PING: Elevated brand image mixing history and innovation

Former General Electric engineer Karsten Solheim began making golf putters in his garage in 1959. That endeavor eventually turned into PING, a golf equipment manufacturing company that is still operated by the Solheim family today. 

As a company founded on putter innovation in the 1950s, PING deemed it important to remind golfers of its inspiring heritage and solidify its presence in the putter market. In 2020, PING teamed up with us to create a microsite that builds awareness of its Putting Lab Design (PLD) brand – a new premium line of putters for consumers. The microsite was aimed at offering an unmatched custom fitting experience and driving sales of PLD products.

We built a solution that enables golfers to equip themselves with a one-of-a-kind premium putter that best fits their specific needs. They do so either directly via a customization option or through the company’s traditional retail partner channel. The lineup consists of four options:

• PLD Custom: Allows golfers to craft their own putter design with the guidance of a PING Master Putter Fitter
• PLD Limited: Lets users buy a rare and collectible putter
• PLD Milled: Offers a collection of tour-validated models
• PLD Milled Plus: Offers the PLD Milled putters with customization options

A low-maintenance, high-value digital asset, the PLD web application is integrated into the existing digital infrastructure of the company’s primary website.

As a design-led effort, we initiated the PLD project by completing extensive research and persona development. Both were crucial as we were engaged with the development of not just a microsite but a message and brand image as well. Central to this was our visit to PING’s headquarters for key stakeholder interviews which informed a distilled set of insights that guided our strategy. 

As a next step, we conducted user research to gather insights into what potential customers look for when choosing their golf clubs. We identified distinct customer personas, ranging from avid to casual golfers. Each persona had varied perspectives on heritage and technology and different goals, frustrations, motivations, and purchasing drivers. 

The user research gave us a good understanding of who we should appeal to with the microsite and how we should best position PLD. It drove content creation towards highlighting the aspects consumers find most valuable and gave us an overall look and feel of the visual design concept. In the conceptual phase, we explored multiple design themes. PING’s selection of a concept that harmonized legacy with modernity shaped the final design direction for the PLD platform.

For the PLD initiative, PING required a full-service partner who could integrate the design and development processes. The design work started as phase one of the project and, a couple of months later, overlapped with the development, testing, and deployment phases. Our team partnered with PING stakeholders on technical solutions and worked in a scrum methodology throughout development. At the end of the project, PING distributed our software and quality engineers across multiple internal projects, and additionally, we continued our collaboration on several new initiatives. 

The PINGPLD.COM microsite has allowed PING to tell the story of a new sub-brand with specific content, beautiful videos, and graphics. The site has grown as additional products have been added. This sub-brand has become a major focus and opportunity for the company’s growth.