- Cockburnicus
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- Exalted Mythic Member
Posted by: Flaming Skullz
Posted by: Cockburnicus
They're going to tell you to use the classifieds. Don't use the classifieds, no-one goes there and no-one will see it. If you are going to post in Bungie forums you have to do it in The Classifieds, and I disagree that nobody will see it. I advertised for my clan in The Classifieds, and I picked up 3 new members in 2 hours.
3 whole members?! Here's the problem, that's not very many. I would estimate that for every 5 members you can recruit for a group, 4 of them wont be long term regulars. They'll check it out now and then, or they'll just lurk, or they'll join it and totally forget about it. The classifieds won't get you members who have been on bungie.net for a long time and who keep coming back here for years and years and years.
There are many ways to get your group more members, they often happen by accident to be honest, there's no one sure fire way of doing it. It usually depends on what type of group you've got, but no matter what your group is about it has to have a unique selling point. I also suppose there is a difference between simply getting more members and building a group that is popular and that will last for many, many years. If you want your group to be popular you can't be afraid to break the rules. It all comes down to word of mouth, everyone who frequents the mains knows who the popular groups are, if they hate these groups its all the better. Any publicity is good publicity for groups.
One approach is to create a cult of personality around the leader of your group, have him as some kind of messianic father figure whose popularity will divide the mains.
Another approach is to have your group associated with rule breaking or controversy, more or less the same as the cult of personality idea but it's more like a "group myth".
Offering stuff that can't be found on the main forums is essential, why should people go to your group over the mains? For flood groups, by which I mean groups that are born out of the flood this is quite easy. Have more relaxed rules allow discussion of politics, religion, popularity contests, discussion on who on the mains is a complete -blam!- etc etc.
lolDrama is also pretty useful and keeps people around.
I would say that to build a group that has not just a lot of members, but a lot of regulars you need to recruit a vast amount of people, not all people will stay in your group or stay on bungie.net. You need your group to stick out, to be entertaining, to consume their lives a little bit, they need to feel like they are a part of it. These are the people who will build your group, who will be there day in day out making good threads and posts and adding original content, not just spouting memes, but really creating something worthwhile. Recruiting in the classifieds and PMing people will not get you that.