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Why Every GM Should Become AI-Savvy (Starting Now)

In this episode of The AceCall.ai Podcast, Clayton Elliott and Brad Milligan deliver a timely and candid conversation around the rising importance of AI in golf club operations—and why General Managers who become AI-savvy are setting themselves (and their clubs) up for long-term success.

Drawing from dozens of recent conversations with club managers across North America, the hosts explore how economic pressure, staffing constraints, and evolving member expectations are creating a perfect storm.

In this new environment, GMs are expected to do more with less—without compromising service standards. That’s where AI steps in.

Clay and Brad describe AI not as a threat, but as a “digital teammate”—a behind-the-scenes helper that never takes a day off.

They emphasize that this tech isn’t about sci-fi robots—it’s about practical, club-friendly tools like AI voice receptionists that can answer phones 24/7, book tee times, provide club info, and escalate issues instantly, even when your staff has gone home.

The biggest benefits of becoming AI-savvy?

✔️ More face-to-face time between staff and members
✔️ Fewer missed calls, fewer voicemails, faster response times
✔️ Happier staff who aren’t stuck doing repetitive tasks
✔️ Better real-time data for GMs to make smarter decisions
✔️ Cost savings from reduced burnout and overtime
✔️ A modern brand image that attracts younger members

One of the most overlooked upsides? Staff morale. When staff get to do the work they’re great at instead of repetitive admin tasks, their engagement, productivity, and loyalty skyrocket.

The episode also tackles head-on the elephant in the room—staff resistance. Many worry AI will replace jobs. But the reality is: AI won’t replace managers—but managers who know AI will replace those who don’t.

Clay and Brad wrap with a challenge: test out the Voice AI demo for yourself. Dial 1-866-838-8581 and experience what a 24/7 receptionist could sound like at your club.

For any GM looking to modernize operations, reduce stress on their team, and wow their members consistently, this episode offers practical insight and next steps. Becoming an AI-savvy GM isn’t about knowing everything—it’s about starting small, staying curious, and being willing to test new tools that could transform how your club operates.

EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

Clay (00:02)

Welcome to the Ace Call AI podcast where we help golf club managers win with AI. Managing a golf club today is harder than ever. So we created simple AI solutions and a podcast to make it easier for you. I'm Clayton Elliott.

Brad (00:17)

And I'm Brad Milligan. Together we bring a mix of entrepreneurial innovation and decades of golf club management experience to help you optimize your club, increase profitability, and elevate the golfer experience. So let's dive in.

Clay (00:32)

Brad, you know, you and I, speak with dozens of GMs weekly at this point. And based on more than a few of our conversations, we're seeing a real shift right now in how some clubs are run and are looking to run in the future. Many clubs are, you know, slowly and steadily pivoting from the full private membership model to some, some, some kind of semi-private and possibly even full public business models.

revenue and profits were never a worry or a concern for many clubs over the last few decades potentially and maybe even longer. Things are starting to change and times are getting tighter all around with this latest tariff announcements and the stock market crash recently.

You know, we're, in uncertain economic times, which kind of feels like we're always in some kind of uncertain economic times, but it feels like now more than ever. And it seems like now more than ever, everyone is. They're thinking about how to do more with less. That seems to be the vibe across sectors and, know, in the, the, in the golf world as well. And the many GMs they're under more pressure than ever. Their members expect great service and staffing is tight and margins are thin.

but they still have to perform. can't, you know, drop the standard and lower the bar that everyone is now used to. And, you know, frankly, from what we're seeing, the ones who are either already starting to embrace AI or are, you know, very bullish and very excited to start embracing AI as soon as possible, you know, for themselves and for their teams, these are the ones that are getting a lead.

on everyone else and the ones that will have a lead in the very near future that might just get a bigger and bigger lead, right? When you fall behind in any contest and you're in a competition, if you're 20 behind the guy in the lead and there's only 10 holes left, well, the likelihood of him missing every shot and you making every shot becomes much lower, right? So the odds of catching up become a lot harder the further on you get in the game. And there's like a, there's a bifurcation, right? This we'll do a whole episode on this in the future.

about the bifurcation that is beginning to happen with tech and people, people getting the wet wear and getting the chip in the brain and getting the, the augment, artificial augmentation of their bodies will be in a different league than the full natural humans who don't want to integrate.

be blended with the machine, right? And I'm, I'm fine for that. I'm full disclosure. I'm one of the ones who will not be getting the machines in my body. just kind of, enjoy tech. think it has lot of benefits, but I don't feel the need to put it in my body. Um, and I'm sure, you know, many of you will agree and many of you will want it your body. And that's, totally cool if you want to do that, but with clubs, the bifurcation with those who do adopt some kind of AI and those who refuse to adopt any of it.

