Pro golf’s offseason of the influencer continues.
On Tuesday, Good Good Golf announced an “expanded” partnership with NBC Sports and an ownership stake in the TGL’s LA Golf Club — a pair of moves further highlighting the content/apparel company’s rise as one of golf’s buzziest brands.
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TIMING IS EVERYTHING
Golf Channel/NBC’s partnership announcement with Good Good comes the same week the network and YouTubers will collaborate on a made-for-TV broadcast from the WM Phoenix Open. For the second straight year, the Good Good GolfNow Desert Knockout Presented by Underdog (legendary sponsorship activation) will air on Wednesday night on Golf Channel and the Good Good YouTube channel from the Grass Clippings facility in Tempe, featuring a competition between Good Good’s stars, other golf content creators, and several “current and former players.”
The expanded partnership will feature more Good Good Golf events on the NBC family of networks, a development the group’s leader, Garrett Clark, hinted at in an interview on the Colin and Samir Show late last year.
“They’re doing our events,” Clark said then. “The live events we broadcast go to Peacock, as well as YouTube.”
NB-SEE IT
The partnership represents a striking admission for Golf Channel/NBC in one way: Golf’s YouTube creators are reaching an audience traditional TV cannot. The same audience gap works in the other direction, which is part of why the deal to bring Good Good to Golf Channel/NBC makes so much sense for both sides.
While it’s easy to find the recent YouTube obsession mildly nauseating, the insight at the core of it is that YouTube is reaching an audience outside the traditional golf demographic. That’s hugely valuable for networks like Golf Channel, which have fallen victim to the same headwinds facing the rest of the cable TV industry in the age of cord-cutting.
If one-offs like this week’s event help drive new viewers to GC, then it’s well worth the cost of production.
GOOD … GOOD?
The benefit for GG, other than a nationally televised spotlight, is the opportunity to diversify the brand’s business. Good Good’s content arm is a well-oiled machine, but its reliance on the whims of the YouTube algorithm makes it vulnerable. (See: Buzzfeed’s rapid contraction after Facebook’s algorithm changes following the 2016 election.) That’s why so much of the Good Good business is reliant upon apparel and gear. If GG’s vision works, those businesses will drive revenue independently of the YouTube algorithm.
OWNER’S BOX
TGL ownership has become golf’s version of FTX brand ambassadorship: Everbody you know has it, and nobody can really explain what it means.
Good Good’s agreement with LAGC is the latest of the bunch, though this equity stake seems to have a more practical implementation for the TGL. There are loads of natural overlaps between Good Good’s content arm and the kind of promotional work that jives with the TGL’s mission with its non-Tiger-or-Rory-led franchises.
One area we won’t see overlap? Merchandise. Good Good has made no secret of its desire to be an equipment and apparel company in the long-term, but each of the TGL’s players is bound by their big tour apparel-and-gear partnerships while playing in front of a simulator. In other words, don’t expect to see Collin Morikawa in a Good Good hat anytime soon.