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How To Start & Successfully
Operate A Correspondence Club
All over the country, in fact - all over the world, there are
lonely men and women eagerly seeking confidential introductions to other
people - for friendship, companionship, even marriage.
They're in every village and hamlet, in every town and city, at
every crossroads and on every rural route; up in the mountains and down
in the valleys; on ranches, in factories, mills, stores, offices,
churches - They're every where!
You can help these people ease their loneliness, and make a very
good income for your self as well, with a Correspondence Club.
If you enjoy people, and have an imagination for the world of
business, then this is for you.
The first step is to find out what the other correspondence clubs
are doing. Your purpose
will be to design your own format, and look for ways to improve upon
what they are doing. So,
check out the tabloids on sale at your supermarket and write a letter to
as many of the advertising correspondence clubs as you can afford. Simply state that you're thinking of joining a correspondence
club - but you don't want to get "ripped off," so you would
appreciate a sample copy of their latest club bulletin/newsletter and a
listing of everything the club endeavors to do for its members.
It isn't an absolute necessity - but it wouldn't hurt to include
a loose 29% stamp with your letter of inquiry.
Most of the established clubs will respond quickly, because the
very least it means to them is another address they can sell.
Don't use business letterhead paper, or a business name. Just inquire as an ordinary interested person.
Once you have your game plan organized - what you will offer your
members, the fees you'll charge, and the related services or items you
want to offer as sources of added income - your next move will be to
begin advertising. Start
small, and go slowly... This
is mainly to allow you to handle the ever increasing number of members
while still maintaining firm control over the time required to keep up
with the business.
Your first advertisements should be in the "nickel or
classifieds" newspapers in your area.
An advertisement such as the following, inserted once a week for
a month, shouldn't cost you more than $25 while filling your mailbox...
Young woman, just divorced, wants to meet eligible men
through correspondence. Tell
me about yourself with SASE to: Box
number, and Your name or nickname.
(Most people just use a
tag-line such as Judy, Box 123, Anywhere USA).
At the same time this ad is running for men to inquire about the
available girls, run an ad such as the following in about five or six of
the national mail order ad sheets...
Young business executive - Little Shy - wants to meet
right woman through correspondence.
Will answer all
letters. Sherm, Box 123, Everywhere USA.
Certainly you should vary the ads - study the ads the other clubs
are running, and adapt what and how they're doing it to your own needs.
Hopefully before you began, and as a result of the "sample
bulletins/newsletters" you received from all the correspondence
clubs you wrote to, you've prepared your own bulletin and can send it
off in reply to all of your inquiries, with an invitation to pay for a
membership in your club. Another
important "rung up the ladder" you're going to get from these
samples is a list of names and addresses of both men and women seeking
correspondence. Some do
include names and addresses with their bulletins, and some don't -
either way, they all sell names to each other so you can send a
sprinkling of those names and addresses with your own, until you become
well established and with a mailing list of your own.
Important to remember - Do not begin advertising until you have
your first club bulletin/newsletter prepared, along with your membership
application. Then, just as
soon as you receive each inquiry, you can send out your answer - the
faster your service, the more credibility you'll impart to your
prospects. Also, always
watch what the older, more established correspondence clubs are doing -
You'll want to duplicate their methods, but with more flair and better
service for your members.
After about three months in business, you should be pretty well
established and showing a good monthly profit.
Then you can begin running advertising of your own in the
"check-out counter" tabloids, and several of the monthly
subscription magazines such as True Story, True Confessions, Modern
Romances, etc.
One way of getting started with a built-in supply of names is by
contacting Metrapala - Box #4091, Sunnyside Station, Long Island City,
New York 11104... They have
several sources of good names of people wanting introductions to members
of the opposite sex, and will gladly supply you with price lists for 25
to 500 names of lonely people in every state in the union, plus from
most countries around the world.
Another important organization that can be of tremendous help to
you is Destiny Syndicate - P.O. Box 5637, Reno, Nevada 89513...
Headed by R.J. Williams who directs the office of the World
Federation of Correspondence Clubs, they can set you up with a quarterly
newspaper that has built in membership forms, and advertising
possibilities as well. In
fact, with a Destiny Syndicate affiliation, you need do nothing more
than a little bit of advertising, and then mail out club news bulletins
every three months or whenever you enlist a new member.
It would be well worth your effort to investigate. |