It's going to, the gap's going to grow and like any V graph, the gap between, you know, high tech and low tech clubs will only widen in the months and years ahead. And so, you know, this episode, we'll, we'll, we'll dig in. really want to touch on the software a bit, but then I want to just talk a little bit about the benefits, of the AI savvy general manager, right? We could do multiple episodes on this. We can dig into certain aspects of the job, and how

Brad (03:48)

Yeah.

Clay (04:05)

You know, you can benefit from being an AI savvy general manager, but this episode we'll just kind of touch on as much as we can without going too deep and getting lost in the weeds maybe.

Brad (04:15)

Yeah, exactly. Clay the job of a GM has always been demanding, but today it's, it's a balancing act between operations, member relations, event coordination, and just keeping everything running smoothly. We say this all the time. AI isn't about replacing anyone. It's about finally getting some relief. It's like giving your team a digital teammate that never takes a day off. And the GMs who, who see it like this and steer their team towards AI solutions will help them.

stay ahead in the years that are coming up, the years ahead. I'll tell you just about my kind of personal walk with golf and where we went from pen and paper, T-sheets all the way to everything being online and in apps and all that type of stuff. It's a lot to stay on top of manually when you have the tech, because tech has been integrated into golf, but it's a lot of user interfacing tech.

where the human being has to be in front of their computer for a good percentage of the day, working with tournament software, POS systems, backends and all of these various systems, setting up T sheets manually, everything kind of has to be done by the human being sitting in front of a computer. So it's a lot of interacting and spending most of your time sitting in front of a machine. Whereas, from all these talks we've had and from

where I came from in golf, really wanna see human beings interacting with human beings more. So I think that's where AI can really alleviate a lot of these issues in work balance is having that face-to-face time with members, with other staff, and really adding the human element back into the game.

Clay (06:06)

Yeah, exactly. I couldn't agree more. And that is the main benefit of the AI, of becoming an AI savvy general manager is you find ways to help your team not only do more with less, but accomplish all their deliverables quicker, easier and faster and more accurately, you know, without the manual grunt work that just ties them up and keeps them on their computer all day. And then with all that extra free time,

The AI savvy general manager has an opportunity to think of how do I now take all of my staff who are incredibly proficient and efficient and effective at their jobs and then find ways to reallocate that recaptured time and give it back to the members, give it back to the member experience, back to the member facing opportunities. And that's the value. That's the one of the.

If I could just sum it all up, that's one of the biggest benefits of becoming the high tech general manager is you can maximize the opportunities for high touch. You can maximize the opportunities for every one of your staff to have more high touch opportunities, which is all the members. I'm going say all the members truly care about, but it's a big part of what's going to make the club stand out and differentiate itself from other clubs who don't have this software and whose staff are just tied to their computers and tied up in manual processes.

And, and work. So, you know, we're not talking about sci-fi robots here, taking over the world. Although, you know, that might come down the road in the future at some point. And we're not ruling that out yet, but that's not our software. And that's the, we're building here in golf. you know, we're, we're talking about practical AI tools that can handle tasks like answering phones and responding to questions and increase and, making reservations, booking tee times, handling an array of admin tasks and.

providing quick updates to members and staff or something they can process large amounts of data quickly that would take a person or multiple people hours or days to do. The kind of things that easily eat up hours of your day if you let them.

Brad (08:19)

Yeah, yeah, for sure. And it's, you know, I was just thinking of this right now. It's like, you know, you have an old manual drill back in the day where you're cranking it with both hands and you're drilling through this piece of wood and it's taking you forever, right? And you didn't even have that before. So what you were kind of chipping away at it with some chisel or something like that. And then you had the power drill come along, which like revolutionized how you can speed up your work process. And then like, you know, a battery power drill, like that's all these tools are.

