Have you asked your nationals to send out a consultant who will help you develop a marketing plan and stay with you to help execute it?

As you go into finals and the holidays, no one is thinking about recruitment at this point or if they want to join a GLO.

Have a meeting and jot down some ideas. Over the holidays, organize your ideas with a few others and set up a plan. Identify dates, goals and what you want to achieve with each effort.

1) Don't listen to sorority girls offer you rush advice. Different ballgame.

2) You don't need to spend more than 10 bucks to get pledges. Stop wasting money. That's not your problem.

I want you to convince me why ZBT should be on your campus. There are 32 fraternities and ZBT is not Jewish (nationally or locally on your campus) so you can't go that route. Why should someone join your fraternity given it's relative youth, lack of alumni, big pretty house, large membership, etc. When you can figure out an answer to that, then you can figure out how to rush for guys.

-Rudey

my fraternity was founded on our campus in 1916 and were kicked off in 1998, as I said, our alumni association owns a large on-campus house, however, we don't currently live in it. We do have lots of alumni and alumni support, but none of them have any experience doing what we're doing.

I know the girls mean well, but seriously, if it was that easy don't you think we would've done it by now? we're not stupid.

Tables in the union, great. Shirts, nice idea. Philanthropy, yeah, thats alright too. What it comes down to, is you need to rush your balls off. Make it your everyday job to get pledges. That guy that sits next to you in Lit. class, rush him. Go dorm storming when you go to parties. Get your friends little brother and his group of friends to go to the cafeteria for dinner. Speaking of cafeteria and dinner, go over to that table of 'kids' and get them to come to your party on Sat. And be sure to get that one kid who is sitting alone. When you're walking to class and you're two steps behind another guy, pick it up a notch and start talking to him. Tell him how ZBT will change his life and you want him to be YOUR brother. You cannot stop rushing, ever.

You have alumni, you have alumni with money, you potentially have a house. Now, you need the men. Go get them. They won't come to you.

You must have confidence. You must believe that ZBT is the shit, before trying to sell it. 9 brothers could be 29 in one semester, easily.

Again - Go get them. They won't come to you.

You're getting great advice. If you want to buy brothers, just hand out the money, it will be quicker. If you are looking for dedicated members you need to work for it.

Recruitment is essentially about making friends. Just like others said, talk to new people in your classes and set up a time to study together at the library. Oh and what if a brother needs to be there too, they now know 2 brothers. I personally wouldn't start off with 'hey my name is tommy, want to join my fraternity?' it will take a while, but slowly introduce them to your brothers, invite them to help out a philanthropy event or take them to a party, whatever is social on your campus. After knowing them and having them meet brothers THEN intro ZBT, but by that point they'll see what the org is.

Everyone brother should be in another club, and hold a position in that club. Older students who are leaders can have a lot of influence on first and second year students (your target age).

Sit at a table where you don't know people (don't be creepy about it) but introduce yourself and be charming.

You can't go after the 'always joiners' they've probably already joined. You need to break new ground and focus on men who are leaders, good students, good moral character and whatever else you may feel is key.

Wear letters always. everyone should have a bunch of shirts with letters and you need to wear them, a lot.

Make your group stand out from the other groups. Maybe you are all very smart and your house GPA is 3.8, or maybe you do more philanthropy, give yourself an identity. Keep posters consistant in their look and general presentation (not identical) Brand your chapter's image so that if someone sees it, they think ZBT.

Good Luck.

For OPA, we sent postcards to all the female incoming freshmen and stuffed mailboxes like crazy and had our biggest Rush ever - is that allowed for IFC?

ETA: Sorry, need to make this more clear - the big thing that this did was make sure that even if the girls didn't know the name of many other groups when they got to campus, they did know ours, and (hopefully) will remember it and have some clue who we are even though we're not a huge NPC sorority.

ETA: I also want to agree with that it's all about making an identity for yourself and making everyone see what makes you different - it seems like every semester I find out about a new fraternity on campus that I didn't know existed because they really haven't distinguished themselves in any way, lol.

The girls won't understand, ever.

The house means nothing if you don't live in it. It's not an asset to you. Forget about it.

Once you figure out exactly what it is you are selling, it's a lot easier to sell it. Shirts, alums, and all that jazz won't help much. ZZ Kai covered pretty much everything you have to do once you figure out why people should join your house.

It's all about the grunt work now.

-Rudey

I wouldn't know. I'm in a Non-NPC sorority :-)

This is the gold quote - like Rudey said once you have an answer to the objections or skeptics... well then you've got the ideal recruitment answer/angle...

Rudey is spot on. What do you have to offer that the other fraternities does not. Why should they choose you over the other fraternities. Don't say brotherhood, all those other fraternities offer that and more. You need to establish a value added service. Distinguish yourself from the other fraternities on campus. This might be an unpopular thing to say, you're selling a product. the other fraternities are also selling a product. Figure out what exactly you're trying to sell and go from there.

Of course we don't think you're stupid. We're all trying to help.


HIJACK:

Rudey, I think it's harsh to say girls won't understand. If anything I think we're in the perfect position to understand. Men don't have to deal with the constant pressure of quota/total. I was a collegiate member for a total of seven quarters. How many rushes did we hold? SEVEN. Every quarter like clockwork. Even after formal recruitment we had another week of COB. I know how hard and draining it is, especially when your working to keep a chapter open. Also, I don't think COB and fraternity recruitment are all that different. Though I do agree that formal recruitment is an insanity that men would never allow.

Could you tell me why you feel the way that you do? Thanks!

/HIJACK

Who said it was easy?

See below, a true success story from Case Western Reserve Beta Theta Pi (posted at www.betathetapi.org earlier this year):

"Five Case Western Reserve University Betas, William Freed-Pastor, '06, David Bartholomew, '06, David Svilar, '06, Paul Serrin, '06 and Caleb Krouse, '05, recruited sixteen new pledges this fall more than tripling the size of the chapter. The hard work of these five men, coupled with the assistance of involved volunteers, will leave a lasting mark on the Lambda Kappa Beta chapter."

Simply because you were not in a fraternity, but a sorority. Being in a sorority involves more rules, organization, and a communist style system that deals with other sororities. Fraternities are not like that. COB is also different. It was all pretty evident in your advice. The advice from sororities probably wouldn't jive for NPHC recruitment either. It's all different - that's all.

-Rudey

The basics of ALL recuritment is the same. Know what you are selling, make relationships, intro them to the product you are selling, close the deal. Put it anyway you like, that is recruitment, the rules only mandate the forms that we do this in. People think recruitment is this huge state secret, it is just not all that complicated, you have to put yourself out there in ways that some people are not comfortable.