Golf Cart Parade Sponsorship: Parades, Charity Rides and Cart Nights That Sell Carts Later

A golf cart parade sponsorship sells carts later when you trade the check for a place in the parade, not a logo on a banner. Ask for the lead cart, a spot in the staging area and the decorated-cart contest. Bring three carts with signs, one person on photos, and a plan for Monday.

What is a golf cart parade sponsorship supposed to buy?

Time with cart owners. That is all it has to buy.

The ask comes every spring. Same neighbor, same committee, same email. “Would the store sponsor the cart parade again this year?” You say yes. Somebody drops off a check. In July your logo hangs on a vinyl banner zip-tied to the fence by the pool, and every cart in the neighborhood rolls past it without looking.

That is a donation. Nothing wrong with a donation. But call it what it is.

A logo on a banner says you paid. A cart in the parade says you were there. People remember the six-seater with the bubble machine and the guy who handed their kid a flag. Nobody remembers the fourth logo from the left.

So the first question is never “how much?” It is “what do we get to do?”

Parades are one of the ideas worth a Saturday. The rest of the list, including the three that are not, is in golf cart dealership marketing ideas.

Why is the staging area the best showroom you will stand in all year?

Because every person in it already owns a cart or wants one.

Picture the Fourth of July, 8:15 in the morning. The parade rolls at 9:30. The carts are already lined up down the clubhouse road, bumper to bumper, and nobody is going anywhere for an hour.

Owners are zip-tying bunting to roof supports. Kids are taping streamers to a rear seat. Somebody’s cart will not turn on. Everybody else is walking the line with a coffee, looking at everybody else’s cart.

That line is a showroom.

On your lot, a buyer walks in with her guard up. In the staging area she walks up to your six-seater on her own, because looking at carts is what everyone there is doing. She sits in it. She asks what the lift kit runs. She says her neighbor’s cart has those seats and hers does not.

You did not pitch her. She shopped.

The route is the least useful part of the day. People on the curb see your cart for a few seconds. The hour before is where carts get looked at. Plan that hour.

What should you ask for in return for the check?

Things that cost the organizer nothing and put you in the line.

Organizers ask for money because money is the only thing a dealer has ever offered them. Ask for these, in this order.

• A spot in the staging area. Not a table at the finish. A place in the line where the carts sit for an hour. This is the one you do not give up.
• The lead cart. A cart in the parade with a job.
• The decorated-cart contest. Offer to judge it and bring the prize. A made-up example: a set of seat covers off your accessory wall. Judging means you walk the whole line and talk to every owner about her cart. When she asks what else is on that wall, the answer is in how to sell golf cart accessories.
• Your name said out loud. “The prize is from Jake at the cart store on the highway,” said into a microphone, beats a banner.
• One line in the parade email. With your web address in it, not only a logo. That is one of the links covered in link building for golf cart dealers.

Here is a reply template. Say the made-up ask was five hundred dollars for a banner.

“Hi Dana, yes, we are in for the five hundred. Could we bring the lead cart, park two carts in the staging area while everyone lines up, and judge the decorated-cart contest? We will bring the prize. If you can say our name at the start and put our web address in the parade email, that covers it. What time is lineup? Jake”

The organizer is a volunteer with a long list. You just took the lead cart, the judge and the prize off it. Treat her like any other partner who sends you buyers, which is the subject of golf cart dealer local partnerships.

Which carts do you bring, and what goes on them?

Three carts. Each one has a job.

The one this neighborhood buys. If the line is full of four-seat family carts with a flip rear seat, bring that cart, in a color nobody on the street has yet.

The one with the friendly price. A clean used cart, detailed, with the number on it. Somebody in that line rides with a neighbor because she thinks a cart costs more than it does.

The one with a job. The lead cart.

Decorate all three. A bare dealer cart in a line of bunting and streamers looks like a sales call.

Then the sign. Every cart gets one, and it is not a logo. Here is a template. The cart and the price are made up.

