Kinships: The Art of Advertising

Advertising your kinship is an art form. And, like Art, there are beautiful ads and there are ugly ads. This little post will teach you how to avoid the latter and keep your kinship at the top of its advertising game. This post is part of the recruitment guide of a previous post.

Step One:

Consider who you want in your kin. Never write an advert in a channel that offers a place for just anyone - otherwise, what's the point in having a kinship? You'll have nothing in common! Here's an example of a bad ad:

"The Potato Peelers are recruiting all levels and races. Send a /tell to Illiullisius!"

Not only did that tell you nothing about the kinship, but also some new players aren't aware of copying and pasting names. Try writing out that player's name correctly first time! It is always better to ask them to contact yourself, than direct them to someone else.

Advertise to a type (or types) when writing in a channel:

-Hardcore Raiding
-Casual
-PVP
-RP
-Mature
-Young players
-Race (Hobbits, Elves etc) only

Step Two:

Give your audience a taste of what you are about. You've stated your type, now give them the personality of your kinship. Are you serious? Well-humoured?

Here's an example which includes a combination of types, as well as a little humour to entice an audience:

"The Carrot Cutters would consider themselves an elite, hardcore community for carrot lovers. In between munching on some of the Shire's tastiest root vegetable, we offer weekly raiding and horse racing. Send a /tell to myself to join!"

Step Three: 

Know your audience! Here's a guide to help you find your future kinnies, both in OOC and /tells*:

Thorin's Hall/Ered Luin/The Shire/Combe/Staddle

Great if you want to recruit new players who will be loyal to the kinship. You're more likely to spend your time helping others as a result, but the best kins start with people who are new to the game.

Bree-Land, Bree Town and World Chat

You will find a combination of high levels and new players here - Bree is the Server's stage. You will see travellers from all over the server here. Great for advertising your kin to get the word out. Not good for specifics though!

World Chat is for anyone. New players will have this channel by default, but may not know how to respond to your adverts. Older players may have switched off this channel because of the constant conversation. The World chat is therefore not shown to everyone.

The Ettenmoors

This goes without saying: if you want PVPers in a PVP kin, go to the PVP zone.

PUNY FREE PEOPLES!

*Hardcore players are typically doing something... hardcore, and may not be watching the OOC channel. If your kin is for hardcore players, word of mouth and asking those players directly will be of great help.

Step Four:

Be patient. Do not throw adverts out every few minutes - that is the easiest way to get /ignored. Simply send it out every hour at the most, and watch what people have said. If someone says "please stop" - take that as a guide that it's going on too long, or people are getting annoyed.

Step Five:

Speak to players you see running around without kin names over their heads. Call them by their name and ask them if they'd like to hear a little about your kinship before throwing stats and info their way. Politeness will take you far.

And that's it! Enough to get you going to make your kinship known. If you've come across some great recruiting ideas, comment below!