Todd Graves  - Graves Golf

On Understanding Your Value: "Your customer is going to feed on your clarity of what you have to offer. And without clarity, you're just going to be a commodity."

Some things just go hand in hand with business.  Things like marketing, closing a deal over a beer, meeting for coffee and, of course, golfing.  It seems that golf is a sport that allows you to chat on a more casual level with vendors and clients to get deals done and have a good excuse to be out of the office on a beautiful day.

But this can be challenging, especially if you don't golf well.

Todd Graves grew up with golf and learned the single plane swing from the best in the business, Moe Norman.  Using Moe's unique swing that works well, along with a 5 step training process, Todd has built a business to help golfers become better golfers and non-golfers become golfers that don't hurt their back.  He has systematized the golf swing to the point of making the game fun for entrepreneurs.

With Graves Golf, Todd has built a business around helping golfers get better.  His process has value for businesses of all types, helping you understand the reason behind the rule of 'Systematize Everything'.

Listen as Todd explains his approach to training golfers and how he built his business around one guys process that went against the norm.

Enjoy!

Visit Todd at: https://gravesgolf.com/

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Podcast Overview:

00:00 Outdated PGA teaching methods

09:52 Regulating equipment in sports

13:15 Learning step-by-step skills

18:40 Todd's seminar on clarity

23:42 Understanding golf swing mechanics

30:20 Fixing common golf swing mistakes

33:51 Starting Graves Golf with a trailer

37:12 Prioritizing values over quick fixes

42:22 Building a custom golf academy

51:08 Raising your standards for excellence

54:44 Golf club components explained

01:02:16 Range balls vs. regular golf balls

01:03:41 Choosing the right golf ball

Podcast Transcription:

Todd Graves [00:00:00]:

Now when you, when you look at the way the game has advanced and I'll just give you some, some data, but just from in the late 80s, early 90s, John Daly led the Tour driving distance. John Daly was the longest striker of the golf ball on the, on the Tour at the time. And he was driving the ball, I think 288 yards, 289 yards. Something was the, he was the longest. And the Tour average driving distance was around 265. Today it's 30 yards greater than that. So now. Oh yeah, yeah.

Todd Graves [00:00:29]:

So now the average driving distance is in the 295 range and the longest drivers out there in the 32330 range and sometimes longer.

James Kademan [00:00:42]:

You have found Authentic Business Adventures, the business program that brings you the struggle stories and triumph and successes of business owners across the land. Downloadable audio episodes can be found in the podcast link found at https://drawincustomers.com We are locally underwritten by the Bank of Sun Prairie Calls On Call, Extraordinary Answering Service, The bold business book as well as Live Switch. Today we're welcoming slash, preparing to learn from Todd Graves of Graves Golf. And Todd, I'm excited. We are now entering what, at least in my world in the Midwest, is golf weather. So let's talk golf today.

Todd Graves [00:01:19]:

Well, yeah, the Masters, you know, coming next week. So really golf, golf season across the country and probably across the world really kicks off for us around Masters. We always gear up for this time of year. You know, nothing's more exciting than the Masters tournament. So that's a, it's a big week next week. So we're excited about what's happening. You know, it's been a, been kind of an early, interesting season this year because the weather seems to be, it's, it's always off and on, but it's, you know, I own a golf course here in Edmond, Oklahoma, and the, the grass came out early this year, which I don't know if that's always a good thing. But, but, but we're, yeah, we got some nice, nice playing conditions and we're ready to go.

Todd Graves [00:01:58]:

You know, golf's golf kicks off for us and we're ready to get busy this year.

James Kademan [00:02:02]:

Nice. Yeah, I'm in Wisconsin and we always joke that we have six springs.

Todd Graves [00:02:06]:

Yeah.

James Kademan [00:02:07]:

Last a day or two at a time. So I know that the course has been open and they've been snowed on and all that jazz. But at any rate, let's, let's talk about how you got started because it's been a while you've been in this game for quite a bit, it sounds like.

