Brand New Guilds

[Atraxxa]

My question to you GM's of newer guilds out there that are now up and running successfully, what did you do to attract new members to your guild which had no established history? How did you market your brand new guild?

[Onikaroshi]

Not a GM of a new guild or anything, but just some perspective points:

1. Decide WHAT your guild is and advertise it only as that, if you only plan on doing Heroic mode, make sure you advertise yourself as a Heroic only guild!

2. Don't lie in your adverts to make yourself look better, it'll always be found out and generally lead to loss.

and

3. Even if someone is 11/11M don't post that your guild has an 11/11M raid leader, it means squat, they could have been carried or even bought it (not yet i mean, but you know). Personally I hate when I see this, it just devalues that post for me, like... why are they there then?

[Deleted]

a guild on my server did the recruit all with autoinvite addons etc.

they started as nothing early WoD, invited everybody who wanted for the better part of a year. encouraged guild chat/being nice/etc. starting organizing glory achievement runs for old stuff and normal raids etc when members permitted. kicked out offliners when guild got full. regularly demoted inactive officers and promoted new.

now they have a heroic raid team of like 40 people. the only reason they don't seriously move to mythic is by choice.

but make no mistake it took whoever started it a lot of effort to make it work.

[Syri79]

I think the advice I would give would be:
1. Don't auto-invite people. Yes, a few might join, and a few might even stick, but they won't really be there for whatever your guild is about, they're just there so they don't get any more auto-invite spam from anyone else. Only invite people who really want to buy into whatever your guild is about. Send messages, see if they're interested, then invite.

2. If you set the guild up with friends, don't use private chat for general conversation (e.g. did you see such and such on TV), use guild chat. It makes the guild appear active, and likely to keep new people interested in staying. There's nothing worse than joining a guild and seeing nothing said at all, but somehow everyone seems coordinated, like they're talking somewhere and you're not invited.

3. Be flexible, but not TOO flexible. If you have a lot of people wanting to try something different, don't get too stuck in your ways, but if they're looking to drag the guild in a totally different direction, don't be afraid to put your foot down as well. You need to allow some room for people trying different activities (e.g. a normal raiding guild trying out heroic) but if someone starts to insist on raiding seriously when you set up to PvP, you really need to point out they might not be in the right place.

4. Apply the same rules for everyone. If someone wants to join a guild run but they're undergeared, and you turn them down, you can't then invite a friend who's also undergeared. You've got to be fair, or people will quit if you seem to be favouring others, or singling them out.

5. Recruit honestly, and without being too spammy. Set up a forum post in your realm's forums on the official site and bump it every so often, but not too often. Maybe just when it drops off the first page or something. Put up a message in trade chat, but don't spam it too often. Make your adverts eye catching, but keep it honest and don't over-do it.

That's just my personal thoughts on how to organise things in a new guild, of course, the main thing is to make a guild that fits your own values, and find your own place in the game.