Jim Lafferty had a problem many children complain of: He couldn’t find anyone to play with. Only, he’s 47. In commercial security sales, he usually works from home in Schwenksville, Montgomery County, putting together quotes as early as 5 a.m. and typically toiling for a solid 12 hours.

“Usually by the end of the week, I’m ready to cut it short,” Lafferty said. That’s when his thoughts turn to sloping fairways and fast greens — and a problem he often encounters when that happens: His usual golfing buddies are still at work.

When he found himself in such a predicament one day about a year ago, he turned to the internet, looking for a website that would help him find a playing partner, writes Diane Mastrull in the Philadelphia Daily News.

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nitially, advertising revenue will come from Google ads on the site and affiliate ads to, for instance, a golf equipment page on eBay, from which Lafferty would collect a 10 percent to 15 percent commission on purchases made. Once traffic to the site grows, he’ll solicit his own ads.

Without a fat budget, marketing has been dependent on sheer hustle. Lafferty has dropped off business cards at nearly every public golf course in the Philadelphia region, and at some in Florida and Maryland while on business trips.

With the golf industry never rebounding after the Great Recession — there were 400,000 fewer golfers by 2013, according to a report by the NPD Group, citing National Golf Foundation data — many courses were forced to close. Now, course managers are eager to find ways to get players on their greens. Yet, many don’t book tee times for singles, considered an inefficient use of precious course time.

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