O rock! You can do it much easier then I thought
Create a new profilefield in the admincp that is NOT editable by the user.
(that will create a field that only you can change through the admincp)
And then go into your templates, specifically the showgroups_usergroupbit
and add the following where you want it
<if condition="$user['fieldXX']">$user[fieldXX]</if>
Be sure to replace the XX with the field number in question