Let’s start with the premise that you have a great golf course with amazing staff and services but you’re still concerned about the dodgy economy. How’d you like to get guaranteed traffic (selling tons of frequent player memberships), great word of mouth and have a leg up on the competition? Try this simple crazy idea:
Host a free day of golf at your course early in the season. Everyone gets one tee time (no replays) but everyone in the group needs to submit their e-mail address to qualify. Also, you can sell VIP memberships at a one time special rate and offer advance tee time bookings.
You can take it from there.
Steve Waxman has hob nobbed with some of the music world's biggest stars for the past 20 years. He's that single player that has joined your group on Saturday or Sunday mornings and has found a way to drop the names of Madonna, Phil Collins or Kiss sometime during the round. 
I would love to hear from courses on why this is not a good idea. I am not being funny but I don’t know the behind the scenes running of a course and I have a feeling not to many courses would do this.