Membership Director - How to Hire and Motivate a Club Sales Pro (Complete Survey)
1/31/2007

Here is the final and complete version of our survey covering the recruitment process for Membership Directors. We hope you enjoy reading the survey results and learn a thing or two about Membership Sales recruiting.

GolfSurfin.com interviewed over 20 Membership Sales professionals actively employed within private, semi-private, resort club/golf club marketplace to help employers determine how to hire, train and motivate Membership Sales Managers. The interviewees are located throughout the US and have anywhere from 1.5–20 years of Membership Sales experience.

We asked a series of questions geared to uncover how the employer should conduct an interview, how to get a new hire up and running quickly and finally, how to motivate the membership salesperson to recruit new members and retain existing ones. Additionally, we asked our participants how best to obtain referrals from existing members.

The results of our research will be broken into 4 parts. Here is complete Survey.


Part I How to Hire & Motivate a Club Sales Pro


Question:Why did you choose Membership Sales as a career?

-Financial Rewards
-Opportunity to build program
-Opportunity to interact with Members & Community

Most people get into Membership sales for financial rewards as well as satisfaction gained by building a membership program from scratch and watching it develop and flourish. Most Membership Directors (MD), if not all, enjoy interacting and establishing relationships with members and prospects. A number of people simply “fell” into the position.

Question: What is the biggest turnoff when interviewing with a potential Employer/GM?

-GM is “wishy washy” about program/doesn’t ask enough probing questions
-GM lacks rapport with candidate
-Group interviews
-Goals/Compensation not discussed

The GM must give the candidate a clear plan including the direction in which the club is heading, knowing the type of “member” they want to pursue and how to pursue them. Additionally, it is “key” during the first interview to lay-out realistic goals and expectations and review compensation and benefits in general terms.

Overall, the successful GM is confident throughout the interview process and has a good rapport with the candidate. Group interviews are ok and can uncover important personality traits of a candidate however, the process should not be too intimidating. The candidate should be made to feel at ease throughout the group interview.

Question: What are the most common errors a GM can make with a newly hired MD?

-No Training
-No Tools
-No Lead Tracking
-Lack of Communication
-No Plan in Place
-No Budget

The newly hired MD should be trained on club “culture” and know the type of individual they want to attract (mentioned above) instead of being “thrown in” to a position with no direction or support from the GM. Some MD’s have had to share desks with other employees, were working without a computer or collateral (printed material) to send prospects.

Lead tracking is an important source for closing new members and the mode of lead tracking varies according to member demographics. Usually, the younger the membership base, the more important a website plays in lead tracking. If lead tracking is done predominantly via telephone, a telephone lead tracking system should be in place.

Communication with the GM and other department heads is critical within the first 90 days of MD’s employment. The management team must “buy in” to the success of the MD and be aware that if the MD is successful, the other departments benefit as well. If the management team fails to communicate and each dept head has separate, autonomous goals, the MD is sure to fail. Finally, just about every MD interviewed thinks it’s imperative to have a clear plan within the first 90 days of employment including setting -up parameters for prospects, purchasing databases and implementing an effective marketing campaign.
Part ll - Motivating the