A.
Start Your Efforts Early!!!
This is your ace in the hole. You are after Market
Share in your area and the “ early bird always gets the worm”. Dinner ticket sales today are first come first served! Your competition is also out there beating the streets for attendees to their events, hustling their tickets. Organizations, such as, National Wild
Turkey Federation, Friends of the NRA, Trout Unlimited, Ruffed Grouse Society,
Whitetails Unlimited, Delta Waterfowl, just to name a few. These guys are all after your attendees!
It is crucial to get your dinner location and date confirmed, and do so early
-- this cannot be emphasized enough. To those above named groups, DU is the organization they all want to take ticket sales away from! These groups have all gotten to where they are by simply copying DU events, not by leading the way. Leading the way is what you do for the best conservation organization ever conceived!
You represent the best. You are the chairman or committee member of the team that is creating the best event of 2007 in your area! Ducks Unlimited’s 70 years of achievements stand alone and are unmatched by any other conservation organization of today! These achievements are a published matter of record and are indisputable! So when you are out there, marketing your event, You Are The Leader Representing The Best There
Is!!
B.
Recruit New Committee Members!!! Yes, Yes, Yes, I know, we have all heard it this year, but the fact is just one new committee member will make a major impact. In our case, at the EUP Dinner in Sault Ste Marie, one new committee member was responsible for 10 new members / tickets sold. That is big…one guy, so figure a possibility of each new committee member being potentially good for 10 new attendees.
Those attendees have their circle of friends, and that circle will grow - and all from just one new committee member! Think of the possible results from 4 or 5 new committee members - wow! Also, remember that your existing committee members are the engine that makes your event happen. It’s an asset to utilize that experience with each individual’s different strengths and new ideas to add to your upcoming event.
C.
The Best Approach Is Simply Face To Face Conversations!!! Show your potential attendee your dinner invitation letter, highlighting those special raffles and auctions taking place at your dinner. Also have with you your Michigan DU Facts Sheet, and a copy of the 70 th Anniversary article about DU, which you can liberally pass around.
Your goal is to project to them that this event is special and a great new experience for them to become involved with. Emphasize the 70 th Anniversary and all the

accomplishments that have been completed by DU through events such as yours, (doing this by showing your Michigan DU Fast Fact Sheet). Remember, you are giving your potential attendee an enthusiastic, positive, and energetic sales pitch on just how much fun your event will be. Impress upon them the opportunity they will have to win some great items, through raffle ticket purchases, silent auctions, or the live auction, if they choose to attend the dinner. Act as if you are giving them an inside stockmarket tip, make them feel special and lucky to have this chance to purchase a ticket from you!
Tell them that they can also bring a friend along to share in these activities, and that you will give their friends the same deal!!
1. Offer your potential attendee a special incentive to attend your event by waiving the cost of the DU membership. This can apply to anyone who has not been to a DU event in the previous 2 (or more) years. The attendee would receive a complementary one year membership to DU and would only pay for the cost of the actual dinner ticket. The theory is that once they are at the event and see what is going on, that new attendee will spend enough to cover the cost of a complementary DU membership, at the very least. Now that they have attended your event, had fun, and enjoyed this special social evening, the majority of them will return to future events, in and out of your area. These new members could now be potential committee members for the following year’s event; each of them with new and fresh ideas, to help keep your event improving each year.
2. Explain to them how excited you are about your new raffles, hunting trips, fishing trips, steak cook outs, wine tasting, hay rides, diner cars, ladies raffle table, the duck hunters table, the fisherman’s table, etc., whatever you have come up with to excite that potential attendee!
Approach your future attendee, with total confidence, pride and enthusiasm, as you explain your event. Your confidence will impress them, creating a desire to purchase that ticket and attend your event! Be and act excited about the upcoming event, project your enthusiasm, as it is catching and will work for you by also exciting your potential attendee to purchase a ticket.
D. Take Time To Do Some P.R. For D.U. With Examples In Hand Such As:
1. Your Michigan Ducks Unlimited State Accomplishment Sheet, Fast Facts & the 70 th Anniversary of Ducks Unlimited article, (Enclosed in Kit)
2. Research what has been accomplished within your county and use those statistics to show your potential attendee; (if no projects have been done, then the state DU facts sheet will do).
3. Consider all your contacts as possible event attendees. Don’t be bashful; ask everyone you run into when you’re out and about. I can promise that you will be surprised at how many of these contacts will be interested and take time to listen to your sales pitch. Be prepared with the proper information to show, and use your sales tools