They're tools and they're meant to be kept on leashes, right? So, and I can tell you from my career experience, lots of those basic tasks that we're talking about here are part of the standard customer service experience and are expected by golfers and members. And it's these same tasks that often get missed during peak times. You know, when the pro shop's jammed and someone's also trying to answer the phone and check in and force them, something always gives.

and both golfers and staff suffer and feel the frustration and stress to some sort of degree. That's where AI can step in and back up staff without anyone really missing a beat.

Clay (09:25)

Yeah, it's, the backup, right? That's the whole thing. It's backup. If people don't have backup and then they're up to their neck and things, they're like, man, like I need some backup here. this, this, the goal is that this can be a backup. It can be something to tag in. It can be sitting in the background, waiting to be, you know, tagged in or waiting to be tagged in by a human or tagged in just by a trigger, a phone call, an email, something can, can trigger the AI to step in and do something. So, you know, and it's all right there. It's right there for anybody to experiment with right now.

You just have to be willing to experiment or have that the scientists ethos, the spirit of the scientists. So let's talk about, you know, one of the simplest ways to start. one we're obviously a little bias about. And if you've been listening to all of our episodes, you've heard this along, say us a lot, but you know, our ACE call AI voice, AI receptionist. This tool is essentially a supercharged front desk assistant.

phone answering assistant that works 24 seven, 365. It handles calls, you know, like a professional, like any staff that you'd hire. Sometimes it can handle calls better than a lot of your staff because it has the information in its database and can retrieve it instantaneously. It doesn't forget. doesn't, it's not busy when you call it. It's not tied up and distracted. So it can quite often recall things quicker and more accurately than staff can if they're tied up and busy.

overwhelmed and it can do this at 7 a.m. or 11 p.m. you know and it just if it doesn't have the answers or it can't do the task it records what someone asked for and it can tap in those who do have the answers or do have the answers or who can do the task

Brad (11:11)

Yeah, yeah, that's a big deal. At most clubs after six or 7 p.m. often most managerial staff are gone. Summer staff are left alone and calls just they go to voicemail and voicemails can be missed for days depending on the line in the club. Missed calls means members don't get the info or service they need and by the time someone gets back to them later that day or the next day they've already moved on forgotten about it. They're doing something else. Voicemail just leaves so many holes.

The voice AI receptionist keeps that door open around the clock and lets callers feel heard and reassured that even though their call was missed, multiple staff will be made aware of their call and reason for calling immediately.

Clay (11:56)

Yeah. like, and it's not, and back to the whole robotic, it's actually not robotic at all. It's, you know, no more robotic than a robotic person. You know, if someone that has a,

just a tone or a style, right? It actually can be, we can modify the style and the tone to make it match your club's vibe, right? And so it understands natural language. understands different accents. It can escalate a call if needed. And, you know, the beauty is it's fully customizable. We can make it sound as much like your club. can be a young man or a young woman or an older man or an older woman, whatever voice you want it to be. can be friendly, refined and casual.

You know, whatever your brand is, the AI can reflect that tone.

Brad (12:42)

Yeah, Clay. And I've talked to a few managers who were worried it might, you might have that like feel that it's impersonal or that their, their older members wouldn't be able to use it. But I reminded them that even their oldest members now have advanced cell phones and voice AI is even simpler to use than, than any app they use regularly. If they can talk on the phone and leave a voicemail, they can use voice AI from their side. And other managers saw the benefits of it right away. Their members.

Clay (12:56)

Yeah.

Yeah, exactly.

Brad (13:08)

love getting answers right away instead of playing phone tag and waiting for people to get back to their voicemails. Being able to reduce response times from hours and days to minutes and seconds and increase their responsiveness while decreasing their staff workload and manual tasks was a no-brainer to them.

Clay (13:28)

Yeah. And they jumped on, like we're setting it up for them right now as we're doing this episode. Some of these guys, they didn't need to be sold or their arm twisted or waiting until the end of the season. They were just like, yeah, it can do that. You can, okay, let's, let's try it out. Let's just, start a trial. So, you know, it is, it's, it's a no brainer. So, you know, what are some of the other specific payoffs and specific benefits for the GMs who become AI savvy? So, you know, we'll break down a little list here.

Brad (13:32)

Yeah.

