play both the front 9 and back in the first two rounds. Therefore, after the 2nd round, every team will have played all 18 holes. Scores for those two rounds can then be combined to determine the winning skins.

Click Here for details on Aggregate Skins.

When setting up the tournament format, you can limit how many points a team can earn in a match. If you adopt this method, it is more likely that each flight will be competitive down to the last match.

Click Here for details on point limits.

Creating attractive and professional printed material is a must for showcase events like this. Our software provides the ability to create high-quality printed material with ease. Pair this with custom stock to provide that best-in-class printed material. Here are a few examples:

Take your printed material to the next level with customized cardstock. Personalize your scorecard, cart signs, and other reports with club logos, sponsors, local rules, or any other information individualized to your event. To order custom cardstock, go to Golfcardstock.com.
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Practice rounds are sometimes an afterthought in the entire scope of a Member-Guest. Casual practice rounds can be played throughout the day with a simple competition. Consider adding some fun games like Skins, 2x2 scramble, a Stableford, Gross+Net, and Average of both balls. Practice rounds also provide the chance for the players to get comfortable with the mobile app if live scoring is being used for their matches (more on this later).

It’s not uncommon for clubs to incorporate Parimutuels into Member-Guest Invitationals. It can be stressful and difficult to manage by hand. However, with our Parimutuel feature, bets can easily be placed and viewed by the players. The parimutuel results can also be determined with one click of a button.

Click Here for details on Parimutuels.

The power and player appeal of live scoring cannot be overstated. Having the live leaderboard available on the mobile app, digital scoreboards (TV Show), and portal will impress the members and guests throughout the entire event. Live scoring has been used successfully in thousands of events, and players love the feature.

A Member-Guest event has a tendency to create a hectic atmosphere. Players are continuously coming and going, and leaderboards need to constantly be updated. Utilizing the live scoring not only provides a unique experience for the players, but it also helps the pro staff minimize “time to results” and frees them up to interact with participants.

Before the event, email your players with mobile app instructions. As suggested above, consider using the mobile app during the practice round to get players comfortable entering scores. Before the matches begin, distribute the scorecards and have the players enter their scores on the mobile app. After the completion of each round, players can hand in their scorecards and confirm that the results on the live leaderboard are correct. Distribute the scorecards for the next match and repeat the process.

Traditionally leaderboards are printed and posted on a board or wall. As players finish their round, scores are handwritten on the printed scoreboards. With the use of live scoring and TV Show Leaderboards, you can throw away the pen and paper and give your players an instant and professional leaderboard using a monitor, TV, or projector.

With TV Show Leaderboards, you have more control over the design of your leaderboards, with header and footer customization, split-screen functionality, and more. You'll be able to create various TV Shows, enabling managers to display multiple shows containing different content on separate screens simultaneously. This is very handy when you have multiple divisions or flights and would like to display each division or flight on separate displays or on the same display with a split-screen.

Our system has the ability to post scores. For more details on posting scores, Click Here.