that you received within your kit. Use your DU Business Card preferably, because that is the bottom line, you are a salesperson for DU.
During this period of ticket sales and new attendee recruitment always try and have all your information close by and handy, just in case an opportunity to promote your event comes along!! You are selling the concept of having a great evening out, supporting a tremendous conservation organization!! So be aggressive in going after your ticket sales, and take charge of your market share in your area. Rest assured your competition is!
E.
Completely Re-Think Your Dinner Event!!!
This is important and will be the measure of your event success!!! Give it a completely new make over, a fresh look; try to change it around at least 50% with new ideas you have come up with. Keep what was working for you the best at your last event. Be aggressive, implementing any new ideas you have come up with for this event. Take some chances; try anything that you think your attendees would truly enjoy (this also includes you). You want your existing members to be curious enough to attend once more, thinking that “I just have to see this.”
This way they will not use the excuse which we have all heard way too often:
“it’s just another DU dinner-- been there, done that, why should I attend?” Any of your new attendees will be seeing it for the first time, so to them it will be great. But it’s the regular membership that you are trying to maintain also, the backbone to your event, the people you sent your dinner letter to. Again, be creative with your new ideas!
Remember, it is not business as usual, those days are done and gone forever! THINK
OUTSIDE THE DU BOX! - (meaning try different items at your event, not necessarily
DU national items or even the state package items, but some totally different things to offer your attendee’s. Use your own creative judgment, make it fun for everyone involved, you will be surprised by the excitement this fresh new look brings to your event!)
Listen to your membership’s pros and cons about the last dinner event, that is a great place to begin fine tuning your event for a major change and face lift. Look for the silver lining in the cloud, it’s there and just takes some looking to find it. The pros and cons you heard, that is where it lies!!
F.
Offer New Attendees Incentives To Attend By Waiving DU Membership
Cost ! This has been explained above, but I felt it is good to go over the idea once again to emphasize it. Get them in the door, and get that head count up; this is so important! Be confident that the event that you have planned and put together will be awesome enough to cause these new attendees and now members of DU to thirst for the next DU event! The bottom line once again is Market Share! Get them through the door, increase that head count, which is our future, the new guys and gals!! And waiving that DU membership is a point of sales winner, it is the deal maker. Everyone wins with this; the ticket sales go up, the head count is up, and from this DU and your chapter gain an increased membership list! Your new members will be appreciative of getting a deal to attend your event, and again everyone wins!

G.
Market Share!
It’s like location, location, location in real estate. These are a couple of important new words to use, understand and implement. Simply put, there is only so much pie to go around. Seventy years ago there was only Ducks Unlimited, and it was pretty much was the entire pie. Today, it’s a whole new ball game, and the old methods of marketing have been noticeably failing. Why is that? The pie is simply shrinking.
It’s being sliced at least 12 different times now, with DU getting a great deal less than seventy years ago. I believe that the first step in increasing the share of pie going to DU, or Market Share, is through the use of aggressive sales techniques that we are trying to implement here. Also, we must acknowledge that we have a problem due to this shrinking Market Share. Keep in mind that the competition may be thinking the same way. So the choices are this: Yes, here in Michigan our economy is hurting; but people are still here, guys and gals still go to work, eat, sleep and live. Those same people will attend your dinner event if you give them a good reason to. They are still spending money; they are just being more picky and cautious on how and where they do, everyone is looking for a deal or a value. So our job is to give them a good reason to pick a
Ducks Unlimited event and see why we are “Number One” in the Conservation and Fund Raising Business.
Event ticket sales is the answer. Yes, it may take a little more effort than say 10 years ago…but those sales are still there! Some people just have to be given a good reason why they should attend your event! They are your Market
Share, and are waiting for you to contact them with your new and exciting dinner event!
It’s in your hands, with just a little more effort than usual, applying the formula that
“Sincere Effort will always Yield Great Results!”
This will result in your success, and you will sell out your event, or at the very least greatly increase your attendance from last year!! And isn’t that our goal, to increase event attendance each year till you hit your maximum capacity… The Sold Out Event!!
A. Simply Ask! It really can’t be much simpler than this. Just simply ask for your donor support, worst case scenario is that you will be told no! I was told no once out of 78 request …I can live with that, and probably you can too.
1. Make A Donors List To Contact: I pretty much just went from one end of a street to the other. I tried to break it down block by block; it’s simple and worked for me. I tried to identify the businesses that I thought would be interested in helping out the dinner event. There is no magic here, just pretty basic door to door salesmanship. I did not make any phone calls. It was all done face to face, cold calling; which means showing up with all the promotional material to support the 70 th Anniversary of DU, and also the
Michigan Facts Sheet, the Dinner Event invitation letter, and your DU business card. I

