Brand deals surge for golf creators as the sport’s popularity spikes

Golf’s moment in the sun for advertisers has paralleled the rise of the number of golf content creators. In 2024, PGA Tour videos averaged 85,000 views and 34 engagements per video on YouTube; conversely, the popular YouTube golf channel Good Good Golf averaged 545,000 views and 717 engagements per video during the same period. In April, the video for “The Duels,” a creator-focused golf event hosted by LIV Golf, accrued over a million views in under 24 hours.

“Golf is very fun to watch on TV, but it almost feels inaccessible at times. Am I going to sit down on Sunday and spend six hours watching a golf tournament if I’m not really fully invested in it?” said Ryan Dow, vp of creator, gaming and esports for the agency Sportfive. “What the creator generation has done is given the reins to individuals to make golf entertaining.”

Golf creators are well aware of the more casual position they occupy in the sport’s media ecosystem, and some have capitalized on it with videos about golf-related drinking challenges and golf-themed game show spoofs instead of focusing on the competitive side of golf — or by taking a particular competitor’s side.

“Ultimately, we’re just a group of best friends having fun on and off the course,” said Bob Does Sports creator Robby Berger. “And, that seems to resonate with people who watch and has led to some incredible brand deals and partnerships.”

Golf creators also create opportunities for some brands that hadn’t aligned with the sport’s formerly stodgy, upper-crust reputation to connect with golf fans. Mountain Dew, for example, has spent the past year sponsoring golf creators such as Good Good and Bob Does Sports, with creators representing the brand’s first-ever foray into golf, according to Sam Graviet, vp of creative at Doing Things, the media company that owns Bob Does Sports.

As part of a year-long partnership with Mountain Dew, for example, Bob Does Sports filmed a sponsored road trip that saw the group play at various golf courses across the U.S. before meeting up with the brand’s mascot, the Mountain Dude. On Sept. 4, Good Good will feature Mountain Dew as the main sponsor of its King of the Mountain golf event, a bracket-style tournament for two-man teams.

Meeting golf fans where they are

For marketers, sponsoring golf creators can be a more cost-effective way to reach the golf audience than TV ads or traditional top player sponsorships, according to Ryan Skeggs, a managing director at the agency Wasserman, who primarily works across sports accounts. By sponsoring creators to attend tentpole golf events like the annual major tournaments, he said, brands can reach these events’ audiences without having to spend costly fees to sponsor the tournaments themselves, which can often go for between $15 million and $25 million. He did not say how much the influencer sponsorships cost.

“You might not necessarily be a sponsor of a major or one of the big golf tourneys, but you can film content there,” Skeggs said. “Obviously, there’s rules and regulations of what you can and can’t do — but they can be seen there.” To avoid interfering with official broadcasts, for example, most golf tournaments typically don’t allow creators to post videos of live play or share real-time scores on their feeds. Some events, like the Masters Tournament, have stricter rules barring attendees from using any phones or cameras at all while on the course.

As golf grows in popularity, brands are stepping up their spending on creator and influencer marketing, with Unilever publicly declaring that half of its marketing budget would go toward social channels by the end of 2025.

Some of this growth is quantifiable at the agency level. At WME, for example, Davis Holman — who has managed golf creators such as Good Good — joined in 2019 as the agency’s only dedicated golf agent. Now, five years later, that team has grown to be five members.

“When it comes to creators, we can be quite nimble, so we can get things done very quickly, and we’re kind of a one-stop shop for everything they need,” said golf creator Paige Spiranac. “Instead of having to go hire copywriters and producers and editors and marketers, we do all of that ourselves.”

At the moment, the majority of golf viewership — and therefore brand interest — currently takes place on YouTube, per Sportfive’s Dow. In 2025, YouTube has more golf content than ever. Total uploads of golf videos on the platform increased from 427,000 to 454,000 between 2023 and 2024. So far in 2025, YouTubers have uploaded 242,000 golf videos, putting the platform on track to have over 500,000 new golf videos by the end of the year.

Golf creators are on the rise on all platforms, both short- and long-form, according to Dow. The golf creator with the most followers on any individual platform is Spiranac, whose Instagram account boasts a following of over four million. This means she is the most-followed golfer in the world on any social media platform, with an Instagram following that exceeds those of big golf names like Tiger Woods, Phil Mickelson and Bryson DeChambeau. Spiranac said that she had experienced an unprecedented influx of brand interest in 2025, although she declined to share specific numbers or name specific advertisers.

“There’s one contract where I make more in one month than I would have even fathomed in one year [in past years],” Spiranac said. “You’re seeing this massive growth, which is really exciting.”