Our club is looking at a new website. The club is very progressive and is also looking for a system where members and public can book online. Currently they have had a quote from Mi Club. The price is outrageous.

How good are they and are there any alternatives?.

Mate, my company builds business portals. For something like you describe we would use a product called dotnetnuke (http://www.dotnetnuke.com/). This gives developers the framework and a stack of shareware tools to put together a really smick site. You can get plenty of add-ons like booking systems and on-line shops for free. It comes with a heap of skins which you (or developers) can use to rapidly build a professional look and feel. And the content management is really easy to use.

Dotnetnuke is a very commonly used system. Have a look at our most recent build www.bstar.com.au. The only .net code we aded was the business calculators that sit behind the site, all the rest is dotnetnuke freebies. The hard part in any site is the graphics.

I am not pushing for your business as we don’y have the available staff… just giving you an option if you need to search for a developer. Assuming you have a couple of photos and some graphics for the logos, a good developer would have something for you to test in 3-5 days ($2,500-$4000).

I nearly fell over when I heard how much our club paid for their website and online booking system from Mi Club.

IMO there is no need to be paying so much for a website these days.

As for their booking system I know our manager is regretting the whole decision given all the negative feedback from the members.

I know that at M.. V… in Northern Sydney, they are really pissed with Mi Club.

What they charge is a joke for what they deliver…would think twice about it and many of the members are only just realising how much they got ripped off.

I did my own club web site (Trentham Golf Club) just in html. I have designed a simple results page in .asp where results can be entered from a web page with a password, but for everything else I just use an html editor. Primitive system, and it lacks a CMS, but it still works well. The hardest thing is getting something that looks presentable, and provides good information to members and green-fee players.

What I need to be really efficient is a commercial, universal tee-time booking system based on an SQL or Access database, where prospective green-fee players could register and book in using a seven-minute calendar. One where the guy who handles our bookings could also log in as an administrator and block out times for the phone bookings he gets. Since we use two tees, it would need to automatically block out the 10th tee a certain time after each group starts from the 1st tee. Anything around?

By the way, my club recently investigated going to Tier 3 Golflink (we currently just use the Tier 1 internet model). The quote from one provider was over $3000 for each of the membership and competitions modules, plus a monthly maintenance and support fee of $120. This is ridiculously expensive for a small club with 300 members that are only charged $320 per year for membership. I think we’ll just stick to Tier 1 and to doing memberships in Excel!

Publish, if there were PM’s this would be one.

If you are interested in putting the work in to developing your own web solution I’m happy to help out with some of the design/coding. (Or though by deesign, I don’t mean pretty looking stuff, that is someone elses job ;) )

amccallum ( at ) ncsis ( dot ) com

publish/TheMenace we are are working with MicroPower/Power Golf on a live teetimes system which is done and is in testing now.

http://www.iseekgolf.com/te...

MP/ISG have also come up with a templated CSS website for use at golf clubs plus they provide the software modules to run your whole golf club or just the proshop or whatever you need.

Think you’ll find MP very competitive – it will be the end of the days that MiClub and others can charge outlandish prices for what are very very simple websites.

http://www.clubsource.com.au

BTW publish good job on the website – bit of padding on those columns, bit more line height on your text and bit better compression job on your graphics and you got a very good website there. Very nicely done.

I had a look at Trentham GC web site and agree. This is a very good site. I have probably only looked at approx 20 different ones and this is the best I have seen. Maybe thats a topic worth raising ie looking at the best golf club web sites.

It would be a short topic :) They’re very few and far between for some reason. Not always the fault of the designer though – committee members get involved and all logic goes out the window. For reason everyone thinks they’re a designer and web guru.

I first put a website online for Trentham in 1997, long before MiClub existed. We were one of the first clubs anywhere in Australia to have a web site. This is its third design incarnation, but it’s still not totally what I want. There’s a lot of functionality that can be developed. By the way, it’s very “co-ordinated” because I am the sole designer, content provider, photographer and administrator! No one else gets their “dirty fingers” in the pie, other than to give me some information for inclusion!

