The internet has turned local leisure businesses into thousands of tiny needles in an enormous online haystack of 'things to do', and people don't know where to start. There are more listings sites than ever before, and therefore hundreds of advertising slots to be filled.
Marketing companies offer ways to optimise the haystack search, and direct them to the needle that's most relevant... but sadly, they offer this to anyone, and those with the deepest pockets are optimised more than some. So that doesn't work either.