I've been meaning to post one of these for a while. It's a sort of mentality and attitude you have to be in when recruiting.

There are many steps for a successful recruiting session, it's not so much a science as it is an art. FC is almost like a product, if you're not advertising, you're becoming irrelevant. It's why, for those of you at Universities, you see posters everywhere advertising various clubs and you receive emails along the lines of "ANNOUNCEMENT: Cheese club is having a contest, winner gets a lifetime supply of provolone!"

Recruitment is actually quite simple to get the hang of. Simply saying "we're a community that has battlenight every Sunday and host a variety of other customs and just generally have lots of fun! Message me for more details or visit fcwars.net" looks okay but actually will rarely work.

Breaking down the quote above brings 3 things:
  1. Battlenight every Sunday
  2. Other customs
  3. Lots of fun


What is FC offering this person? Oh Battlenight every Sunday? Like where we play each other in Customs? I can do that with Matchmaking with my other friends. Other Customs? What does that even mean? I don't need FC for that. Lots of fun? I already have fun! There's not much here and it sounds like a generic ad that you see on TV. Point is FC, isn't eye-catching.

The post that made me join was by Zeta Crossfire. The reason I actually cared enough to view the site was in the way he presented the material. There was a fresh new concept there. He really sold the two armies clashing and clawing their way to get to the other army's capital to seal a victory. Wars lasted long and were close with no defined winner. You had High Command and War Directors and different squads and different personalities. You could find your fit and enjoy the many good times in parties while you bonded over the many fights that took place every Sunday. This is all very good stuff and will most likely cause the recruit to at least get back to you so you can further elaborate on the way everything works.



FC needs to be offering something that can't be satisfied by Matchmaking or any other clan/community. Otherwise what's the point of even existing. A good way to find that hook is to look back on why you yourself joined. For example, I joined because the concept of the WARSIM was so fucking cool and was something new to my stale Halo experience. I applied that to recruiting and ended up finding like-minded people. I would recruit 2-3 people a week on Halo 4 as it was dying by just applying the fact that FC is a unique experience and offers something different from MM.

An even better method is to think "what are 3 reasons someone would want to join a community?" This is a great question. Answering that, define what a community is. I would say it's a group of like-minded people banding together to further a mutual goal. I would say that goal for FC is offering a unique experience that builds relationships to last a lifetime.

So people wouldn't join FC to play with friends, that's not a good reason. Imagine you see that same flier for cheese club. "Eat food with friends!" It's not really offering anything unique. I can go to Walmart and pick up some food and have a movie night, that sounds more fun than cheese club... I would say that people stay in FC because of their friends within the environment. A better way to look at it is to emphasize that you will bring close friendships that will last a lifetime. A true brotherhood environment. Everyone here wants that I imagine, why else would you join FC?



Just off the top of my head, a good recruiting message over xbox would look something like:
"Want to join a fun, unique experience? Forerunner Conflict has been the go-to community for over 9 years. We had about 700-800 active members in our lifetime. What we offer is 2 armies REDD and BLUE that fight for territories in a true war environment. We practice each week preparing for the carnage that is every Sunday as each army claws for territory on our map. These wars can last up to 3 months! Message me for more details or visit fcwars.net for more info!"

I would argue that this is rather eye-catching. Obviously someone that wants nothing to do with communities will delete this message. Not everyone will want to join. If someone is looking for something that FC offers, this puts it right in their face. Once they message you back, then you can use your charming physique and electric personality to further sell the concepts of brotherhood and WARSIM to get them to sign up.

I hope this was helpful for anyone struggling with recruitment. Please note this little guide is not a substitute for laziness. Recruitment is work, you have to seek out the people because they sure as hell won't come to you.

Feel free to copy-pasta in army sub-forums if you want.

Nervy