Challenge

The PGA TOUR wanted to provide their fans with additional ways to experience the sport of golf by building and supporting exceptional iOS, Android, and AR applications.

Inspiration

Golf caters to audiences of all ages and with the PGA TOUR’s suite of digital products, their fans can now experience the game in completely new and immersive ways, even when they’re off the course.

Idea

VML Apps developed iOS and Android apps for the PGA TOUR to create a more engaging fan experience. The apps allow users to follow the PGA TOUR from anywhere, which includes a real-time leaderboard, live-player scorecards, shot trails, access to live video for all PGA TOUR events, on-demand content, latest news from PGA TOUR.com, and personalized push notifications based on user preferences. For onsite event attendees, we implemented beacon technology into the apps to alert users when they are near different attractions on the course.

We also developed GolfTV to internationalize the app so people outside of the U.S. could experience PGA TOUR golf content, which applies a user’s geolocation to provide them with specific PGA TOUR content based on their region.

We redesigned the app’s navigation structure so that users could take better advantage of the application’s content that highlights special events catered towards both live and non-live tournament days. We built a new PGA TOUR homepage to prioritize content that users will care most about.

And to bring fans even closer to the PGA TOUR we created the PGA TOUR AR experience, an AR app that features various holes on the PGA TOUR that allows users to plot shot trails from live ShotLink data as tournaments are being played. The experience applies surface-detection allowing users to display 3D golf course models and shot trails onto any flat surface around them in AR. With the 360º Magic Tee Experience, AR and 360-degree videos are combined to allow fans to completely immerse themselves in the tee box of a tournament. The PGA TOUR AR app offers a new and unique way for fans to follow golf, one they wouldn’t normally get off the course.

Growth

VML Apps worked on innovative updates with new features for the PGA TOUR applications for many years. While working on the PGA TOUR App, the iOS app rated at 4.6 stars while the Android app was at 4.1 stars. The PGA TOUR AR app saw a successful launch, a significant amount of press coverage from publications like Sports Business Journal, Golf.Com, and TechCrunch, and the app was even covered in a SXSW panel by Apple’s Senior VP of Internet Software and Services Eddy Cue.

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Awards

2018 Webby Awards

2018 Webby Awards

Mobile Sites & Apps - Sports


Honoree

2018 Cynopsis Model D Awards

2018 Cynopsis Model D Awards

Best Use of AR Tech


Finalist