Day in the life of
Director of Membership and Marketing – Melissa Hansen
A Director of Membership and Marketing wears many hats. A typical day will include responding to prospective member inquiries, orientation, and onboarding of new members, creating social media content, updating the club’s website, meeting with current members to discuss events, resignations, or inquiries, and touring prospective members around the club. The task that takes up the majority of your time is processing new member applications and onboarding a new member.
Serving members on the golf course
My typical day
As the Director of Membership and Marketing at a private club, a normal day starts with greeting the golfers before they go out onto the course in the morning.
Once the first wave of golfers is out, it’s time to dive into your inbox. Answering inquiries from prospective members is your next priority. Scheduling tours of the amenities, providing pricing, and answering any questions they may have is essential as the #1 priority of a Membership Director is generating new sales.
Next, it’s time to tackle the inquiries from the current members – questions such as resignation, how to log in to the website, registration for events, and billing pop up in your inbox on a daily basis.
Staging a photoshoot for the club
After your inbox is clear, it’s time to get creative. Whether you are generating content for social media, editing and writing an internal newsletter for your membership, or designing your new piece of collateral for prospective members that tour your club, creative time is a must. On any given day you can have multiple tours of the amenities. Showcasing the lifestyle of your club to prospective members and buyers is a highlight of your role. Being able to story-tell and allow buyers to envision an ‘experience’ is crucial.
Other important parts of the day include attending events such as golf mixers, tennis exhibitions, or social gatherings. Networking with your members is key as that can lend to member referrals. Meetings with vendors, colleagues, and staff also take place throughout the week. Continuing education is also important to know the latest happenings in the industry and generate new and creative ideas for your role.
Creating an experience to remember for our members
Pros
The pros of a Membership Director include the ability to be creative, having the opportunity to meet and get to know incredible people from all around the world, lucrative income, having your hand in many different things so that you never get bored of doing one job. Being able to sell an experience that enhances people’s lives. Being the face of your club. The ability to create new events and ideas.
Cons
The cons are that when it comes to sales, you can never really ‘turn off.’ You will receive inquiries about joining all day and all night so it can sometimes be hard to unplug.
Most often, you are a department of one so you have to be able to multitask as there are a lot of different hats you wear, such as internal communications, external communications, content management, branding, sales, and marketing.
In the role, you are often acting as a listening ear to your members that have complaints. You have to have thick skin and you can’t take their dissatisfaction to heart.
It can also be frustrating when you miss a sale and a buyer joins another club.
