Filling a club with GON and other social media.

Have you had good or bad experiences by getting members from social media posts? I went that route 8 or 9 years ago and it was a horrible experience. I had an opportunity to lease a great tract in a good area so I went the social media route to quickly acquire members. After that year, I swore that any club I was affiliated with would be only with folks I actually knew. Any horror stories? Positive experiences?

Mostly very positive here.

The guys I am associated with largely came from GON and they are awesome.

You can review their previous posts and see if they are serious hunters with good attitudes and good hearts or if they are idiots.

Don't take the idiots.

My .02 Worth!

Best of luck

Jim Boyd said:

Mostly very positive here.

The guys I am associated with largely came from GON and they are awesome.

You can review their previous posts and see if they are serious hunters with good attitudes and good hearts or if they are idiots.

Don't take the idiots.

My .02 Worth!

Best of luck

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This x2

U can use media to get your needs out. You can also interview an meet in person serious inquiry's into your lease. Because In the end it's your decision aswell.

What Mr. Boyd said.
I found a great club on here a few years ago. Really good guys. Land was nice also. They just didn't have a huntable hog population.( I know y'all are like that's a good thing. ) and I was on a waiting list for a club a couple of long time friends were in so I left. But yes I've had good results with GON at least.

Most of the time you can trust total strangers better than you can friends or family

I use Craigslist for advertising and initial contact with interested parties, they call my number listed in the AD and I interview them then. I then use Facebook to get a look at them closer, I have had good success using people's post and photos on Facebook to get an idea of what kind of person they might be. I never show the lease to anyone until we have had about 3 phone calls in which I try to learn more about them and see if they will fit our club.

I have had some guys slip in who turned out to be a pain or irritating but they don't get invited back the next season. Some folks who want in your club will lie to you in an attempt to convince you that they are who you want. I have put a few people in sight unseen and who I never showed the club to due to schedule conflicts. Every single one of these that joined without ever seeing the club never showed up to hunt a single day, not one! It baffles me why someone would spend money to not hunt but I do love those kind of members.

I answered an ad here on GON last May, talked with the OP on the phone and mailed him a check. I didn't think $350 was too much to risk.

Nice folks, friendly, helpful and I had a nice season.

No conflicts, no drama.

I had good luck here. We only needed 1 member and a guy called me. We met on the land I showed him around and he said he would like to join us. That was 3 years ago and he turned out to be a great member, his son is first on our waiting list too.

Mexican Squealer said:

Have you had good or bad experiences by getting members from social media posts? I went that route 8 or 9 years ago and it was a horrible experience. I had an opportunity to lease a great tract in a good area so I went the social media route to quickly acquire members. After that year, I swore that any club I was affiliated with would be only with folks I actually knew. Any horror stories? Positive experiences?

Click to expand...

Only guy I ever hunted with who I wish I'd never heard of was a guy "from a hunting board" who just couldn't seem to find any where to hunt. Just didn't seem like he could look at a map of ALL OF HOOSIER NATIONAL FOREST and figure out a place to go. "If only someone could just get me started..."

Live 5 counties away from me, clear on the other side of the state capital and wanted to hunt "southern Indiana". EVERY COUNTY between me and him has higher allowances for special doe permits.

I'd lost my brother, my regular hunting partners all moved, got married, got girlfriends... how bad could it be. "He's just dumb..." Told him on a Monday he could come over and we'd try a public land spot I'd hunted a few times. I Thursday he calls, "Gee, I can't make it this week end. Could I send my buddy McDuffus down and you could show him? He'll need to camp at your place."

He is the only person I EVER EVEN HEARD OF who could mess up a public land spot, get the surrounding land owners mad enough to put up locked gates on all their field lanes. I never saw or heard of any one who could WOUND and cripple more deer.

Signs a guy is someone you NEVER WANT TO MEET or hunt with.
1. Nobody who already knows him will let him hunt, he don't have any place of his own.

2. The further he has to drive to find a place where no one knows him so they'll let him hunt, the less you want to know him.

3. If he is 30 years old, says he hunts, but doesn't have any PLACE he can hunt, there is probably a darn good reason why.

Not here, but Craigslist.

About 10 years ago, it was mid-september, and I was anxious to join a club. Found an advert on Craigslist for Coweta County, and it sounded absolutely perfect. Tons of trail cam pics of big bucks and groups of doe's.

I hunted no less than 5 days a week. Saw some small bucks, but never saw a single doe. Paid for food plots that never got installed. 1 decent buck was killed on 800 acres all season. Couldn't understand how I didn't see a single doe all season. Come to find out, the pics were from years earlier, and they had pretty much wiped out the entire population over the last few years by keeping the "brown it's down" mentality.

Needless to say, I went back to public land.

Club

? percent success with members on the forum...That may change but all good in the neighborhood for me.

I like facebook. I can check them out and see the types of deer they have posted in the past so I know what they are shooting. Plus I can see their posts to see if they are general trouble makers and such.

Good point^^

jigman29 said:

I like facebook. I can check them out and see the types of deer they have posted in the past so I know what they are shooting. Plus I can see their posts to see if they are general trouble makers and such.

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Yep 90% will have their Facebook wide open and you can tell a lot about them from what they post.