Clay (13:57)

Well, obviously first they get a good boost in member satisfaction. That's the purpose. The primary purpose of this is to impress and wow your members with a higher level of service that they have not previously experienced or, you know, came to expect at the, at your club. Because, you know, when it takes the small stuff off your plate, your staff can better service face to face and more free time from staff equals more face to face time with members. And, you know,

the of the day, this adds some of the stuff that adds the most value and it's what's most memorable and to both, you know, loyal, the loyalist members and also like one-off golfers alike, right? They don't know what they're coming to expect, but they can still be wowed. You know, they don't have to have like 10 points of reference at your club to know that they got a really great experience and a really great treatment and really great customer service.

Brad (14:55)

Yeah, yeah. That's, and that's been a real theme clay and the GMs I speak with have all been in agreement. I spent countless hours behind a desk from early morning until late at night on some of the most beautiful days of the year and busiest days at our club. You know, I charge $150 an hour for private lessons and could have been doing that a lot more if I was not on my computer as much. mean, there are tasks that need to be done, but, definitely great to get outside.

It definitely was not the highest and best use of my time or skills or value to the club and our members or myself. I could also have had more time to just schmooze and build deeper relationships and stronger connections with members. Face-to-face human interactions is what staff and members want more of. And then there's the cost savings. Less overtime and staff burnout, fewer callbacks, fewer dropped balls.

When you're using your team more efficiently and effectively, your budget goes further and nobody even knows you're doing more with less. Plus tools like AI analytics will help GMs make smarter decisions based on real time data.

Clay (16:01)

Yeah, that goes back to this, you know, uh, centralized complaint and compliment line. I think that's, I'm really bullish on that one for clubs because, uh, it's the real time data. It's, in the moment getting these insights and these, uh, ideas in the moment. And some of them you can't act on right away. Uh, but some of them you're like, Oh no, we can fix that right away. And even if it's a little thing, it's the member being like, I, I, I, I

used their software. I registered my critique or my complaint. And within 24 hours, I got a response saying, thank you for your feedback. We fixed that thing. Thank you. The members are to be like, wow, great. I love this software. My voice is heard with this software and things get done with this software. I like this software and the staff too. They're like, man, we didn't even know about that. That's been right under our noses this whole time and we didn't even know about it. We could have fixed it at any time previously, but thanks Brad, you know, send us a little message and

brought our attention to it and someone fixed it with a screwdriver in 30 seconds or five minutes or 10 minutes or whatever, right? It's really, it's just giving the ability to make data driven decisions that like never before, right? And so this isn't just with the voice AI, but there are other ways the data can be accessed and sifted and extrapolated and then make the

decisions based on the data. Another one is like staff morale is one of the most overlooked benefits of AI tech. And this ties back into being overworked or being well utilized, not doing boring drudgery work that, you know, feels like it's below you is not the word I like to use, but it's not the highest and best use of someone's skills and abilities. And that's what we want to do. If someone is being utilized,

And their, their skills and their strengths are being leveraged and fully unleashed. People get fulfillment from that work. Right. And when you're like, I'm so good at this job over here, but I don't get to do it. They still got me stuck over here doing this thing. It can definitely affect morale and you know, battles and wars are, they're won and lost based on, know, soldier morale. really is the most important thing more so than your numbers or your resources is your morale.

And you know, when your team's not stuck doing repetitive stuff, they're repetitive work, they're more engaged, they're more productive, and they're more likely to stick around for the longterm, right? Their loyalty and the staff retention just goes up and up and up.

Brad (18:37)

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Really good points there, Clay. And don't forget clubs that lean into this tech get seen and become known as innovative and forward thinking that attracts younger members, which like it or not is the lifeblood of club success in the future. The average age demographic that clubs have historically served is shifting younger and younger with every year. The combination of a COVID boosting the industry paired with the full swing series on Netflix and YouTube golf and

just popularizing golf has made golf really, really popular amongst younger generations. This trend is only accelerating, which means tech will become more more ubiquitous in the years to come.

Clay (19:18)

Yeah. And I love that show actually. It's getting me more into the game. I'm learning a lot about it and I'm seeing just some epic highlights of some of the best like tournaments and best, know, tours, like performances, some of these guys, like it's, it's like a highlight reel with some drama and I'm enjoying a lot. It's, really getting me into it. okay. So let's address the elephant in the room, right? It's it's team resistance.

and like staff resistance and, know, member resistance, but let's talk a little bit about team resistance. You know, sometimes staff and just people, right? This is the worry that is permeating every industry and every job. And if you're not thinking about it, if this is not in your mind, if it's not making you lose a little bit of sleep at night, you're not paying attention, right? Because AI, it will be replacing people in certain jobs in certain sectors.

