From a COB's perspective...
 

When I COB'd this is what the three houses I visited did... (setting: mid-western state U. in the 90s.) I ate dinner at the houses at least once, usually with a house tour following. (Don't be afraid to NOT put this first. Doing something out-of-house with a couple of actives is a great first 'event' to warm up to. But it's ok if that's how it works out.) One house invited me to basketball games to hang out (they bought the tickets). With every house, I was always with the same active at each event, and usually one of their friends. With XYZ house, my pairing would have become my Big. At a second house, it actually turned out to be the informal rush chairman (who LOVED her position). :)

The house I joined had a game of "Clue" with a small group of PNMs, with each PNM paired up with an active (that familiar face!) so she wouldn't get lost in the house and I remember there being a lot of actives hanging out in their rooms. I got to meet a lot of girls that way, and got more familiar with the house, although it could be intimidating (or in the eyes of the paranoid, hazing, so be sure to dot all i's before doing this). I would recommend having a couple of events with each PNM before playing a game in a group like this, it makes it more comfortable and less overwhelming if there's a familiar face or three to "anchor" to.

Be cautious of dropping girls over semester break. My timing for COB wasn't probably the best, but picking things "back up" after 5 weeks of classes doesn't look good. I'm assuming what happened in my particular case is rare, but I thought I'd throw that out there.

It's all about keeping it low key and making the PNM feel comfortable yet special. As a COB, I wanted to see behind all the polish and frill of Formal. I wanted to see what the chapters were REALLY like on a day-to-day basis, and to see if I connected. I visited one house during dead week (see above note about not-so-great timing) and that let me see a lot. (Looking back, I'm surprised they had me...)

On the other side of COB, I remember going along with a rush group (sorry, 90s term...), and playing chess at a coffee shop with my now-bff. It just so happened we clicked, and her pairing assignment not as much. Again, stating the obvious, but if that happens, let it.

Good luck!

I was always taught that you will only be able to convince about 10-20% of the total people in any recruiting pool to join during any COB period (formal is different since those women sign up with intentions to join) so the larger pool of women you have, the more women you can carry to the end of COB if you keep working at it. (and bonus!.. the better selection you have so you can recruit the quality women.)

This is a little bit more of a long term plan, but is pretty similar to CrimsonBlue's COB list...

1. Get the chapter together (possibly during or after chapter) and have each woman make a list of all the unaffiliated women she can think of. The most important piece of this activity is to reserve judgement on whether or not she would want to join, what year she is, if you actually think she's a good fit, etc. Basically, you are having a brainstorming session with your chapter (and if any of you have ever been involved in a serious brainstorming session, you know that you are absolutely not allowed to discount any idea before you finish the session)

Everyone should have been able to make a list in like 2 minutes of at least 20 women she knew that are unaffiliated even if you are listing half 4th years. Think about girls you sit by in class (even if you dont really know them.. yet), girls in clubs or sports with you, well-known non-Greeks on campus, that girl you always see walking to class, etc etc. Unless you can say that 90% of your campus is Greek, members have no excuse for not being able to contribute a long list of unaffiliated names. Considering that you'll have a lot of repeated names, you could end up with around 200 or more names out of this activity (if you had 20 unique names for each woman in a 40 person chapter, that would be 800, but thats unlikely to happen).

2. Now that you've got your list, you can pare it down a bit.. take out seniors and any serious potential problems (like the girl that slept with all your sisters boyfriends or something). you should still have a pretty long list and all it takes is some motivation and pushing to get women to start inviting them to events. Keep in mind that some of these women may not be close with any of the chapter so you will need someone to break the ice.. chances are someone vaguely knows them (or they wouldn't be on the list).

3. The list should actually be the easy part.. you now need to keep on members to talk to the PNM's and invite them to events (and if someone knew an effective method for that I think we would all be forever in debt). Making it easy on them and making and addressing invitations for them to personally hand out is a really good idea since it has the personal touch and also will be a physical reminder of what they have to do. Go over exactly how to hand out the invites with members so no one is just shoving it in a PNM's hand and running away.

Unless they've only got 6 weeks to go, keep the seniors on. You never know - some women contribute more in two semesters than others do in 4 years.

Also keep in mind that not everyone is on the 4-year plan... depending on their major(s)/minor(s) they can be academically sound and be around for 5. YMMV.

(edit for misspelling...)

I really like the idea of the "familiar face", I don't think that that's something that our chapter has specifically done before, and I feel like we've kind of "lost PNMs along the way" because of it.

We're definitely open to taking fourth years, we took two last year and they both had a great year with us.

I'm definitely forming a COR program based on all the suggestions I've gotten here, I'm really excited! You ladies have been SO helpful!

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3. The list should actually be the easy part.. you now need to keep on members to talk to the PNM's and invite them to events (and if someone knew an effective method for that I think we would all be forever in debt). [quote]

Thanks for that by the way; glad to know it's not just me that has this problem! :p

In my chapter, we often have friends or at least good aquaintances of actives, who attend COB events and to make it less awkward for them to just show up at our chapter house, we have an active who's friends with a pnm meet her before and walk over to the house with her to make things less intimidating. (All our chapters COB in the fall.) It's little, but it really raises our number of accepted invitations when the pnms know they can show up with a friend who already is involved in the house.

I am the recruitment head for a chapter that is basically in the same situation. We are at about half total, and generally draw a larger number from informal than formal, much to our detriment. Personal invites seem to really be the way to go with pnms, and offering free food on my campus is guaranteed to draw attention. As far as invitation quality something nicer is going to spark more interest, I'm lucky to have very crafty sisters who volunteer to hand-make personal invites. I think it might even do better than a stock invitation from a store, or a printout. I also found that when you deliver bids, brings snacks. We give bids in the morning before class (too early for my liking but some sacrifices must be made), and its easy to be grumpy at someone who just woke you up, but no one can be upset with a donut. Another one of my chapters strategies is an overall PR boost, our formal recruitment occurs in the fall, so getting to know freshman early through PR activities and my "bring a freshman" games (invite freshman to our open activities and win points toward some prize). And don't forget freshman boys, they know freshman girls.
I've found sister morale is my main concern, since recruitment is an ongoing problem and the sense of campus-wide competition leaves us a little demoralized. I agree with what was said above about using incentives and keeping on top of your chapter, but keep the incentives appropriate to your chapter, candy bars wouldn't get me anywhere, but I'm going to try laundry doing, room cleaning and meal cooking which hopefully will get me somewhere. Try reaching out to local alumns and your national for ideas , locations for parties, and donations for any sort of recruitment supplies.

I'd love to hear how things work out for you. Best of luck!