• Line one, biggest type: “This one is for sale.”
• Line two: “4 seats. Lifted. Lithium battery. Sand color.”
• Line three: “$10,900 as it sits.”
• Line four: “All the photos:” and then the web address of this cart’s own page.
• Line five: “Text Jake” and the store’s number.

Line four is the one that matters.

She will not write anything down. She will take a picture of the sign. That night on the couch she types the address and lands on that cart: the photos, the price, the details. Send her to a homepage and she has to hunt for a sand four-seater she saw for two minutes at 8:30 in the morning. She will not hunt. What that page needs is in golf cart online showroom.

How do people find your store afterward without a clipboard?

Three things. None of them is a sign-up sheet.

The sign. The picture of it is in her phone, next to forty photos of her kids on a decorated cart.

A card. Handed over when she asks a question, not before. A name, a number she can text, the web address. “Text me and I will send you the photos of this one.” That is the whole pitch.

A photo of her cart. Your photo person shoots every decorated cart in the line. The album goes up that night. She finds her cart, tags herself and shares it. Her friends see your store’s name above the picture.

No clipboard. No salesperson working the line asking who is in the market. You are a guest at somebody’s neighborhood party. Working with the association behind that party the rest of the year is in HOA golf cart sales.

One more thing. Some of the carts in that line came off your lot. Those owners will walk a neighbor over and say “this is who we bought from.” Give them a reason to keep doing it with a referral program built around every delivery.

What does a golf cart charity ride sponsor actually bring?

The things only a cart dealer can bring.

A charity ride is a slow loop with stops, run by volunteers, for a cause the neighborhood cares about. As a golf cart charity ride sponsor, your trailer matters more than your check.

• Loaner carts for the volunteers. Check your state and local rules and ask the organizer.
• A tech with a jump pack. On any long ride, somebody’s cart quits. The tech who gets a stranger rolling again in front of the whole group is the best ad your golf cart service department will run all year.
• A cooler at the halfway stop. Water and ice. Your name on the cooler.

Tone the selling down here. It is their cause, not your sale. A small sign on each loaner is plenty: “Loaner from Jake at the cart store. Yes, this one is for sale.”

Should you sponsor someone else’s event or host a golf cart cart night at your own lot?

Do both. Start with sponsoring.

Sponsoring is easier. The crowd already exists.

Hosting is more work and all yours. A golf cart cart night is one evening a month in season when owners bring their carts to your lot. The grill is on. The service bay door is open. A tech checks tire pressure and battery water for anyone who asks. The crowd picks a favorite cart, and the winner gets something off the accessory wall.

Nothing is for sale on the microphone.

A cart night is not an open house. An open house is a sales event built to move carts that weekend, and how to run one is in golf cart dealer open house. A cart night sells the cart she buys next spring, and the rear seat her neighbor adds in August.

Home shows and fairs are a third thing. That crowd is strangers, not neighbors, and working it is covered in the golf cart show booth guide.

Who takes the photos, and where do they go that night?

One person, by name, and that is their only job all morning.

If photos are everybody’s job, you drive home with six blurry shots of the back of a cart. The shot list:

1. Every decorated cart in the line, straight on, family in it. Owners who spent two nights on streamers want that picture.
2. The contest winner holding the prize next to her cart.
3. Your three carts in the line, with the sign readable.
4. Ten seconds of video walking the line. Ten seconds of the lead cart pulling out.

Then the part that gets skipped. The photos go up that night, while everyone who was there is on a phone looking for a picture of their own cart.

• The full album on Facebook. A caption template: “Here is every cart from this morning’s parade. Find yours and tag yourself. The blue six-seater that led the line is on our site with every photo and the price.” Then the link to that cart’s page.
• The short video on Instagram and Facebook. The roll-out, no editing.
• The ten best to the organizer. She will use them in her recap and on next year’s flyer. Your cart is in them.

How event posts fit with the rest of the week is in golf cart dealer social media.

What happens the Monday after?

Thirty minutes, five things, before the week eats it.

