How to Attract More Women Members to a Golf Club

To attract more women members to a golf club, build a four-rung ladder: a free taster, a short group beginner course, a cheap three-month stepping-stone membership, then a first-year full-membership offer. Sale Golf Club in England ran this ladder and turned more than 30 stepping-stone members into 15 full members, just under half.

At a glance

• The gap: women were 17.7% of Australian golf club members in Golf Australia’s 2024/25 participation report, and 15% of club members in England in England Golf’s 2015 figures.
• The demand: in Western Australia, 83.8% of the 1,228 adults who signed up to a Get Into Golf beginner program in 2024/25 were women.
• The metric: full members per 100 taster attendees, tracked rung by rung.
• The asset: the Beginner-to-Member Conversion Ladder below, with the Sale Golf Club cohort and three labelled assumption bands.
• The failure mode: beginners who finish lessons with no playing partner and no follow-up drift away before they ever reach the stepping-stone rung.

Rules of thumb (sourced inline, or arithmetic from the worked table below):

• If your stepping-stone members convert at Sale’s published rate (15 of more than 30), expect about one full member for every two stepping-stone members (CMAE).
• If 40 women attend tasters across a season and every rung runs at the mid band, expect about 10 new full members within the year.
• If you lift only the last rung from 30% to 50% in the low band, expect 5 full members instead of 3 from the same 40 attendees.
• Run tasters as all-beginner groups with time for a chat: England Golf’s focus groups found women prefer to learn where everyone is new to the game (Golf Retailing, 2015).
• If women are under 17.7% of your members, your club sits below the 2024/25 Australian national average (GolfWA).

How do you measure whether a golf club is attracting more women members?

A golf club measures women’s membership growth with two numbers: women as a share of all members, and full members gained per 100 women who attend a taster.

The share tells you where you stand. Golf Australia’s 2024/25 report put the national average at 17.7%, with Western Australia highest at 19.7%, according to GolfWA’s summary of the report (December 2025). England Golf said in 2015 that women were 15% of club members in England, against around 30% in other major European countries. That English figure is a decade old; treat it as history, not a current benchmark.

The conversion number tells you whether your effort works. A club that fills three taster sessions and gains two members has a ladder problem, not a marketing problem. Count each rung separately every month: taster attendees, course starters, course finishers, stepping-stone joiners, and stepping-stone members who upgrade. The general case for counting joiners and leavers separately is on our page about how to increase membership in a club; this page applies it to one segment.

Frequently asked questions

What percentage of golf club members are women?

Women were 17.7% of golf club members in Australia in Golf Australia’s 2024/25 participation report, as summarised by GolfWA. England Golf put the figure at 15% for England in 2015.

What is a stepping-stone membership in golf?

A stepping-stone membership is a short, low-cost category between beginner lessons and full membership. Sale Golf Club’s version cost £99 for three months and included two lessons, practice facilities and accompanied course access.

How many beginners go on to become full members?

No cross-club rate is published that we could find. Sale Golf Club reported 15 full members from more than 30 Get into Golf members, just under half, and Richmond (Yorks) reported 50% of 30 academy members upgrading to its PlayMoreGolf category, a step short of full membership.

Should women’s taster sessions be free?

Both published examples kept the first step free or cheap. Sale ran free tasters followed by a £20 four-week course, and England Golf’s focus groups recommended equipment be available so women can try the game without spending much money.

How quickly should a club follow up after beginner lessons finish?

LeadsNow recommends the week-2 rule: a named buddy, a booked game and a personal message within 14 days of the last lesson. It is a decision rule, not a measured benchmark.

The Beginner-to-Member Conversion Ladder

The Beginner-to-Member Conversion Ladder has four rungs, and each rung exists to make the next commitment small: free taster, group beginner course, stepping-stone membership, first-year full offer.

Sale Golf Club’s club manager published the club’s first cohort in a 2018 article for the Club Managers Association of Europe. The ladder he described: a free ladies’ taster session, a four-week beginner coaching course for £20, then a ‘Get into Golf’ membership for £99 that included two 30-minute lessons with the professional, three months of practice facilities, a bar discount and limited course access when accompanied by a full member. Before that membership expired, he emailed each new golfer a special first-12-month membership offer.

One cohort at one club is an example, not a benchmark. The 22 attendees came from a heavily promoted launch that included members’ friends, so treat its rates as one club’s result. That is why the worked model below takes only one ratio from Sale, the cumulative rung-3-to-4 rate of about half, and treats every other rate as an assumption you should replace.

