On Demand Virtual Event Series

[title card] Shriners International Education Foundation presents: Fueling Membership Growth: Creating Systems for Success

[title card] Noble Academy logo; Kurt Klingenmeyer, Membership Chairman | Tripoli Shriners; Shriners International Education Foundation logo

Alright, so best known, beats best, and what is a system? I want to dive into this a little bit. A system. A system is a duplicable process that is done the same way every single time. It's your cookbook, it's your recipe. Now, make sure that, now, a system is not something you have just memorized in your head. If you do that, that means we're now more personality-driven, not system-driven. You want to have a recipe that's written down, and if you can automate this as much as possible, now you don't have to do that going out the gate, automating things, okay? Right now all that I want you to do is make sure you're collecting these leads. Have some type, it's called a funnel. Have some type of funnel where you're collecting this stuff, and that you can text these people. Then, okay, now when I talk about recipes, this kind of hits home for me.

I used to work in a bakery as a high school and college job and made all sorts of breads and rolls and cringles and cookie dough and everything that a bakery makes. And we had a white book. It was the white cookbook where everything was just handwritten chicken scratch down where those were the recipes. So if I had to talk to my boss, Wayne, and say, 'Hey Wayne, how do I make those Kaiser rolls again?' He said, 'Look in the book, and it was your step-by-step process.' That's what you want to have because look, if you have the recipe for the world's best cake, follow the recipe. Because if you substitute baking soda for baking powder, look, that cake don't bake. So you've got to do it the same way every time. And that way, if you improve the process, the system, everything improves at the same time.

Okay? So get your stuff written down. It doesn't have to be very complicated with that, but it does need to be system-driven. So let's say we're talking about, oh, I backed up too many. There we go. Thank you. Alright, so going back to that off-site booth event, because again, those are great, because everybody there is already used to going to charity events. So, best known beats best if I grab the business card from somebody. Now, make sure you have business cards too. Now, if you are in one of these organizations, and let's face facts – nobody's heard of what a Potentate is or imperial of this or imperial of that. Keep it simple in the English language. What we are, if you're the membership guy, just have down, don't put down, Illustrious Sir. It's going to confuse people. You've got to have a little bit of humility with this.

You can have a set of business cards that are for the general public, but then have another set of business cards that are for shrine events or Masonic events. So please, you've got to keep it in layman's terms with people, okay? Don't make it look like Greek. So, give your business cards out to people, but you have to get some in return. Now, let's say I met another business owner, or let's call it a local politician or attorney. Whoever's at this event, I would text them back the next day, and look, I'm giving you the system, I'm giving you the recipe, I'm giving you the answers to the test. This is all you've got to do day one. That means like the day after. Okay? 'Hey John, this is Kurt, a triple shrine in Milwaukee. It was great meeting you at the Zoo Fundraiser event yesterday.'

And again, keep it short, don't write a thesis, okay? I would try to abbreviate this as much as possible. 'Here's a couple of free tickets to our upcoming gala on December 1st, I want to put you at one of our VIP tables before I run out of seats. Would you be able to make it?' If I don't hear back, then day two, I'm going to call them and personally invite them. Month two, repeat month three, repeat. Month four, repeat. And again, a pro-tip. Try to automate these texts as much as possible if you can. But hey, look, when we're starting on day one, it's just your little keyboard warrior, okay? Or with your thumbs, you're just texting these people and then calling these people, and of course, remind them. Give 'em a call to confirm and all that. But I do want to give you another pro tip that's not listed on here.

Now, you can use this for all of these text messages. You should use this for all of your emails. You should use this for all of your phone calls. And look, I'm giving you the reason why I'm giving you all the answers to the test is this. I have been to too many, I've been to 60-plus conventions about membership and recruiting and marketing, and I've spoken in over 20 of them, I think 25-ish or so. And it burns me when I go into an event or I go to event that I'm paying money for, and it's a big ooh-rah event, and everyone's really excited about it, and everyone's pumped up, and you leave. And what do I do now? Well, I don't know, but I'm really excited. That frustrates me as a consumer, as a buyer. I want to give you all of the answers to the tests. We're grabbing the low-hanging fruit right now so that way you can implement this system right out of the gate. Okay? So here's that pro tip. This is called the four steps of selling. I want you to write this down. Okay? Four steps of selling. Now, what that is, is in this text, number one, write this down. Reason number two: value and sell it. This is where I slow things down to make sure that we get this written down. Number three: call to action.