Todd Graves [00:02:21]:

Yeah. Yeah. You know, I'm not sure, you know, in business, being an entrepreneur, I'm not sure that you ever really know what you're doing at first. You know, you get into the game because you, you have an idea or you have something unique that you want to offer the world and help people with. And I think that's kind of what I stumbled into. I, you know, I, I played professional golf. I played in college, and I played professional golf, and, you know, I aspired to be a player, and I played for a while on the, on the tours around the world, and, and I just, you know, I kind of fell into. I saw a problem.

Todd Graves [00:02:53]:

I saw a problem in the golf world from, from a golf learning teaching methodology standpoint because I struggled, you know, I struggled to learn the game. I struggled to become better at playing it, even though I was a good player. I, I, you know, I came from a background of, of educators. My parents were both. My dad was a PhD in microbiology, taught at the medical school. My mother owned civil learning centers here in Oklahoma City. She was an entrepreneur herself. So, you know, I came from this background of always questioning how things worked.

Todd Graves [00:03:23]:

And, and I, I would consider myself relatively smart. I don't think I'm the most intelligent tool in the, you know, the smartest guy in the world. But, but I always, you know, I'm, I'm inquisitive. I always was curious about things and, and as I tried to approach the game of golf and get better at it, there was a lot of, A lot of dogma in, in the golf instruction world. And there was. There was really no standardized teaching methods. There was, and it just didn't seem simple to me. So the more I tried to improve, the more trouble I saw with the industry that teaches the game of golf.

Todd Graves [00:03:54]:

Matter of fact, to give you an example, the PGA teaching manual, the manual that they teach from today, if you go into a pro shop and you want to learn from a PGA pro, that teaching manual that they operate from and they, and they use has not been updated since 1990. So, so you would think that, you know, with the technology today and with, with the way the game works and with all the, I mean, look at, look at the industry. Look at your world. You know, we got AI. We got so much, we got so much information out there and the ability to do things we could never do before, and you got this antiquated way they teach the game of golf. Now, I'm not saying that everything in that manual is bad and wrong. I'm just saying that there's so much more that we can, we can offer and become better at what we do. And, and that's, that's part of an entrepreneur's job is to, so I look at that.

Todd Graves [00:04:41]:

That was part of it. And there was, you know, everybody's teaching a different method. So I just, I said, look, there's, there's something wrong with, with the game of golf. It's how it's being taught and it's what's being taught. And I've been, I, I built a business around that and, and so I kind of stumbled into it just because I saw a big need and a problem. You know, that's what we do as entrepreneurs. We find needs, we find problems, we try to solve those things as best we can. You know, that's fair.

James Kademan [00:05:03]:

That's totally true. Tell me a story, because I have to admit ignorance here I am just getting into golf, like just getting into golf. So I have played golf. Not well. We play best ball and out of 18 holes, we're probably using mine two or three times at best.

Todd Graves [00:05:19]:

Yeah.

James Kademan [00:05:19]:

And I'm going to call that pure luck. Nothing.

Todd Graves [00:05:22]:

Yeah.

James Kademan [00:05:23]:

So at any rate, tell me a story about, let's just say a typical drive. A typical drive in 1990 versus a typical drive now with the skills and the tools and all that kind of stuff. Is it. When I say a typical drive, I guess a good drive, not my drive. A good drive where it goes straight, where you intended to go. Is it farther than what it was?

Todd Graves [00:05:44]:

Well, here's what's interesting about it. You know, when you, when you look at the way the game has advanced and I'll just give you some, some data. So just from in the late 80s, early 90s, John Daly led the Tour driving distance. John Daly was the longest striker of the golf ball on the, on the Tour at the time. And he was driving the ball, I think 288 yards to an 89 yards. Something was the, was he was the longest and the tour average driving distance was around 265. Today it's 30 yards greater than that. So 10%.

Todd Graves [00:06:15]:

Oh, yeah, yeah. So, so now the, the average driving distance is in the 295 range and the, the longest drivers out there are in the 32330 range. So. And sometimes longer so that, you know, you can, you can attribute that to probably, we call it the tiger effect. In the game. You can, you know, better athletes,...