 Hi! I'm Joan Graham, your guide to sharing the universe, the training videos produced by the Astronomical Society of the Pacific. Welcome to the first episode in our series on growing your astronomy club, Welcoming Visitors. In this episode, we share research on how astronomy clubs have successfully recruited new members by effectively welcoming visitors. If you want your club to be a healthy, vibrant organization that gives your members years of fun and learning, it has to both retain current members and have a stream of new members joining the club. But research shows that too many astronomy clubs are growing older and not successfully recruiting new younger members. So how do you begin? How do you get anyone to visit your astronomy club meetings in the first place? Let's begin at your public events. We'll offer you some easy-to-use effective strategies. Watch Dave as he shares his enthusiasm for astronomy and also promotes his club. Wow, Jupiter is cool! I didn't know you could see the moons. How often are you guys up here? Our club comes up here about once a month. Really? This is a club? Yeah, we meet over at the Nature Center. Hey, you should join us. Oh, I don't know. I don't know anything about astronomy. I don't even have a telescope. Hey, you don't need a telescope. All you need is interest. I can see you got plenty of that. That's true. We have someone coming to talk about NASA's planetary missions next week. Here's a flyer. Do you see how Dave enjoys public outreach, but he also remembers that every public event is an opportunity to recruit? And he wasn't pushy. He observed the visitor's interest and responded to it. You just need to plan ahead. Remember to invite interested visitors to the next meeting and give them a flyer with club information. So what do you do if someone you invite actually shows up at a club meeting? Run away. No, greet them. Visitors who take the time to attend a club meeting are your very best prospects for new club members. But a club may seem like a closed, unfriendly group of people who only talk to each other. Friendliness is the number one factor that makes visitors decide to return. You might think your club is friendly and maybe it is, but to be sure that every visitor thinks so too, you can set up a welcome system. Now you may be thinking a welcome system seriously. Do we really need that? Let's ask some visitors. Nobody said even like welcome, dude, visitor guy when I walked in. They were all just talking to each other like they were scared of me. They made me stand up and introduce myself in front of the whole club. I hate talking to crowds. I didn't know what to say. I asked a guy a question about where comments come from and he looked at me like I didn't belong there. Treating visitors that way, it's no wonder they don't return. That's why we need a formal welcome system. Set up your welcome system with greeters and a welcome table. Then apply the greeting formula, greet, show, introduce. Let's look at these one by one. Greeters are really just two or three friendly people who are familiar with many of the members of the club and are assigned to greet visitors. A welcome table is more than just a flat surface. It's staffed with greeters, has information about the club, how to join and the benefits of club membership, and many clubs welcome visitors with a gift like a coffee mug or back issues of astronomical magazines. To apply the greeting formula, simply greet, show, and introduce each visitor. Greet everyone coming through the door including the regulars. Be sure to welcome any children accompanying an adult. Show first-time visitors to the welcome table. Then personally introduce them to another club member. Finally, return to your position greeting visitors at the door and do it all over again. Let's see how Dave does it. Hi, I don't believe we've met. My name's Dave. Right, it's my first time. I'm Sharky. Well, welcome to the Astronomy Club. Sharky, we've got a table over there with information about our club, all of our activities, so there's some free magazines and some refreshments too. How'd you find out about our club? Oh, I was at your thing up on the hill. They gave me this thing. Oh, well, you're lucky you came tonight. We have a guest speaker who's going to talk about the NASA missions. Let me introduce you to Maria. She loves meeting new people and she can answer any questions that you have. Yeah, I was going to ask, how long is the meeting? Excellent. Did you see how Dave greeted the visitor by first introducing himself, then showed him where things were and engaged him by asking a question. Then Dave left his greeting position at the door and introduced the visitor to a friendly club member. That's why it's best to have at least two greeters. One can introduce a visitor while the other continues to greet at the door. It's a good idea to introduce visitors to the club at large, but don't put them on the spot by asking them to stand and introduce themselves to the whole assembly. Do this instead. We'd like to welcome all our visitors. Please raise your hands so our members can say hi to you during the break. Thanks for joining us. And don't pressure a visitor to become a member. Sign here. Or smother visitors with attention. Let's recap the main points. Your club needs a constant supply of new members if it's going to be strong and healthy now and for the future. Every member needs to contribute to this process. And using these easy techniques, every member can. Public events are an excellent opportunity to invite prospective members to visit your club meetings. And visitors to your club meetings are the best source of new members. They're much more likely to return if you use the elements of the welcome system. For more about welcoming visitors to your club, see the Sharing the Universe website at www.astersociety.org slash Sharing the Universe. Feel free to send this video to all your friends and colleagues. And be sure to check out the full set of the Sharing the Universe videos for more tips on successfully growing your club.