Number four is close. Let me say that one more time. Number one is reason, two, value and sell it, three is call to action and four is close. Now, in this text message that has everything, and you can base all your emails and phone calls, so it's not like I've sometimes tried to do this off the cuff and it just feels like I just word vomited at somebody. If I'm calling them up, I'm like, ah, that phone call went horrible. Write this stuff down. So right in there, it's, 'Hey, John, this has occurred at Triple Shrine. It was great being at the zoo fundraiser yesterday. Here's a couple of tickets for the upcoming gala.' That's my reason.

My value is I wanted to put you at our VIP table. My call to action is before I run out of seats. My close is, would you be able to make it? That's the fourth step of selling, and you can integrate these even within a sentence, but that helps you keep everything really clean, really concise. All of these leads we're bringing, look, I'm not asking you to work harder, we're working smarter. I'm not asking you to go on and do a bazillion different events, and what you're doing. Use the stuff you're using right now, collect the information, and we're putting this into a funnel, and this is all we're doing. The answers to the test. This is what you send out to people every single month.

[title card] Shriners International Education Foundation presents: Fueling Membership Growth: Recruiting at Off Site Charity Events

[A slide that reads "Discover essential strategies to effectively attract & engage potential members" with a column underneath titled "Best Known Beats Best" with a list containing "On site charity events, banners on site, brochures, business cards, festival booth, events on site, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, parades with brochures, "Sportsman Night" and Off site charity events." The Shriners International Education Foundation logo is on the sidebar above a column that reads "The only goal for EVERY one of these platforms is to 1) Collect contact info, 2) Insert contact info into a "SYSTEM", 3) Invite new contacts to your public events monthly, 4) Create and incredible experience for them that they want to be a part of. Below this is the Noble Academy logo.]

Kurt Klingenmeyer | Membership Chair, Tripoli Shriners:

But the trap we fall into is we don't collect the lead information to let them know about the next one and about all of our events we're having in-house, the goal is to get in front of your audience and get them into your building to see if they want to enjoy that experience more. Now we do have one more thing on this slide off-site charity events. Now, an off-site charity event. I love this one because it's where you get to meet people in your community. And really, what I'm doing is I'm fishing when I go to these events, let's say it's the zoo. I have two favorite ones. It's the zoo. And I love going to the canine groups. Okay? So when they're doing the canine for the dogs, for the police departments, I love going to those. They'll have different municipalities there. And where you get to see the dogs, you don't pet the dogs, but you get to see their dogs and the policemen that are their handlers.

And it's a huge charity event where they're raising money to purchase new canines. And the other one is, I love going to zoo charity fundraisers. And the people that go to these are other business owners in the area, these are other professionals, these are other politicians. These are leaders in your community. Mayors, governors. You'd be surprised who you meet when going there. And these people are going to charity events. They're used to going to stuff like this. So what my goal is to walk into these events, if I'm representing Shriners, I would have my fez on because that already opens up the doors with conversation. What's the funny red hat? What's the bonnet on your head? What is all that for? It just opens the door for more conversations. And my goal is to collect a half a dozen business cards from other people and invite them to our charity events. So all I'm doing is I'm just lead nurturing. I'm lead generating, and I'm getting contact information because heck, at these offsite events, they're used to doing stuff like this. They're used to going to the zoo, charity fundraisers. They're used to going to the canine groups. Why not bring 'em into your groups? Show 'em a great experience, and then if the door opens, then you can ask 'em to be members.