Smaller clubs either need someone with some graphics skill who can develop and administer a website in HTML, or an off-the-shelf template they can adapt using a CMS. Out of the 1600 golf clubs in Australia, only a few hundred at best would have the financial resources to afford a MiClub type model. Many, like mine, have a few hundred members and a total turnover of a couple of hundred thousand annually. Spending five thousand or more on a website and booking system is cost-prohibitive.

I reckon the way to go for smaller clubs to become “ICT rich”, including the web, would be either through an inexpensive off-the-shelf model, or through a cooperative program with backing from their state association. There is capacity to have club information included in, for example, the VGA website, but it’s buried very deep, is awkward for a club to advertise the URL, and only has basic information.

Interesting feedback guys.

We have Power Golf doing a full presentation to our board in the new year. Did not realise they were in so many golf clubs.

The deal with Micropower/ISG sounds very interesting. Look forward to finding our more.

http://www.clubsource.com.au

horrible design.

Yes it is – that’s why we took over the designs for the golf club websites :) They do the club software and are the no.1 in the Australian market.

Im a member at Coolangatta Tweed and they use Micropower’s Tee plus for booking and i think it’s great i just login and can book my comp or social games, check my booking times and results.

Danz – this is the design arm of things

http://www.microgolf.com.au

• electronic tee bookings
• my partner list
• my personal details
• competition results
• my handicap lookup
• member account viewing & payments
• member directory
• member messaging
• member business directory
• advanced content management including scheduling (upcoming events and promotions can be set to turn on and expire)

http://www.rosevillegolf.co...
http://www.lonsdalegc.com.au
http://www.nambourgolfclub....
http://www.heidelberggc.com.au
http://www.hortonparkgolfcl...

I am on the commitee of a club in Sydney that uses the Power Golf back of house and Mi Club for the member and public bookings. We will be ditching Mi Club in the new year and installing Tee Plus which is a Power Golf member and public booking system. The Mi Club product have failed to live up to expectations we feel we need a product that totally integrates with our financials.

Sounds like we are not alone on this issue.

Here are some examples of Micropower website designs …..

Our club (Sydney based) is about to build a new website to integrate with online member, public time sheet and back of house financials.

Currently our club is using FACTS back office which we will be replacing as they don’t really have an online booking system.

We have had presentations from both Power Golf and MiClub late last year.

Mi Club were dear as poison and could not offer a fully integrated system – only with a number of third party products. IMO – always a worry.

The Power Golf system offers a fully integrated system all the way through.

Were were also particularly interested in the Power Golf partnership with the ISG and the upcoming online tee times bookings for the public.

I take your point Danz. Templets are fine and it certainly serves it purpose for what it costs. Especially for clubs on a budget.

I think some clubs are way to fancy and pay way to much for their websites when it is not necessary. As long as you have the basics done properly ie, quality photos, contact pages, detailed directions, facilities etc

The main thing for us is the back of house functionality that goes along with it. And what I mean by that is financials, member and public online bookings.

Hi de ho

I work for a QLD web company that builds custom applications for the web using PHP and MySQL. At the risk of sounding like one of the sales guys you should consider customs solutions as they are never as expensive as what people think. You only pay for the functions you need!

Contact your local developer or flick me a public email address and I can get one of the sales guys to send you some info.

Eek

quality photos

Too often club web sites are full of poorly taken and badly framed photographs. I’ve seen pics in course tours that consist of little more than some tee markers and a gum tree … they don’t tell you anything about the hole or the course’s attractions.

If you can get someone to take some good photos of your golf course, preferably in early morning or late evening light, it will add magnitudes to any web site.

Definitely this is what we keep telling clubs but they just will not listen.

I have seen club websites where there is no picture of the golf course. There’s pictures of the clubhouse, the committee members and the front gate but not the actual thing you are playing on!

And the other thing is the midday overcast photo looking towards the sun – may as well not bother.

Unfortunately everyone thinks they can take a photo – just check out David Scaletti to see what a difference talent and morning/afternoon light makes in golf course photography.