Recruitment Strategies

[hugs_n_ladybugs]

My chapter really needs help with recruitment. Our campus is pretty small (around 2000 full-time students), and there are only about 30 girls who participate in formal recruitment. Our upcoming fall semester is informal recruitment, and my sorority is trying to come up with new ways of recruiting. We've considered the "Wish List," which each member suggests at least one potential new member to invite to a recruitment event. We're also working on a chapter website and are planning to advertise more with posters and newspaper ads.

What are some successful techniques y'all use? What do you suggest? Help!!

[azdtaxi]

We would make like little goody bags at the beginning of semesters with pencils, pens, candy (not expensive stuff) and make little like fake buisnesses cards and hand them out to girls we would talk to in class ... I spent forever taping little flags to pencils that said have a great semester from alpha xi and then like our email or website address under that ... its a good way to start also just have pencils or pens with little things taped or tied on them people are always asking me for pens and pencils and I am always asking others .... good luck let us know how it goes ::::

[Laces02]

Last fall for Move-In day and what not we made door hangers that said "Welcome Back, Hope you have a great semester Love the Sisters of KXA" or something along those lines. We had housing put them on all the doors in dorms, it got our name out there before classes started. I'm from a small campus as well(3000 something full-timers), and they seemed to work well.

[adpiucf]

Contact your sorority's area recruitment director. She is an alumna who has been trained to assist you with Formal and COR/COB strategies! She will make a great resource for you!

Also, a great idea for a COR is to have an event for the women living in the dorms and their friends. You can co-sponsor it with the RA association. It could be a workshop on study tips and time management, self defense, women's issues, "what every freshman needs to know about XYZ university: getting involved on campus," etc. Have a sign-in, nametags and lots of food! Get the names and contact info for the girls. Have your sisters wear lettters and make sure that before and after the event, there are opportunities to mingle with people. From these conversations, you can COR women because they will be meeting your sisters, etc.

Also remember, the more visible you are on campus, the more you are "advertising." Make one day a week "Letters Day" where all sisters look neat and presentable in letter shirts. Groups can meet for lunch in spots around campus on Letter Days.. Nothing is better than seeing sisters laughing and enjoying one another's company together.

Get your web site up. Take out ads in the school paper. Hang banners from your house, and have the fraternities hang banners from their houses wishing you luck, etc. It is all about getting your name out!


Invite girls from class and other activities to the house for movie nights, dinners, etc. Also, make sure all members get involved with at least 2 activities outside the sorority. This is a great way to keep your name out there and meet new people who are active on campus and not yet Greek.

[WLFEO]

Recruitment Boot Camp is just what you need! They are put on by Campus Speak and they are fabulous. I think any chapter can benefit from it even if they are at total consistently. (BTW, I don't work for them, but I have attended RBC).

One thing you learn there is that recruitment is a lot more than just getting your name out (that's referred to as The Drowning Man Syndrome). Rather, you have to let others know what you stand for- your core values.

I don't know if there are any RBCs during the school year or not, but if there are, it would be well worth the money to send someone from your chapter. OR, the speakers are available to come to your campus (for a fee, of course!). But you can team up with PH and sponsor a speaker. Their website is www.campuspeak.com/.

Another idea is to have someone who recruits for a living come talk to your chapter. A coach, someone in the admissions office, etc. They know a lot of recruiting strategies that make sense on the basic level- they might not know chants to sing at the door, but they'll know communication skills.

Good luck!

[hugs_n_ladybugs]

Those are all really good suggestions--thanks! I really like the idea of personalized pens/pencils and door hangers. I'll mention it to my sisters and see what they think. Don't get me wrong, we do a lot in the way of "making our presence known"--we always decorate our cars, hang banners around campus, wear letters... It's just that none of the Greeks here are allowed houses, so recruitment is sometimes difficult--we can't host house parties or recruitment events like I've seen y'all write about.

My sorority is the smallest on our campus, and we've always prided ourselves in the idea of "quality over quantity," refusing to compete with the other sororities here in taking in as many new girls as possible, simply for the sake of numbers. A lot of our members are graduating soon, though, and our numbers will be extremely low. We need to seriously zero in on recruitment this year, now more than ever. So if anyone else has any ideas, please let me know. Thanks a bunch!

.:.Hugs 'N' Ladybugs.:.

[Laces02]

I know how you feel, my sorority is the smallest on campus and we wear our letters on campus, decorate our cars and make banners to hang up(actually just finished one tonight, and im covered in paint still to prove it). We just got our shipment of new pens in(and they look fantastic!!). We had a Fraternity member tell us rush is all about the numbers. I must disagree, we look for quality, a strong independent individual who can uphold our ideals.

We're focusing heavily on rush now it's basically do or die for us, we lost a lot of sisters last year to graduation and another one is graduating at the end of this semester....so we'll have to wait and see


Well Good Luck With Rush!!!!!

Laces

[tunatartare]

At my school, freshmen aren't allowed to rush until the second semester, so what we do is have all of the sororities get together and have a dessert party for freshmen and sophomore girls towards the end of first semester or at the very beginning of second before rush starts. This gives the girls a chance to talk to girls in all of the sororities on campus and see what they're like in another setting. Also, sometimes sororities here will do a study break with pizza or cookies or something in the freshman residence halls during finals or midterms.
Good Luck!
-Masha

[SOPi_Jawbreaker]

I'm in an Asian-interest sorority at my school. Since we're not in Panhellenic, we don't do formal recruitment. Because of that and because my sorority doesn't have a house and because we are an Asian sorority, we have to get creative to get our name out. One of our other chapters puts on an annual talent competition to get their name out. My chapter put on a fashion show last year and we had girls that we wanted to rush as models in our fashion show. Some of our other chapters have joint philanthropies or mixers or sports games (powderpuff, basketball, volleyball) with organizations like the Asian Christian Fellowship or the Asian Student Association. For a Panhellenic sorority, you could have an event with any club you have on campuse (ex. Honor's Society, Finance Club, Habitat for Humanity, French Club, etc.)