[title card] Shriners International Education Foundation presents: Shriners Lead the Way: A Masonic Centered Approach to Membership and Marketing: Creating Change: A Case Study

[title card] Noble Academy logo; Rusty Petty | Potentate, Imperial Marketing Committee, Region 3 | Ansar Shriners; Shriners International Education Foundation logo

So, the bad news and some good news. So, like many temples, Ansar has been on a membership decline over the past few years. We currently sit right around 2100 members, but have lost a dest in the midst, over 400 members in the last five years. So we still have amazing parade units and geographic and interest clubs but have had to merge and shutter severally recently, the average age of our temple is still pretty high thing right around 72 years and our temple is in need of thousands of dollars in deferred maintenance and we are at the point of having to decide on a new path just for the building. But Ansar is very fortunate. We are fortunate to have access to monetary resources, and we are fortunate to have a young Divan with many active younger members. So much so that we have also been chartering some new interest-based clubs like a bourbon and cigar club and a fishing club. So Ansar had the resources that could be tapped and we had the members who were willing to step up.

[a slide titled "Shriners of the Corn, Shriners International Education Foundation. Ansar Shrine: An Early Case Study." Left column reads "Next Next Steps: Leadership Connections, Joint Committees, Opened Meetings, Local Efforts" and right column reads "Big Steps: Budget, Shared Resources, Ansar2030, Membership Townhalls"]

How did we redesign what Ansar was doing, and how did we break out of the slump? So it did not take place overnight, and it's still an evolving work in constant progress using the 2023 circus as an advertising excuse Ansar contracted with a professional marketing firm to manage our social media impact. So we had great success with this, with over 1.5 million impressions and paid in organic posts. We committed $3,000 a month for their professional advice and management and have not looked back since. They work all the time to redefine the Ansar brand and how we communicate for the first time in a long time. So we established committees to support to Divan and to get more Nobles involved in the fraternity. The membership committee is actually comprised of Masons who are Shriners, but several who are not in the shrine.

[a slide titled "What if Nobody Comes? Shriners International Education Foundation Ansar Shrine: An Early Case Study Membership Townhall." Left column reads "Ansar-wide Effort, Masonic Partnership, Masons & Non-Masons, 90-Minute Presentations, No Pressure No Hype" and right column reads "Marketing Efforts: Social, Paid Targeting, Networking, Friend-to-Friend"]

So we look for members who are natural Masonic salesmen to push our message and based on the data that we receive from our marketing gurus, we continue to reframe our brand and our message. But as it turns out, fraternity community charity, we're not huge sellers, and attracting potential members to our streams. Beer, cars, cigars, social events, in other word,s being seen as fun and open. Those messages were received and responded to and we also encourage our clubs and units to focus on membership and to use some of the money that they raised each year to host non-members for outreach and for all and to lodges and to be more engaged within the community. We elevated our communication strategy by emailing out a weekly membership newsletter. When we began this endeavor, we only had about 800 good email addresses, and by constantly asking for contact information, we now have over 1500 good email addresses. Membership and marketing were becoming one program that supported each other for the benefit of Ansar shrine.

During 2024, we continued to build on the idea of leading a collaboration effort. We reached out to leaders and other Appendant bodies to work together on like-minded projects, Ansar continued to host joint committees of nobles and non-Nobles alike. We opened our stated meetings as much as we could to interested Masons and hosted Lodge masters as our highlighted members at stated meetings. We have literally thrown the doors open of Ansar Temple and we have also continued to budget for marketing and membership. This year's budget was $50,000. Now that sounds like a lot of money, but based on our social media data, are successful circus last weekend and how members and others are reacting, I'm sure that this is not enough. We have began offering our buildings to community charities for their events as well as other Masonic bodies. Two weeks ago, Ansar hosted the Illinois statewide reunion for Scottish Rite with nearly 200 men in attendance.

