Posted on 09/24/2006 9:39:16 AM PDT by kerryusama04
9/24/2006
Dear NRA,
I am writing to make some suggestions to marketing of the NRA. Since I upgraded to life member, the mailers I receive from the various NRA organizations has tripled. I have to confess that I don’t even open them anymore. These mailers, some on rather expensive bonded paper and weighing enough to require more postage than normal, get tossed out with the junk mail.
I purchased a membership for my brother-in-law a few years back because I felt he would receive the America’s First Freedom publication well and thus we would gain a member. Before he received his first magazine, he was also hit with a blitzkrieg of NRA mailers. My sister was really turned off by all the solicitations and it is a battle to get them to renew each year. My gift of an NRA membership was meant to draw my family closer, and it has, for about 50 weeks out of the year.
I dare say that you guys spend more money sending out mailers than a $35 dollar membership, less magazine subscription, produces in revenue.
I am requesting that you take me off of your mailing list and, instead, send all material electronically to my email address (below). I am also suggesting that, much like a credit card company, you give the option to the entire membership of how much, how often, and in what format we want our mailers and alerts. I am assuming that many members are like me and would rather receive the information electronically, thus saving the NRA a lot of money in postage and printing.
I am also recommending that you entertain changing strategies in the marketing. I think we all agree that the goal is to increase membership. To do this, I suggest a radio advertising campaign featuring Wayne LaPierre. The conservative talk radio icons like Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity have already assembled incredibly large audiences of likely members. If purchasing radio air time on these large market shows is cost prohibitive, I suggest that you guys purchase the air time from local conservative radio shows in various targeted markets. Here in the Kansas City area, Jerry Agar is a pro-gun radio host on 980 KMBZ who might even be inclined to have Mr. LaPierre on his show as a guest. I assume that other cities in red states have similar hosts, as they would likely have similar demographics. Bill O’Reilly came out decidedly pro-gun in the wake of the post-Katrina fiasco. I recently attended an NRA election meeting where we got to view a new movie you guys made highlighting the gun confiscations in and around New Orleans after the hurricane. It is just a hunch, but I think if you could find a way for Bill O’Reilly to see that movie, he may even be amenable to highlighting it on a segment of his television show.
The moral of the story here is that we need to get the word about what the NRA is and what it does out to a much larger number of folks than current efforts are reaching. The NRA is the largest and most powerful single lobbying group for a reason, and I understand that once a winning strategy produces such great results, one would be reluctant to change it, but times have changed, and we must adapt to continue growing.
Perhaps if anyone reading this agrees, they could send a similar message to the NRA? Sort of a reverse-lobbying effort, huh? :)
The smartest thing they ever did with their money was get some good design staff on the magazines. They started looking slick a few years ago, which really helps their image.
but don't grumble.
If you don't want mailings from the NRA just call and ask them to stop; they will!
You play directly into the hands
of the Marxist/Anarchists in the Democrat party,
who would be more the happy to take away the guns from the citizens. Ex. 16:8 Moses also said, “You will know that it was the LORD when
he gives you meat to eat in the evening and all the bread you
want in the morning, because he has heard your grumbling
against him. Who are we? You are not grumbling against us,
but against the LORD.”
Brother, I am not grumbling, but suggesting a better use of our resources! Thanks for the tip.
You're not grumbling. It reads like grumbling. Let me check. Yep, you're grumbling. You should have spend the time to call the no solitation number from the magazine if you wanted the mailings to stop. If you thought about it, the mailing work or else they wouldn't do them. While you and some others are grumbling about getting off the couch to throw a letter away, there are those who get out their checkbooks to send money.
Try an experiment. The next time you get a letter, send a little amount of money. Each and every time you get a letter. Do it for a year. Then you might feel like the rest of us who get irritated by the 76 million gun owners who won't join the NRA because of a million stupid excuses. You can also get really irritated by the moron Freeper who posts thirty year old "failures" of the NRA because they weren't a lobbying group at the time.
Jumping on my case because I dare suggest out of the box thinking isn't going to reach those other 76 million either.
About ten years ago we renewed early in response to such a mailing, and they screwed my membership up beyond belief--wrong name, transgendered me to female, and something else I now forget.
Don't ever do that.
Here's your solution to this nonexisting problem. Call the no solicitation number and then get on the website for the emails. It's easy.
Let me ping you every time the moron Freeper with the thirty year old data complains with his lame website.
What does this mean?
It means there is a Freeper who's a moron and he posts a link to an anti-NRA website. It was explained time and time again to him that the NRA was NOT a lobbying group at the time. If they had done what he accuses them of not doing they would have lost their tax status.
Let me alert you the next time he shows up. I don't know why the moderators help him do sarah brady's work.
btw, it's not a "nonexisting problem". My dad has been a member forever and he gets the deluge. I get the deluge and my brother in law gets the deluge. Unless my inability to read crosses genetic lines, then the deluge is a problem. Our membership not increasing dramatically, especially in light of the recent problems with Katrina and the Rebecca Peters' crowd is also a large problem.
Unemployment is a problem. Divorce and separation is a problem. Sickness and death is a problem.
Throwing a letter away every couple months is NOT a problem.
Call the non solicitaton number and quit grumbling. It's starting to read like a whine.
I don't think you understand what I am trying to say here. 1 guy throwing away 1 letter every 2 WEEKS is not a problem. NRA spending the money on thousands letters when they could be making better use of it is what I am trying to highlight. With the exception of NRA members procreating, NRA is not gaining membership. In a world as anti-liberty and anti-gun as this one is, that is also a problem. The majority of the folks at the NRA meeting I went to have another NGO in common - the AARP. I guess I am just off in right field here wanting the NRA to grow. I will go away and not bother you old fellas anymore.
Throwing a letter away every couple months is NOT a problem.
"You play directly into the hands
of the Marxist/Anarchists in the Democrat party,
who would be more the happy to take away the guns from the citizens."
Let 'em try! We've got'em, they don't!
All he had to do is post the no solicitation phone number if it was such a "problem". He also could have included the website for emails if he was so inclined.
That would have been a positive response. He didn't. He's not the only one who complains about the mailings but it's usually a disgruntled so-called "member" who uses it as an excuse to do nothing.
Sorry, I don't have the patience for these people. We're still in the ballot and soap box political fight. I seriously doubt any gun owner who complains of a letter once in awhile would be able to watch my back if the real bad stuff happens.
I'm putting this in prospective. I heard of one guy who didn't want to join the NRA again because they never shipped his crappy plastic "bullet" keychain.
If 74 million gun owners have this type of crybaby attitude, I don't want them in the NRA. I wouldn't want them to destroy my votes for the Board of Directors.
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