How to Increase CGN Membership 10x (to 1/3 million) in 1 yr?

[Kestryll]

Two quick points:

* any statements need to come from Kes, Ivanimal, Artherd or myself.

* we need to remember that CGF and CGN are two separate and independent orgs. Our outreach program is thru CGN.

Both good points.

Calguns is of and for it's members but for legal and liability reasons anything that comes out as 'official' needs to come from one of us.

This shields the membership from being personally liable for something misinterpreted and protects the forum from being financially liable for something misstated.

It's kind of a legalese protection for all of us.


We really need to keep the separation between CGF and CGN both in mind and very visible.
No one wants to waste time and money paying Counsel to explain the difference in court and we definitely do not want to generate confusion that might jeopardize CGF's 501 (c)3!

I know it sounds a bit weaselly but the more we grow and step in the spotlight the more we have to watch our step and cover our backsides.
And by 'our' I mean both CGN and the members that make it happen.

[wildhawker]

Megan, call me later this afternoon. Email me and I'll get you my phone number.

[mmartin]

dude we are SOOoo much cooler that that...
megan

this, but replace the swords...

http://www.flickr.com/photos/azizasaid/

megan
ETA: ok, that didn't work (including the photos) but the link should.

[Kestryll]

dude we are SOOoo much cooler that that...
actually, I've got 4 sherrif's officers in my classes right now.
megan

The first thing that popped in to my head was those cheesy movies like 'Nazi Cheerleaders'.

So what kind of bellydancing do you do?

Several years ago my Wife and I had a friend who did and taught informally the more traditional forms of bellydance.
Sisi helped my Wife make a traditional garment which I can not recall the name of, it almost looks like a sleeveless coat.

[mmartin]

Megan, call me later this afternoon. Email me and I'll get you my phone number.

pm with contact email sent.
megan

[mmartin]

The first thing that popped in to my head was those cheesy movies like 'Nazi Cheerleaders'.

So what kind of bellydancing do you do?

Several years ago my Wife and I had a friend who did and taught informally the more traditional forms of bellydance.
Sisi helped my Wife make a traditional garment which I can not recall the name of, it almost looks like a sleeveless coat.

love those movies, got all the ones with bellydancers. cheesy dancing but really fun costuming.

I won the Middle Eastern Dance in North America competition in 2000.

I do turkish, egyptian, arabic, american, greek. folkloric, modern and traditional styles of cabaret, folk dances from all over the middle east and north africa. american tribal style and fusion. also a bit of flamenco and hula.

basically everything from what you see at the ren faire to what you see in restaurants. mostly teaching and not performing much right now. have about 60 students active and 4 teachers besides myself in my school, and half a dozen professional performers.

have written chapters for several books on the subject too...

that's generally called a ghawazee coat or a beladi dress, but sometimes a thobe... depends on the style and nationality.

megan aka Aziza Sa'id

[jdberger]

I just want to get this out early - I'm not posing.

I'm just not that comfortable with my body image lately - so stop asking.

On another note - I wonder if we could get ranges to hand out an CGN brocure with every lane assignment?

I'll check with Davis Street to see if they're interested. This might take a week or so - I have to wait for the friendly range guys and I won't be available this weekend.

Is there a .pdf of the CGN brocure that's available?

[wash]

I just had the most horrible flashback to bad 70's B movies.....

I imagined Haji from Faster *****cat Kill! Kill! but that's more like go-go dancing:

[Kestryll]

Ghawazee, that was it indeed.

I remember Sisi being very adamant that bellydancing wasn't just about gyrating in a bikini and that if you could not do it and be both entertaining and attractive in a ghawazee with full sleeves you weren't doing it right.

[wash]

I don't discriminate against the gyrating in a bikini type.

[dantodd]

I've talked about this with Brandon before but I think we should print trigger guard tags and get gun stores to put them on their firearms display and preferably also add them to the box of any firearm sold. I know the NRA does this at the manufacturer level for national coverage but having a tag on most guns sold in CA would be a huge help. Unfortunately the fact that CGN and CGF are not the same entity will come up because it would be great if the "call to action" would lead them to both a donation page AND a "join the community" page.

I personally believe that the flyers/tags etc. should all be done through CGF with a secondary call to join the CGN community. This will allow CGF to use fundraising monies to print and distribute the documentation. It will also allow the donation page with lawsuit information etc. to be the first impression. While the forums are great if we drive membership via CGF we can control the first impression our new members get of the goals and successes of the movement much more than if the community and forum is their first exposure.

I also REALLY like the CalGuns business card idea. We could probably use zazzle or some similar site to print the cards which would keep control of the image in CGF hands and also have a built-in CGF donation with every order.

[steadyrock]

1) does CGF have a "sign up to have regular monthly donations" feature?
automatically billed to your CC or paypal?

2) offer a bonus of some sort to donation subscribers - a monthly gun review, a whitepaper on reloading, a cheat-sheet on improving your accuracy, a bullet-pointed guide to talking about guns to the gun-timid.
takes a little effort to write this stuff up, but once written, it costs almost nothing to distribute, and nothing if done electronically.

3) is there a program in place to get shops / vendors / ranges to give a discount to calguns members? we give them some advertising indicating they offer a discount, they promote us with flyers in their location, customer signs up to calguns and gets a discount too... everyone wins.

megan

Following up on (3), could a vendor agreement be reached with some or all of the vendors here to include a CGN/CGF color flier in each order? Something small, similar to the AB 962 fliers. That is a very large distribution network we may be able to tap.

[wash]

Vendor fliers are a great idea.

[wildhawker]

So, another couple of quick hits:

* Additional content: we're looking at creating a single-page buckslip (like color AB962/SB585 flyer we just produced) for those instances where the additional cost of the full tri-fold is unwarranted. Tri-fold brochures will probably be refreshed at the same time we create the buckslip. We already have CGN business cards, and will be refreshing those as well. Likely will go to 2-sided for add'l info (presently 1-sided).

* I *really* like the gun hang-tag idea. For me, right now, my hangup is that there are a few fruits that need picking before this comes up to the top. That said, I'd like to make this a goal for early 2010.

* No offense to all, but I'd love to see if we can put togther a coalition of web developers to assist with some badly-needed web updates and infrastructure to support the outreach program (I think obeygiant, 8-ball, ripcurlksm etc had some great ideas here to build on). I'd further like to bend CGFs ear and see if they'd let us create some proposals for a landing page upgrade over there.

* First and foremost: I need some help taking the existing database of volunteers, getting it into a format we can more effectively utilize and get some people to follow up and fill in some blanks. From there we can build the programs and setup project teams.

I'd love to brainstorm this with a few savvy CGNers on a conf call.

It's time to get moving. We have bills to beat and culture to change.

[SKSer]

the biggest obstacle ive come into with spreading calgunnery is speaking with older people, which is a large part of the gun community, who are completely computer illiterate.