1. Thank the organizer. A text with the photos and one question: “What would have made our part easier for you?” Then put next spring’s ask on the calendar.
2. Answer every comment and message from the weekend.
3. Send the cart links. Anyone who texted the number on the card gets the page for the cart she sat in.
4. Tell the floor to ask. Every walk-in gets “how did you hear about us?” When the answer is “the parade,” write it down. How to keep that count is in golf cart lead tracking.
5. Fix the three carts. If one sold, point the sign at a different cart. A sign should never lead to a dead page.

The text template for step three, with a made-up cart:

“Hi, it’s Jake from the parade Saturday. Here is the blue six-seater you sat in, every photo and the price. Your cart looked great, by the way.” Paste the link to that cart’s page under it.

Do not count on a cart selling on the route. A golf cart parade sponsorship is working when a message comes in some Tuesday that starts with “we saw your cart at the parade.” If nobody on the floor asks, you never hear that sentence, and by February you decide the parade did nothing.

Which community events for golf cart dealers are worth it?

The ones where people arrive in carts. Pick three a year.

You will be asked for more than three. The school, the ball league, the fun run, the fall festival. Run every ask through three questions.

Are there carts there? A cart parade, a charity ride and a neighborhood cart night put your cart in front of owners. A banner at a ballfield puts your name in front of parents in pickup trucks.

Will they let you be in it? If the answer to your list is “we only have banner spots,” it is a donation. Give if you love the cause. Take it out of the giving budget, not the marketing budget.

Can you staff it? Three people on a Saturday in season is real money. If the only people free do not want to be there, skip it.

Then spread them out. One in early summer. One in the fall. One in December, which lines up with a golf cart holiday sale if you run one.

The one-page event sheet

One page, printed, on the dash of the truck. Here is a template with made-up details.

• Event: Fourth of July cart parade, the north gate neighborhood.
• Organizer: Dana, with her cell number.
• What we gave: five hundred dollars and the contest prize.
• What we get: lead cart, two spots in staging, contest judge, name at the start, web address in the parade email.
• Times: we arrive 7:30. Lineup 8:00. Roll 9:30.
• Carts: blue lifted six-seater leads. Sand four-seater and white used four-seater in staging, both with price signs.
• People: Jake drives lead and judges. The tech stays with the line. Maria is on photos and nothing else.
• On the trailer: signs, zip ties, bunting, cards, cooler, jump pack, tire plug kit.
• Tonight: album up by 8:00. Ten best to Dana.

Five mistakes that turn a sponsorship into a donation

1. Writing the check and not showing up. The banner went up. Nobody from the store was in the line.
2. Bringing the wrong carts. The wildest build on the lot, in a neighborhood of four-seat family carts. A show cart gets photos. The cart that looks like hers with better seats gets a message on Tuesday.
3. No one assigned to photos. Everybody meant to. Nobody did. The album never got made.
4. Pitching on the route. Flyers on windshields, a salesperson working the lineup. You were invited to a party and treated it like a lot.
5. Forgetting the organizer next year. If the first she hears from you is when she needs money again, you are back to a banner.

Where does Cart Launch fit?

We build the place the sign and the post point to. We do not run your events.

We do not sponsor parades, call organizers, film the line, post the album or send the Monday text. Your team does that, because your team was standing there with a coffee at 8:15.

What we build is the online showroom. The sign on the parade cart has a web address on it. The post that night has a link in it. Both should land on a page for that one cart, with real photos, a real price and the details in text. Your team keeps it current from a phone, so a cart that sold Friday is not the cart the sign points to on Saturday. You see which carts got looked at and who reached out. The domain and the content stay yours.

That is what golf cart dealer websites are for. Where events sit in the bigger plan is on our golf cart dealer marketing page.

Cart Launch works with 55+ dealer partners. Between the owners there is 14+ years operating in 8-figure golf cart dealerships.

If the sign on your parade cart has nowhere good to send her, book a call.

Keep reading

• Golf cart dealer open house: how to run an event that sells carts that weekend
• Golf cart dealer local partnerships: realtors, courses, marinas and builders who send you buyers
• Golf cart show booth: selling at home shows, fairs and expos