The Q3 2024 benchmarking report for UK golf retailers has just been published. Learn how the top 11 UK golf retailers perform across the digital space.
The latest Q3 2024 benchmarking report for UK golf retailers has just been published. It covers the largest 11 golf retailers, including American Golf, Clubhouse Golf, Golfbidder, County Golf, Snainton Golf Centre, SCOTTSDALE GOLF, Affordable Golf, Druids Golf, Function18.com, HOTGOLF LTD, and GolfOnline.
The research gives an inside track on who is winning the biggest share of voice online and quantifies the gaps, risks and missed opportunities for other golf retailers to win brand exposure, drive online views, and generate in-store footfall (where relevant). The report highlights quick wins that will improve enquiries from your online strategy and identifies the barriers that may be reducing your site’s ability to optimise digital performance.
To see a preview and contents page of the Q3 report, click here. To get a copy of the full report and the key takeaways, please complete the enquiry form or schedule a call.
For a glance into just six of the metrics we evaluated these top 11 golf retailers specialists on, check out our quick-look table below;
Continue reading for further detail on this quarter's best and poorest-performing UK golf retailers specialists or request a copy of the report for the full review.
The 70+ pages of research benchmarks each retailer based on 50+ metrics and indicators of successful digital strategy, including organic visibility, domain authority, paid media ads, conversion performance, technical performance, site speed, universal search, content, social ads, accessibility, and mobile performance.
Some of the leading players in the space are high spenders on paid media channels such as Google, Bing and Facebook - but have a poor or sub-optimal conversion improvement strategy. Without an optimised, sophisticated conversion strategy that maximises the conversion rate, the return on investment is unsustainable or will underperform. Scaling spend on paid media is not achievable unless the conversion rate delivers optimal performance in the sector. Some in the space have paid media spend levels from £30k+ per month but dedicate minimal resources and budgets to conversion testing. Given the cost per clicks on ad networks will continue to rise, we recommend spending at least 10% of your paid media budget on ongoing conversion optimisation testing schedules to ensure your paid media ROI maintains long-term viability, competitive advantage, and sustainability.
Savvy digital marketers know that having a technically sound website is an essential component of a successful fully integrated digital strategy - plus a site capable of maximising conversion performance. Golf retailers ensure that they’re not directing consumers to broken links, which can cause them to become frustrated and resort to competitor websites instead.
HOTGOLF LTD reported the highest number of 4xx errors (5). Even though this figure is low, it’s still important that brands assess their internal linking structure to check all links are still valid and working.
When 62% of consumers are less likely to convert if they have a negative mobile site experience, ensuring that your site is quick and easy to load will see a significant improvement on your overall conversion rates. Golf retailers should aim for the highest site speed possible, which may mean switching to a more mobile-friendly website theme so consumers can access their websites on the go with minimal delays.
The mobile site speed for this quarter ranged between 54 and 8, with HOT GOLF LTD reported the slowest site speed. After examining its mobile website, this golf retailer should aim to reduce image sizes and compress them to help with download speeds and reduce page weight so there isn’t as many images on the homepage.
Domain authority (DA) is an essential metric for measuring the effectiveness of SEO performance and helps create a reliable overall gauge of how effective your site is at achieving organic traffic, i.e. ‘free’ traffic that isn’t gained through sponsored ads. All golf retailers should prioritise creating content that other websites will want to link back to. This includes topics that are selfless and provide their target audience with new information.
A ‘good’ DA really comes down to how your competitors are performing, however it is generally considered average between 40 and 50, good between 50 and 60, and excellent above 60. The DA for this quarter ranged between 65 and 16, with County Golf reporting the lowest DA score. This golf retailer also received backlinks from the fewest domains, which can affect a brand’s DA score.
A strong organic performance is strategically important as it ensures your site ranks above competitors for core, transactional keywords. When 93% of your customers won’t go past the first page of Google, your absence or lack of targeting for essential keywords will cost you conversions. Organic traffic will fluctuation between quarters, and brands should follow a keyword strategy to ensure they’re following protocols to increase organic traffic on both devices.
Four retailers saw a decline in organic traffic on desktop, while 7 reported a decline on mobile. GolfOnline reported the biggest loss (-43% on desktop and -53% on mobile). It should ensure its website is mobile-friendly to increase traffic on mobile.
Google Universal Search Results are an evolving opportunity to make your pages visible on a SERP (Search Engine Results Page). Universal results often appear before traditional listings and are eye-catching for users. Universal search results refer to rankings on a SERP that are not the traditional ‘blue line’ Google link, and a retailer can appear for universal search results without being strong in standard rankings. Golf retailers should focus on appearances for ‘reviews' and ‘images’ to help increase their position in SERPs.
American Golf reported the highest Universal Search appearances (27,879), with the majority of these coming from ‘reviews’ and ‘images’. Alternatively, County Golf received the fewest overall appearances (1,352) and should encourage past customers to leave an online review.
Longtail keywords are often considered high intent and potentially more likely to convert as a searcher is being more specific. Optimising for longtail keywords also puts your content strategy in a strong position to rank for new search terms as they enter Google’s index. Golf retailers should focus on longtail keywords that its target audience types into search engines, such as ‘lightweight, wide putter’ or ‘pre-owned golf clubs’.
American Golf reported the most longtail keyword appearances for position 3 (3,456) and positions 4–10 (6,008). On the other hand, Druids Golf saw the fewest longtail keyword appearances (122 for position 3 and 323 for positions 4–10). While GolfOnline is lower down on the leaderboard for position 3 appearances, it aw 2,363 appearances for positions 4–10 — a strategy that can help increase the brand’s ranking in SERPs.
With the number of Facebook users in the United Kingdom (UK) hitting over 44 million users in 2023, it is not surprising that companies have jumped at the opportunity to advertise on the social media platform. Facebook’s UK digital advertising revenue has been estimated to have breached 2.6b GB pounds in 2019.
We’ve included examples of SCOTTSDALE GOLF’s sponsored Facebook posts. This retailer included the same text with a unique vertical video, which indicates it’s testing which media choice helps to increase its engagement.
When it comes to social media and on-site content strategies, it is important to release content that has a longer shelf life. An article is considered 'Evergreen' if it has maintained its relevancy to an audience for longer. Having a consistent social media approach will benefit golf retailers, as it allows their audiences to get to know their brands and become familiar with their products.
American Golf has the largest Facebook page (155,700 Likes), while SCOTTSDALE GOLF has the largest Instagram account (168,500 followers).
About 20% of people in the UK have a disability – 2 million of which are people living with sight loss. In addition, 1 in 12 men and 1 in 200 women have some degree of colour vision deficiency. Golf retailers should ensure they are not excluding visually impaired customers on the basis of having a non-accessible site and must ensure that all consumers are able to browse services with ease.
Clubhouse Golf flagged the most accessibility alerts (358), with the majority of these alerts due to redundant title text and redundant links. It’s important that this golf retailer assesses and fixes these areas to improve readability for those on a screen reader.
To get a copy of the full report, please complete the enquiry form. If you want to talk to us about accelerating your digital performance, please call us on 01543 410014 or schedule a call with Mike Movassaghi.
Photo by Courtney Cook on Unsplash