used a pretty basic line,
“Hi, my name is Dan and if I could have a moment of your time, I have some material I would like to show you, and am asking for your help, perhaps with a donation to our upcoming DU 70th Anniversary dinner event. Either cash or merchandize or a gift certificate would really be a great help and deeply appreciated!” That was pretty much it, pretty basic, direct and straight to the point. Your contact’s time is valuable, so you want to be polished and direct. I always asked to see the owner or manager first, and if he or she were not available, then I set a time to return and meet with them, leaving my business card and all related DU material for them to look at. I also took their phone number and called to reconfirm my appointment and time. This helped for the follow-up with your foot in the door for the scheduled meeting with them. Every time that I met with the manager or owner, it was fun and a great experience. They all were very generous to our event, and happy to help out however they could. Here is where beginning ahead of your event date pays off, as you will have that time to return and firm up that donation.
2. Who To Ask For Your Underwriting Or Donation: If you are using a dinner program, DU furnishes the outer jacket. I sold the inside front page, the back inside page, and the back outer page of the jacket for $350.00 each. For that I gave each donor a full page ad; they furnished the copy, approved it, and we paid for the printing. I told the individuals that paid the $350.00 that their funds would be used as underwriting to help offset the cost of the merchandize from DU. Each was fine with that. I sold to one bank, one lumber company and one car dealership (as examples to consider). The fee of
$350.00 was an arbitrary figure I came up with as a fair amount for DU and somewhat affordable for the donor. This figure could be raised or lowered depending on your targeted contacts and area. Next Year I will ask for a little more, and depend on repeat donors. This is just like the head count; first get them to help with a cash donation, such as was given; and next year, perhaps more. These cash donations are a tremendous help to a dinner event, and almost certainly guarantee your success.
I also gave out 12 business card size ads in the dinner program. I put 3 ads per page, and did it on the word processor. The finished product was submitted camera ready to our printer (this saved approximately $40.00 per page in set up fees). Each of the business card donors had given over $100.00 worth of gift certificates and / or merchandise. I tried to help the small business with this presentation, and did receive good results when I offered this to them. You may want to consider this, as it helps a lot if the potential donor feels that he or she will have some good visual exposure, through their ads, to the DU crowd. Everyone who donated was acknowledge in the dinner program.
3. Donation Ideas: You can contact nearly everyone in your town for a donation to your dinner event. I found that getting gift certificates was a great way for a lot of my contacts to donate. We ended up with enough restaurant, pizza, and movie tickets to have a “dining out around town package” (that was our district chairman and
R.D.’s idea as a way to maximize these donations). We put over $500.00 of gift certificates