And if AI doesn't replace the person, a new person who knows AI will replace the old people who don't know AI. Right? The, the compete that it's like applying for a job.

30 years ago and not knowing how to use Microsoft Word or Microsoft Excel might not have disqualified you for the job. But most jobs now, like, you know, I've been in recruitment for a number of years as well. And one of the, I read a lot of job descriptions. If you are not proficient, like really good with Excel, with Microsoft Word, you're not even hired. They don't even consider you for the job. So we're kind of at that bifurcation again, we're at that place where people who are learning AI and how to use it.

even rudimentarily are going to be leaping ahead of others who don't. again, AI won't replace you, but there is a lot of people out there who are learning it and it will be hard to compete with them when one person who knows AI really well can do the job of five people who don't know AI. So,

It's a, it's a big concern about losing your job to AI, you know, not as much in golf, but you know, managers and staff, they, they do need to think about this, uh, other professionals, other manage management professionals, even not from golf who are super proficient in AI, like a food and beverage manager from a hotel who uses some AI software in that hotel. Well, guess what? They're valuable now everywhere where they can bring that, their knowledge of that software.

Like we were just speaking recently with John Cave in St. George's and he was talking about benchmarking in other industries. He was saying, we're not just benchmarking our restaurant to other golf clubs. We're benchmarking our restaurant to all other fine dining restaurants in the area. And cause those are the substitutes we're competing with for a fine dining restaurant experience. So, it's not just people in golf competing with people in golf. It's people in golf competing with other staff from other industries that overlap.

who develop these AI skills potentially in another industry that's not as slow to adopt and get, you know, utilizing this, software. So yeah, won't, AI won't replace your job, but another manager who knows it just might. So, you know, becoming the AI savvy GM means you will always have a competitive advantage in the golf labor market compared to managers who don't and all staff, all the staff at every level.

they can find ways to utilize it, they will have that competitive advantage over those who don't. you know, we always like to talk about how AI needs to be kept on the rails so that it doesn't go off and do things we don't want it to, which is true, but it does not need to be intimidating. It's again, it's just a tool to help your staff be more efficient. And as a result, have more time and more availability to focus on the human side of operations.

Brad (23:12)

exactly Clay, it's a tool. It's about supporting the team, not replacing it. We're not trying to get rid of people here. It's why we always recommend starting with a low hanging AI fruit, something easy and high impact, like our voice, our ACEcall.ai voice receptionist. Once your team sees how it reduces interruptions and makes their work easier and less stressful and helps them do a better job and make members happier, they will quickly become the biggest fans of this tech.

Clay (23:41)

Yeah. And that's the hope, right? And it's crucial to bring all your team into the process early on into the learning, bring them onto the learning curve as soon as possible, right? And just share with them, basic white papers or PDFs or videos or short tutorials, just bring it to their attention and get their input. Cause again, if you're not talking about this with your team, you're also missing out on opportunities.

to tap into their genius and their experience. some, might have one of your staff that spent the last two years learning it inside and out as much as possible. They might already be using it. They may not be talking about it because maybe no one else is using it and they don't want to, you know, be the odd one out. But if you make it the norm to at least discuss and share wins, that's really important. And, you know, and let them sit in on the meetings and ask questions and suggest ways that it could help them automate some of their own tedious tasks.

that are on their regular list of routine duties. And it gives them ownership. It reduces the fear factor, it reduces the friction, it reduces the unfamiliarity, which makes them just a little more open. You really want and you really need their buy-in. To get that, you need to be clear and you need to get a clear picture of their daily workload before AI.

and what their daily workload would look like after AI. they can, you know, when they can see how much better everything that they do, when they see how much better like everything will be when they can see how much more they can do with this tech compared to without this tech, there's a good chance that the most, most of them will jump on board with enthusiasm, right? To make sure that these initiatives succeed, right? Because overall, bit of learning curve, bit of

stumbling around at first potentially, but, the gains are too big to, to ignore and to pretend like they're not there and then not pursue them.

