The world of golf marketing is vastly different than it was just 10 years ago. Gone are the days when golf courses were unable to reach mass golf audiences because they couldn't afford TV, press or radio advertising. Thanks to golf marketing online or golf e-marketing, golf course owners can now spend very little to reach potential customers.

So what are the golf marketing options online? The opportunities largely involve using email, search engine marketing, e-zines, blogging, online articles, online PR or social book marking to drive traffic to your golf course website. Compared to traditional golf marketing channels such as direct mail and print advertising, it is often a low cost alternative that has a much higher rate of return.

So, ready to jump in? You can use some of these tips to get started:

• Ensure Your site has attractive content: Golf marketing is about content as well as advertising. Make your customers want to come to your golf course website. Offer them an incentive, such as a free tool or service (for example you could offer handicap management software or personal score tracking software). Regularly post informative golf articles on your site that will help them solve problems. The more they visit your site, the more your golf course will be in the back of their mind.
• Publish an e-newsletter: An essential element in golf marketing. If you're not collecting the email addresses of your current members or green fee visitors, start now. These golfers have already bought from you and offer the biggest golf marketing opportunity because they are probably willing to buy from you again. Publishing a monthly or quarterly e-newsletter full of interesting, helpful golf articles and golf promotions will give you more of that invaluable "top of mind" advertising.
• Use email to send coupons: You know those email address you're now collecting for your e-newsletters? You can use those to send coupons and other golf promotions to green fee visitors. People love reading email, and since they willingly give you their address it's not considered "SPAM". Make the tone helpful and informative, with a catchy title in the subject line.
• Online PR: You can issue a press release, which will be distributed to hundreds of media sites across the net and will also appear in Google News and Yahoo News. This powerful golf marketing tool greatly increases the chances of golf journalists picking up your release and writing an online article on your story which will in turn drive traffic to your site.
• Blogging: Blogs are more like a scrolling, online journal and may not be a golf marketing tool that immediately springs to mind. However, blogs can be an effective way to subtly market your golf course. Many bloggers have become almost like celebrities and the word-of-mouth advertising about your product or golf course can spread like wildfire. You have the option of starting your own blog or you can also arrange for popular golf bloggers to promote your website for a fee.
• Search Engine Marketing: This is one of the most important golf marketing tools online. Ensure that you appear in search results for key terms that your potential customers are searching for is the single largest golf marketing activity that will drive traffic to your website. First, submit your website to search engines. This might help increase the visibility of your site on the web and drive more traffic to your site. Search engines like Google, Yahoo, and MSN all have submissions pages available:
  
  Google: http://www.google.com/addurl
  Yahoo: http://search.yahoo.com/info/submit.html
  MSN: http://beta.search.msn.com/docs/submit.aspx
  
  However, simply submitting your site URL to search engines won't be a miracle cure. To appear in natural search results you need plenty of keyword-rich content that can be picked up by search engines and these keywords will need to appear in the meta tags of your site. It's also important to keep your content fresh. Search engines like big, fresh sites, require that you constantly update your site and keep the information current; this will help you in increasing your site visibility. To increase your search engine ranking it is also important to get many other sites to link to yours. Appearing in natural search results requires Search Engine Optimization (SEO) on your site.
  
  Another golf marketing option is to pay to appear on the first page of search engine results. These are called adwords campaigns and you pay each time someone clicks on your ad. You can set up a campaign on Google or Yahoo or a marketing agency can set up and run the campaign for you.
• Article Marketing: This is an important golf marketing tool and a great way to be seen as an expert in the golf field. Writing articles and publishing them on other websites, e-zines, and e-newsletters will help drive traffic to your golf site. Make sure that you put a short bio of yourself and, even more importantly, your web address at the end of each article. If you're not much a writer, don't worry. You can hire a professional writer to ghostwrite the article for you or www.MarketingGolf.co.uk can have your articles professionally researched and written.