in a blitz raffle, used a full deck of 52 playing cards, and raised $350.00; as opposed to just putting them on a table and giving them away. Great way to raise some money. Also for the general raffle table I received lots of actual hard merchandize. The amazing thing is how happy all the merchants were to participate in the event, and actually many, many times thanked me for including them in our event. For most, it is easier to give something to the dinner than to work it into their schedules to attend. Either way we win, but it is always nice if the donors can attend also. Each of you knows your town and the merchants. I went to places that no one else had considered, it seemed. For example,
Edward Jones Investments, Pizza Hut, Gas Stations or Hardware Stores; stay with the mom and pop business. They can make the decisions quickly to give you the support and donation you are asking for. The larger corporations are a little more complicated and take longer to complete. They are definitely worth the extra effort it requires; it just takes longer to get the donation. (At this writing I am waiting for a $500.00 grant from Wal-
Mart, for a dinner event we have in November). Also, I went to the little stores off the beaten path, they are more than happy to help out. I solicited small bars, party stores, small gift shops, flower shops, coffee shops, fast food places, local restaurants; the supply really is limited only to your time and amount of effort you would like to put into it for gift certificates, merchandize, or cash. Approach your donors wherever you find them. Your town is full of people that will help your event, if you “Just Simply Ask!”
3. Banquet Invitation Letter: You will find a copy enclosed with your sales kit. This invitation letter is just an outline for you, to give an example of a possible idea to emulate.
It worked well for the EUP Spring Dinner, as all who read it were excited long before they arrived at the event! Be creative with your writing; make it fun for the reader, showing your new direction, your face lift to your dinner event, thereby enticing them to attend.
This is just simple marketing- selling your event and giving your members a reason to attend. Also, it is helpful to put your letter on a brightly colored paper, and your order sheet on a different colored paper. Try and stay away from simple white typing paper. I like to use a brightly colored envelope; yes it is a little more expensive, but if it nets better attendance results, that outweighs any small additional cost. I also like to put a line on the front of the envelope on the bottom left, underlined, saying something like, “new dinner information enclosed!” It is a small trick and effective to get your letter not so easily misplaced or thrown away, or lost in a pile of other white envelopes.
4. Advertising: Yes, this is a big one!
There are lots of directions to go on this.
Your local newspaper is your best bet. Your local radio and television stations all have free ad spots for non-profit organizations to help advertise your event. Trade dinner tickets possibly for some ad space, with your local paper, perhaps a radio spot or same for television. Run a good ad design at least 3 times before your dinner event. Have all your contact phone numbers listed, 2 or 3 of them, just incase a few guys are gone and a caller can’t get a live person. Each dinner event will have special needs for your ads, so this is something that is a one per one issue. It is hard to measure the results of an effective ad campaign, but your newspaper coverage with a possible article about the upcoming event is pretty solid. This year our dinner received some extra attention with a great front page

story, correlating around the DU 70 th Anniversary. That article definitely helped promote our dinner event. This will work for all the summer events, and fall dinners coming up this year, and is a trump card that should be played by all reading this.
It is Solid Gold; the papers are always looking for a great article and some news to report within their area! The article is enclosed in your sales kit.
5. Mailing List: This is the backbone to all DU events. The problem is that once mailed out, the committee seems to become complacent, thinking that they have now done all they can, and will just wait to see what comes of it. Wrong, Wrong, Wrong! The list is just one of many tools you need to get your intended members to your event. Early
Bird Raffles are always nice to use to get everyone to send their money in early. But we also have available lots of great posters, provided by DU to place around town in strategic places, announcing the time, date, place, ticket cost, and who to contact for more information. I have also used computer technology. I created my own DU poster, by scanning the smaller one that DU provides, and sent it on to all my email contacts. It is fast, and right to the point, and is the wave of the future for our communication and announcements! Another great way to get some easy coverage at no cost is the DU web site. List your dinner event letter on the site. Your WEBMASTER is Amy Spray, call her at 517-331-1909. Her email is: dumichigan@yahoo.com just email her your event letter information as an attachment, and she will put it on the web site with your dinner event date. This is a great tool to get some other DU members to possibly attend your event from out of your area!
1. Have A Calling Campaign: About a week before your event date, after your letters have been sent out, assign your committee members a list of existing members names and phone numbers to contact. Have the committee ask if they received the letter and or if they plan on attending. It is an effective way to remind lots of people. I have used this method for our events, and have had many contacts who would not have attended, if I had not called to remind them. So give this some consideration, it is effective and works.
6. After The Event: Send a follow up letter, thanking everyone who attended; and perhaps mentioning the success of the dinner and how much was raised for the Ducks.
Make them feel included and part of the larger picture. This is just good common sense, as it is sowing the seed for your next event. I have enclosed a copy of a thank you letter to the sponsors of a recent event we held in Brimley last winter. It can also be an example to use and modify to fit your needs; a simple guideline to give you some ideas to help with composing your thank you letter.
Also send a thank you letter to all your donors! Keep in mind that they will remember this when you come and ask for their support next year. Yes, I know that this may be some additional expense after your event is over, but it is a wise investment in the continued growth and overall health of your dinner event. This is also a great way to protect the Market Share in your area, by going the extra mile. Make no mistake and

take nothing for granted, as the competition is breathing down our neck! These few simple suggestions will help to keep us leading the way, as DU maintains its rightful position as the number one conservation organization in America!!
DFH