Brad (25:47)

Yeah, yeah, without buying from key staff first and all staff eventually, it will be a challenge. We had that interview with Brad Burgaard and did a sales meeting with him and his team. And, you know, he brought his whole team in, all his managerial staff and had them in there in the room, right? So it's good managers will do that. They'll really lean on their staff and see how they act towards this tech and new ideas at the club and bring them in. They want this think tank of information.

So to help with this, can even identify somebody like a tech champion on your team, someone who's excited about new tools and can help coach others along the way and be an advocate for bold action and embracing the spirit of the scientist. It's all about creating momentum with those small wins. And even the most tech adverse, self-proclaimed dinosaur GMs know who the best techies are on their team. Everybody has some sort of techie on their team.

and can empower them to start tinkering and experimenting. It does not need to be a full team and company-wide campaign to start. Nominate your most tech savvy staff who would be most excited to take this on and delegate to them the job of researching and presenting to your team the best AI tools and tactics that are again, that low hanging fruit. If the experiments are cheap or free and you can quickly...

and easily start generating data and feedback. You can make up your mind if a tool or a tactic should be adopted long-term or just simply discarded. The GMs who embrace the true spirit of a scientist and the scientific method will win in these modern times. This is really, really a powerful analogy for golf club management and all management really. Ask a question or address a problem, do some research, form a hypothesis, run an experiment, analyze the results.

And then, you know, form your conclusion. This formula built everything around us and it can help golf clubs and golf managers win with AI too.

Clay (27:52)

Yeah, exactly. And that's it is it's the spirit of the scientists, right? It's that spirit of like, I have a, there's I have a question or a problem. It always starts with that. Okay. Hypothesis and you work through those steps and then you get a result and it's, it's a, it's a result based on, a rigorous process that's dispassionate. It's, it's separate from.

Brad (27:56)

Yeah.

Clay (28:17)

opinions or trauma or fears or biases, right? It's really just doing the tests, getting the result, and then saying, is this, does this benefit us or not? Does this, is this, is this what we wanted or not? Does this match our hypothesis? And does it, you know, help us access a benefit or not? Right. And it's becoming an AI savvy GM. It's not about knowing everything. And it's not about knowing everything right now, right? It's just about taking that first step.

be curious, be open, and most of all, you know, be willing to test and learn. And yeah, like you said, man, it's the spirit of the scientists and it's always observing and looking for problems to solve or pains to heal or remedy or ways to make, you know, the existing way of doing things better. And that all starts with, yeah, embracing this process, right? And people including myself and...

And you too, imagine, right? We have a tendency to draw firm conclusions and make up our opinions based on our gut feelings, which they're not always wrong. You know, our gut it's right often, right? Our intuitions are.

of snap judgments, right? They can be accurate if they're based on a life and a career of experience, right? It's called second nature for a reason. You don't have to think about things. The real professionals, do things, doesn't matter what job or profession, they do things almost automatically because a lot of it is in their unconscious. And when something's off, they just know it. They don't have, they don't need a scientific experiment to prove something's off. But sometimes that can also blind us, right? So

You know, I'm not suggesting we form and execute deliberate scientific experiments for every decision we need to make in business and life, but we can always benefit from embracing the path of objective truth seeking and coming to impartial and non-subjective

conclusions, you know, and I think this is a, it's a big, big part of becoming that AI savvy general manager is that you're not starting with a, A preform conclusion that must be perfectly matched. have end goals, have, ideals, you have dreams you're aiming for, and then you try to reverse engineer something and to get you there. You know, if it doesn't happen the first time, maybe the second time it will, but again, the benefits of attempting.

Even if it doesn't go perfectly the first time far outweigh the risks. and even far away the benefits of waiting, right? There's benefits of waiting and there's benefits of trying to do something now, even if it's small, I would say the benefits of action sooner than later outweigh the benefits of action later rather than sooner, if that makes sense.

