Preparation for Next Year's Golf Tournament

As the golf tournament concludes, it's time to focus on prepping for next year. When considering plans, you may start asking yourself - What were some crowd favorites? What could have been better? Did participants enjoy the playing format?

With so many aspects to consider, it's easy to get overwhelmed. In order to ease this process, we've broken down the important steps to take to ensure the last tournament was successful and to be prepared for next year's event!

Tie Up Any Loose Ends

With all of the excitement, it's easy to put off the final touches of the event. But when planning to host an event next year as well, it's better to be quick with all ending processes - this way the participants are happy, and your tournament doesn't earn a reputation for procrastination.

Ensure the following steps are complete:

Calculate money raised after expenses
If raising money for a charity, make sure funds get donated
Determine winners of tournament and distribute prizes

Reach Out To Everyone Who Helped

As soon as the tournament has finished, reconnect with the people who helped make the event a success. Participants, judges and volunteers played a huge role in the tournament, so be sure to reach out to these groups to show gratitude and possibly ask for help next year.

Start by:

Writing thank you letters to all attendees
Creating surveys asking players for feedback on the tournament
Letting sponsors know how much money you raised with their help
Distributing surveys via email for lower cost and easier answer analysis
Sending out thank you letters to judges, volunteers and players via mail or email

By reaching out to these groups post-tournament, it offers the opportunity to show appreciation for their help and gives them a chance to respond with feedback. Additionally, showing gratitude to sponsors and keeping them informed on how the event went (i.e. attendance, money raised, etc) may entice them to donate again next year.

Once the answers from surveys are collected, take recommendations seriously - look for patterns or useful suggestions. Making an effort to improve is essential in making next year's golf tournament an even bigger success!

Make Next Year's Tournament Better

When you're reviewing the finished tournament, take a step back and look for ways to improve. If something more obvious went wrong, it's easy to avoid for next year. However, smaller issues can easily go unnoticed until they actively cause problems. In order to break down all elements of your event, it's helpful to start from the beginning.

In this case, our beginners guide on How to Plan A Golf Tournament is a great place to start to ensure all the basics are covered. Below are the sections outlined in our original guide, but with possible considerations for an event next year.

Have a Goal: Was your goal attainable? If it wasn't a monetary goal, was it successful?
Set Your Date & Time: How was the weather? Were there complaints about the time or date?
Appoint a committee: When planning your event, was there enough help? Were all bases covered?
Determine a Budget: Were there any last-minute or unexpected expenses? What was your event missing?
Choose a Tournament Format: Were the rules easily understood? Did the players have fun?
Choose a Golf Course: Was the golf course easy to work with? Did they give everything they promised?
Find Sponsors: What was the most successful method to get sponsors? What offer did they like the most?

Brainstorm some answers to these questions, and try to think of other considerations that could pertain to your specific tournament.

Planning For Next Year Overview

Once your first golf tournament is complete and you've wrapped up any loose ends, it's important to revisit what went great and what areas needed improvement. Start by surveying participants for feedback and creating your own record of what went well and what could use some work. As a reference, start from the original planning process. From there, analyze all of your available feedback and brainstorm how last year's tournament could be improved. Before you know it, you'll be on your way to an even more successful golf tournament next year.