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The general's recruiting tips
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President Don Canaday takes care of Kiwanis business in his home office--a converted bedroom.
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Assemble your special forces: It’s time for club building and membership recruitment. If your plan is strategic and well honed, says International President Don Canaday, it will succeed. Take a gander at the plan that has proved successful time and again for Don. Then put it to practice in your community:
1. Conduct a site survey to determine the need for a Kiwanis club in the community.
2. Train the Kiwanis members who will be assisting in the club-building efforts and approaching prospective members. Follow Don’s “New-Club Building Essentials” guidelines.
3. Order and use Kiwanis International materials and your own club brochures. Don prefers the “Changing Tomorrows Today” brochure, which includes information about Kiwanis and a membership application.
4. Make your first recruitment appointment with the superintendent of the local school disgrict. During that meeting:
- Explain what Kiwanis can do for the school and its children. Don uses Bring Up Grades (BUG), Terrific Kids, Key Club, Builders Club, and K-Kids as examples of Kiwanis programs that benefit kids.
- Point out that the children in the community have been denied the benefits of these programs because there has been no Kiwanis club to facilitate the programs, but—and this is key—“We’re fixing that. We’re organizing a Kiwanis club.”
- Ask him/her to become the new club’s first member.
5. Make the next appointment with the town mayor or other high-ranking official. Tell him/her that you’ve recruited the superintendent as the first member, outline what the new Kiwanis club will be doing to benefit the school and town, and invite him/her to become the next charter member.
6. Continue to recruit charter members by networking, and always ask newly recruited members for referrals—friends, co-workers, neighbors—who they believe to be “quality enough to recommend them as charter members in your new club.” Allow prospective members to see a list of those who have already signed up for the club.
7. Give prospective members an instant connection. Approach referred prospective members by saying: “Your friend, Jane Doe, has just joined as a charter member of the Kiwanis Club of X, and I asked her who she believes to be quality enough to be charter members of the new club. And she said (referred person’s name).”
“First, that strategy puts the prospective member on a little ego trip,” Don says. “But also, it makes them feel more comfortable in considering membership—because someone they know and respect has already joined and recommended them.
“Ninety percent of these referred prospective members are ‘closers,’" Don says. "They join. The other 10 percent already belong to Rotary, Lions, or another organization.”
8. Close the sale. Ask the prospective member to “assist the community” by completing the membership application at the back of the “Changing Tomorrows Today” brochure.
“I ask them to complete the application down to the signature—which should only take two minutes,” Don says. “And I ask for a check for US$100 to cover the cost of their first year of membership—you might have to come back for the check, so be sure to make an appointment to do so. I tell them the check won’t be cashed until the club is organized and they have elected a treasurer who will open a club bank account.”
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