Brad (31:14)

Yeah, totally. And there's nothing wrong with trying something new out. you you're going to win a lot of the time if you, if you've done your due diligence, your research and everything, but even if it doesn't, doesn't work out for you, like say you buy a bad software program or something and it's no good admitting that that, software is no good. then, and then being able to shift and then get some other software in a timely manner, instead of just kind of, you know, riding that, that sick horse.

and keeping going down that road, think that's, that's a huge, standout play of really good managers is, is, you know, getting feedback from everybody saying, this isn't very good software. I don't like it. It's not working. It's not doing what we thought it would. And then not continuing to go with that software and just saying, okay, it didn't work out. Let's shift because you're going to get way more praise for that. And people will recognize that in you and be like, yeah, no, he noticed a problem and it wasn't working and he shifted. So, you know, I just like to say in, in, in free for.

for you listening right now, experiment with calling our demo voice AI receptionist for our hypothetical ACE call golf club. Experiment with it and test it out. Ask it questions and experience it like a member would. Hear what it's like when a friendly professional voice answers your call at any hour. You'll be amazed with the conversation you can have with it. I've called it tons of times. I have a great time with it. Just give it a try. Just dial 1-866-838-

8581 that's 1-866-838-8581. Give it a call.

Clay (32:48)

Yeah. And you'll see how easy it is to chat with. you know, if you love it you want to learn more, we'd love to show you how it could work at your club. You can book a demo with us directly. You know, we can run through a whole conversation with you after you tested it out, you know, 30 minutes tops. And if you're ready to work smarter and improve your member experience and give your staff the support, the backup that they've never had previously.

you know, and you can get ahead of this AI kind of movement and get ahead of the curve. You know, now is definitely the time and you know, don't, don't wait for all your peers to do it first. you know, some of them are your competitors, some of them are your peers, but, don't be the last guy to get on this bandwagon. You know, there, there are some real, opportunities for the early adopters of this to

We've mentioned in previous episodes, like the wow factor, like the last person to get email, there's no wow factor there. The last person to get any new tech is just playing catch up, right? The first people to get it and do it well, they have buzz, they have wow factor, they give opportunities to leverage new levels of member and customer service experience that were previously impossible to get.

And it's an opportunity to set the bar, to be the people who set the bar versus the people who are trying to quickly in a kind of panic, catch up to the new standard. So that's really it for today. I don't have nothing more to add. Brad, is there anything more you'd like to add?

Brad (34:32)

No, no, that's good stuff. Yeah, I think these managers just need to try it out and see how it's gonna work for them, because it will work for them. As we're having these discussions with general managers and other industry experts, they just have different uses for it. So it's more working hand in hand with us to figure out, hey, I could use it for this or I could use it for that. One club may need to use it for their food and beverage department. Another club might not have enough staff in there.

their pro shop and their phones are not getting answered. So there's all these different use cases and it's basically just figuring it out in these discussions and podcasts that we're doing with general managers where the holes are in their operations and you know how we can come in and help them with this tool.

Clay (35:14)

Yep. And as you talk, we've talked to a lot of private clubs, talked to a few like semi-private clubs. I think one that was like full public. I can't remember if we've talked to a full public club yet, but they're full public now, They've shifted fully away from the membership model. So yeah, each club, have different goals. They have different financial goals. They have different member or golfer.

Brad (35:26)

Yeah. Yeah. Taryn Dow with their Ted Pease. Yeah. Yeah.

Clay (35:41)

Right. They once served as a golfer that might buy a 10 pack, you know, and then never buy a 10 pack again, or check a different club. Other places have legacy members for 20, 30 years. They've been there and they're, not going anywhere. So there's different goals. There's different objectives, there's different challenges and pain points and problems. And, know, AI can help with all of those, depending on who you are and what your, what your club's like and what the objectives are of your, of your club's existence. So we'd love to chat with you a little more about that if you're interested. So do reach out to us.

And I would say that's it for this episode of the ACE Call AI podcast. Thank you again for joining us as we just started to explore and really just scratch the surface of some of the benefits of becoming an AI savvy general manager. and be sure to catch our next episode, the benefits of becoming the AI savvy golf pro and trainer. we're going to dig in and explore that. if you're running instruction clinics or a lesson book and you

You really, you won't want to miss how AI is, is beginning to change the game there as well. There's, there's tons of opportunity for you to reclaim, misallocated time or just wasted time, that doesn't add value to you or your, your, your, your members or your, students or your, customers. and, know, do share that episode with your golf professionals and your training staff so that they can learn these, you know, very timely.

and important tips that can help them improve their customer service and enhance your club's member and golfer experience. That's it for today. Once again, I'm Clayton Elliott.

Brad (37:19)

I'm Brad Milligan.

Clay (37:20)

And we'll see you next time on another episode of the ACE Call AI podcast, where we help golf club managers win with AI. Take care.