[A flyer that reads "Have you ever thought about becoming a Mason? Maybe your dad or grandfather is a Mason, Maybe you're a Mason but want to learn about other Masonic Orgs, Maybe you're looking for something more, Maybe you've heard the conspiracy theories, Whatever the reason, please join us to learn more about Masonic Membership. Masonic Townhall, Thursday October 3rd 6:30 to 8pm, Ansar Shrine Temple 630 South 6th SPFLD, IL. More info & RSVP AnsarTownhall@gmail.com. Drinks Snacks and Answers. See you on the 3rd!" next to a smaller flyer that reads "Ansar Shrine and Valley of Springfield Membership Townhall. Are you interested in Freemasonry? Are you a Master Mason interested in next steps? Are you community service minded? Are you looking for a values-based organization? Are you ready to become a Mason? A calendar icon next to text that reads 'Oct. 3, 2024'; a clock icon next to text that reads 'Start at 6:30p.m. - 8:00p.m.'; a map location icon next to text that reads '630 S. 6th Springfield, IL'; More info AnsarTownhall@gmail.com"]

Most of these men had never been into our building and many were not Shriners. We have kicked off the Ansar2030. This to be our first five-year strategic plan in a long time. This living document is currently being finished up with seven different committees working to make it a success, and this year, we hosted three membership town halls in partnership with the three Scottish Rite valleys in our jurisdiction. The town hall idea continues the idea of throwing open the doors to Masonry and its Appendant bodies. Ansar partnered with the Valley of Quincy on our western edge, the Valley of Danville on our eastern border, in the Valley of Springfield, which is centrally located. The idea for these was to invite Masons and non-Masons alike to learn about masonry and our appendant bodies. By growing masonry, we will grow the shrine. We encourage partners and spouses to attend.

Each evening was 90 minutes with speakers from Blue Lodge Shrine, Scottish Rite, York Rite, and we had youth groups represented: Order of the Eastern Star, Daughters of the Nile, and even The Grotto. We didn't want anyone to feel like this was a timeshare pitch. We specifically did not have a sign-in sheet and told attendees that we would not be hounding them after the session. We did have petitions for Lodge and Independent Bodies if they were interested, though. Our marketing efforts for this involve paid and organic social media, Masonic networking between different bodies, and direct friend-to-friend asks. The branding and messaging we used was fun and it was the same across the jurisdiction. We appealed to legacies, we appealed to current masons and we appealed to community interests and values. Of course, we appealed to pure curiosity. The images we chose also conveyed more than the fez or men in suits or parade-dress uniforms.

Here are the raw facts from this effort: Around 50 men engage with us in these different three different town halls. We had 150,000 unique impressions, and we spent just under $1,000 on all the marketing for this event, and less for all evenings was snacks and drinks. We had participation from nine different bodies and the leaders of some of the bodies expressed that they found the event interesting because they did not know about some of the other Masonic bodies and we invited the public into our secret buildings and finally, between all the different independent bodies we took in 22 petitions. Now this doesn't seem like a lot, but what a great start. So what we have learned from this two-year effort is that we have a lot to learn. Probably the best takeaway is that we started planning. The simple act of actually planning leads to execution, successful or not. The success is that we moved forward. Next year and in 2026, we will have three town hall meetings in the spring and three in the fall.

We also learned that we should have just focused on having something at a large Masonic temple, but we can do these in community centers or churches, or other locations that may not be so intimidating. We are adding a community relations chair and a committee to the membership and marketing team to build our capacity with other organizations and other events, not just parades throughout Central Illinois. So we will make a lot more mistakes, but we will own them. We will learn from them and we'll keep planning and executing. We are excited to continue building solid relationships with Masonic leadership throughout our area. And next year we'll also be reaching out directly to include Prince Hall into our efforts, and we'll continue to permeate Ansar with the message of membership through communication, our ambassadors in our clubs and units. Not everything is going to work, but we are not going to listen to those who think nothing will work or who continue to rely on. We've always done it that way.

[title card] Shriners International Education Foundation presents: Shriners Lead the Way: A Masonic Centered Approach to Membership and Marketing: What's Our Story?

