I’m the course ambassador for my local courses. I’m quite invested in the reviews we receive given that I designed one of the courses and that each tenth of a point could have a considerable impact on whether someone plays our courses from out of town.
I’ve grown increasingly frustrated with my inability to effectively counter reviews with inaccurate or misleading information. For example, the course I designed has two different sets of baskets that correspond to an A and B layout. We also have short and long basket layouts (one basket set is the shortest on the even holes, the other on the odd holes). The layouts are clearly described in the layout descriptions, but many players won’t bother to read them (or look at our tee signs or deduce the obvious alternating pattern). Or we had one reviewer who confused a shelter we built for a stray cat as a homeless encampment. They then ding us in reviews.
I should be able to do something about that. I’d recommend a feature like Google does with it’s review system where a business owner can respond to a review. The course ambassador would have that power. I’m sure there are other acceptable solutions to fix this problem (i.e., having an applicable report option) if there’s a concern about abuse of the commenting system.
These reviews matter for whether people play your course, which matters for our ability to get new courses and city involvement generally. Currently, I update my personal review to address misinformation, but that looks petty, and it doesn’t connect to the incorrect review. I should have an effective way to deal with this situation.