Worked example: 40 taster attendees in one season

A club that brings 40 women to taster sessions in a season can expect between 3 and 17 new full members within a year, depending on how well each rung converts.

Two things fall out of the arithmetic. First, the rungs multiply, so a weak middle rung caps everything after it: in the low band, halving at each of the first two steps leaves only 10 people to sell a full membership to. Second, Sale’s first cohort (41% end to end) sits near the high band, which is a reason to aim high and a reason not to budget on it. Nobody publishes a cross-club rate for these steps that we could find; if your county, state or national body runs a beginner program, ask for its conversion data before you plan.

A second published case gives a similar upgrade rate on a different ladder. Richmond (Yorks) Golf Club started 30 women-focused academy members in August 2020, and GolfMagic reported that 50% had upgraded to a PlayMoreGolf category, with some moving on to full seven-day membership.

Why do women beginners drift away after the lessons end?

Women beginners drift away after lessons when the course ends with no playing partner, no regular session to turn up to, and no one from the club in touch.

Both published cases built a social layer on purpose. At Sale, the lady captain set up a WhatsApp group for the new golfers and arranged weekly sessions on Tuesday evenings and Sunday afternoons; the manager wrote that this was crucial to the women feeling part of the club. At Richmond, existing members mentored new players, women donated clubs, bags and shoes to beginners, and a WhatsApp group found playing partners during the week. England Golf’s focus groups pointed the same way: the social side of golf matters to women, and many stay away because they see clubs as elitist.

LeadsNow calls the fix the week-2 rule: within 14 days of the last lesson, every graduate has a named member buddy, a booked game or practice session, and a personal message from the club. It is a decision rule, not a measured result; neither club published a drift rate, so we cannot tell you what share of graduates it saves. What the arithmetic shows is the cost of skipping it: at the mid band, each course starter lost before rung 3 costs about a third of a full member (70% x 50% = 0.35).

What should a golf club change first to attract more women?

A golf club should fix its pathway product first, because a free taster with no cheap next step gives a keen beginner nothing to join.

1. Create the stepping-stone category. Price it so trying golf needs little financial commitment, give it lessons and practice access, and set an end date. Sale’s was three months for £99; yours depends on your fee schedule.
2. Schedule the upgrade offer before the stepping-stone expires. Sale emailed its first-year offer before expiry and 9 of 16 took it. An offer sent after a membership lapses is a reactivation campaign, which is harder (see how to reactivate lapsed club members).
3. Staff the social layer with current women members. Ask them to attend sessions, buddy beginners and run the group chat. Sale’s manager called them a massive asset; they are also your most credible recruiters, which is the logic of a member referral program.
4. Market the taster where local women already gather. Sale promoted its first session on local community Facebook pages, one with over 13,000 members, and to local women’s groups, and 22 women attended.
5. Answer every enquiry fast. A woman who asks about the taster and hears nothing for a week may not ask twice. Response-time evidence for clubs is on our page on membership enquiry response time.

Women who already play as visitors are a separate pool with their own ladder; our page on converting green fee visitors into members covers it.

What does running the ladder yourself cost a club?

Running a women’s membership ladder yourself costs a club professional’s coaching hours, volunteer time from current members, and an administrator who follows up every attendee at each rung.

The coaching is the visible cost: a four-week course is four group sessions, and a stepping-stone membership with two lessons adds two more slots per joiner. The hidden cost is the follow-up. Each attendee needs a message after the taster, a reminder before the course starts, a check-in in the fortnight after it ends, and an upgrade conversation before the stepping-stone expires. For 40 attendees that is roughly 90 to 140 individual contacts across a season, depending on the band, most of them in evenings and at weekends. Clubs with a manager or membership secretary who owns that list can run this well in-house. Clubs where enquiries land in a shared inbox are where the ladder leaks, and that is the point at which some clubs bring in outside help with enquiry handling, as covered on our page about lead generation for golf clubs.

Sources

1. Club Managers Association of Europe, “Successfully attract more lady members to your club”, John Jackson, 2018 (Sale Golf Club cohort, prices, follow-up).
2. GolfMagic, “How ‘Stepping Stone’ Memberships helped UK Golf Club attract more female members”, updated 1 November 2023 (Richmond (Yorks) academy members).
3. Golf Retailing, “England Golf women’s focus groups generate factsheets”, 11 May 2015 (15% share, focus group findings).
4. GolfWA, “Aussie golf participation levels surge to record high”, 8 December 2025 (Golf Australia 2024/25 report: 17.7%, 19.7%, 83.8% of 1,228).