Golf Monthly, the flagship golf title from the global leader in specialist media, Future, is once again expanding its editorial team with four exciting additions and announces record e-commerce sales on golfmonthly.com
Golf Monthly is delighted to announce that Alison Root will be joining the staff team as Women’s Golf Editor. She brings with her a wealth of golf media experience having previously held the position of Editor at Women & Golf. She will now take on the responsibility of leading Golf Monthly’s coverage of the women’s game, helping the brand to grow its female audience in 2024 and beyond.
On the equipment side, Joe Ferguson will be joining a growing team of reviewers led by Joel Tadman. Joe has competed on the DP World, EuroPro and Challenge Tours and as a PGA Professional has held a number of custom fitting roles, including at Precision Golf. He will now lead GM’s drivers, irons and DMD coverage.
Golf Monthly is also pleased to announce the addition of Jonny Leighfield to the news team. He joins from the Swindon Advertiser, his home newspaper, where he led the sports desk and reported on the ins-and-outs at Swindon Town FC for almost five years. Working alongside Elliott Heath and Matt Cradock, Jonny will help deliver an ‘always-on’ approach to news coverage, further building Golf Monthly’s audience of high intent golfers and golf fans.
Completing the latest expansion of the editorial team is a new Social Media Editor. A multimedia journalism graduate and 3-handicapper, Monty McPhee had previously worked for Golf Monthly in a freelance capacity. Now on the staff team, his focus will be around building off-platform engagement through innovative and exciting social video story-telling.
“I’m delighted that our parent company, Future, has recognised the potential for growth within golf,” says Editor, Neil Tappin. “Our new hires will help us continue on the trajectory we have set over the past couple of years. I’m particularly excited to see how we can accelerate our women’s golf content under Alison’s expert guidance.”
Elsewhere, Golf Monthly has seen another record year for e-commerce. Since October 2022, the expert content at https://www.golfmonthly.com/ has driven four million affiliate link clicks resulting in audiences purchasing over £12 million worth of retail golf products. Between June and August, Golf Monthly content helped golfers purchase £3.8 million worth of golf gear that fitted their exact golfing needs. The top performing posts included Best Golf Club Sets for Beginners, Best Golf Shoes, Best Women’s Golf Sets, Best Rangefinders and Best Golf Balls. This performance has been driven by improved Google rankings and the optimisation of on-site guides helping users fulfil their purchasing journey.
In October the team will be heading Stateside to tell Golf Monthly’s growth story to key brands. Then, on November 30th, they will be hosting a Golf Industry Summit in London to lay out the brand’s exciting strategy for the year ahead.