[title card] Noble Academy logo; Dave Kelm | High Priest & Prophet, Membership Chairman | Asan Shriners; Shriners International Education Network logo

We don't know what it's going to take for you or your temple or your lodge to get moving to start your membership journey or renew your membership journey. Our course objectives are pretty simple. We only want you to take one thing away. What is that thing? What is going to light your fuse? What are you going to come away with from today's presentation that gets your temple moving? What is that one thing? I've got to figure this whole thing out with the clicker. I apologize, everybody. So here we go. What is our story? Who do we say we are? We say that we're one brotherhood. We say that the third degree is the pen. Ultimate. We meet on the level and we part on the square. But you know what? This is where we really reside, isn't it? We are a group of human beings who are sometimes bogged down by petty jealousies.

We frown upon Appendant bodies. We've all heard the whole story about he only wants to become a mason because he wants to become a Shriner, or he is going to join a lodge because his friends are in Scottish Rite. We've even heard in central Illinois of some lodges blackballing potential members because they feared he would join an appendant body. What they really feared though is they couldn't or wouldn't give that potential brother what he was looking for from Masonry. But masonry has something for everyone, doesn't it? Look at all these different, confusing paths of membership. We are one big Masonic family, and we tend to be one big dysfunctional family. You can't chart a path on this map without a professional cryptographer. For us to explain how to become a potential member is difficult. It's challenging. It can be chaos. The potential member, we are a membership organization, and to a potential member, it is really difficult to figure out how to become a Mason.

[A large, elaborate flow chart labeled "Masonic Family Map" that has dozens of offshoots and labels that are illegible on the screen.]

So we have erected some barriers. We've self-erected these barriers here that we've found, and we also have external challenges that we have to overcome, to steal a clichéd corporate phrase, we have allowed ourselves to become stovepiped. It may not be correct for us to talk about our current state of affairs, but we are famous for pretending as masons that other bodies don't even exist. Most of us belong to many different independent bodies. But it would be, gosh, we believe if we talk in lodge about shrine or if, as a York Wright lying officer, we would dare ever discuss degree practice for Scottish Rite. We have lodges that want to raise new masons, but only if they purely will stay at a lodge. We also have long memories. We also have members who remember some personal slight that took place, excuse me, in the distant past, but that still guides our decisions today, even if it is injurious to growing membership, that we have all been at an event where someone brings up why we don't do this or why we don't do that, and that will trigger a story whose passion is fueled by scotch, but whose facts are often shaded by time.

We are also the great victims of the phrase. We've always done it that way. We don't want to make it easier to pay dues. We don't want to make it easier to sign up for an event or volunteer as a first-year member because we've always done it that way. And of course, probably the death nail of membership growth. Enshrine is somebody came up with to be one ask one. This single phrase, in my opinion, is the single largest reason why we have had a reduction in membership and membership efforts other than death. As an organization, we have told ourselves, we have given ourselves permission to wait for non-members to knock on the lodge door. They've got to come to us. We can't talk to them or offer them information or ask them to become members because to be one, you have to ask one.

So we sat back and we waited and we waited and we waited. And in that interim, what has the public come to think of us? We're a secret society. We have these secret blogs and these secret temples. Well, being secret means not being very inclusive. We just discussed the previous slide. That path to membership is arduous. We also know that our mission and values are very clear to us, but to broadcast those and communicate those well to a potential mason is difficult. Clearly, the commitment to become a master mason shouldn't be taken lightly, but those of us trying to move that message forward and grow the fraternity, it's difficult. Recently, the Northern Masonic jurisdiction did a survey of non-members. The respondents knew a lot about Freemasonry, that it was an organization that where there are parades that they're male-oriented, but they didn't know those core values or what it stood for.

When those same respondents were informed about the core values of Masonry, more than 70% of those respondents indicated that they may be interested in becoming a Mason. We can't do anything about the age of our current members, but it's important to recognize that that has an impact on potential members. And while we have heard in our outreach at Ansar, and we know as Shriners that parade units and hospital commercials and the iconic fez identify us as Shriners, many non-members don't know that you had to become a Mason first to become a Shriner. So in our little corner of central Illinois, we talked about how to get Shriners activated in membership development and how, as Shriners, we can move that forward.