ONE CHAPTER’S MASS MAILING EXPERIENCE

Since March, when we first became active in recruiting, we’ve added some 30 new officer and 3 auxiliary members.

Of the new officers, 21 have joined to date as a result of the mass mailing recruiting effort, out of some 490 retired or former officers solicited.

Working on late renewals, from April to June, some delinquent two or three years, we managed to renew about 15 officers and 8 auxiliaries. On the other hand, we ended up dropping about twice that many for various reasons - failure to respond, deceased, living outside the area, etc.

The mass mailing recruiting process, as you know, is not complicated but requires significant time and effort.

We select a target group, e.g., non-Chapter member retired officers aged 85 or less residing in the Chapter area. We request and receive a file of these individuals from National MOAA, prepare individually addressed envelope labels and solicitation letters here most and mail the letters with an application form to each person in the prospect group.

We provide some incentive for the prospects to join initially, such as free membership for the remainder of the current calendar year. As applications are received, we send each new member a greeting letter and newsletter copy, get Board confirmation of their membership, and add them to the roster.

Based on prior experience with mass mailing recruiting efforts elsewhere, I find the total of 21 we have recruited a little disappointing. With a year’s break between each of three mass mailing efforts, from about 1996-2002, to a similar target group of about 500, I believe we recruited some 50, 40, and 30 new officer members, experiencing gratifying but diminishing returns.

Perhaps we can attribute our lesser result this year to most WWII era officers, known comparatively as greater joiners, now being over age 85 and outside the target group.

The aforedescribed mass recruiting results and the process used were reported to both State and National MOAA and were appropriately recognized.

Submitted By: Solano County Chapter

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