Recruitment, Retention & Reactivation

Recruitment, Retention and Reactivation [R3]

Participation rates in many outdoor activities are changing. Demographic changes, competing hobbies and interests, and shifts in popular American culture have all contributed to the decline in participation rates of several outdoor pastimes. Currently, champions of the outdoor recreation community are focusing their efforts to strategically increase participation in hunting, angling, and the shooting sports through a national movement referred to as “R3.”

R3 (recruitment, retention and reactivation) describes everything from a specific program to an organization’s entire strategic vision to engage and serve customers.

Outdoor Recreation Adoption Model

The ORAM (Outdoor Recreation Adoption Model) illustrates, in a linear fashion, the steps an individual moves through as they learn about, try and then adopt a new activity or behavior. It can be used to understand the difference between recruitment, retention and reactivation. By understanding the ORAM and the process critical to an individual's adoption of an activity, R3 program managers and organizations can build strategies that effectively engage individuals in outdoor recreation. This will then further increase the reach and impact of R3 efforts

Participant Tracking and Evaluation:

Evaluation is a process that critically examines a program. It involves collecting and analyzing information about a program's activities, characteristics and outcomes. Its purpose is to make judgments about a program, to improve its effectiveness and/or to inform programming decisions.

The Wildlife Management Institute (WMI) Evaluation Tools below are developed specifically for skills training/learn-to-hunt seminars and training hunt programs. However, the information contained within these tools can be modified to fit most conservation related programs.

Video Resource: Diving in to Evaluations (YouTube)

Does your organization have an R3 program that you would like to have assistance with tracking and evaluating on?

Let us know, we are happy to help. Available services:

Online Registration (Event Manager)
Online Pre, Post and Follow-Up Surveys
License Purchase & Basic Program Analysis
Results Chain Development

Contact Megan Wisecup or Rachel Ladd if you are interested in trying out one of our available services.

Focus Groups

Many organizations are unaware of the kinds of benefits using focus groups can have. Focus groups are often used in order to gain a better insight into different behaviors and opinions of customers regarding products, brands and services. They are typically helpful when you are looking to reach a new target audience, making changes to or establishing the brand of your organization or creating a new program or service.

Below is a questionnaire template we developed to help get you started. If you conduct any focus groups and are willing to share the results we would love to see them. We are in the process of wrapping up some additional focus groups this Spring targeting millennials (young professionals and college age students) and will be compiling a report with the results that will be made available to our partners early this summer. Any additional results we can gather to include in our final report will help us all better understand this target audience.

Focus Group Questionnaire Template

Please submit any completed questionnaires or a summary of the results gathered to Rachel Ladd.

Marketing Tools:

In October, the Iowa DNR launched a campaign called "Let's Go Hunting" to encourage existing hunters to share their passion and invite someone to go with them. The multi-channel campaign will also promote hunter education, the Apprentice License and hunting related links and applications. The media toolkit includes a series of videos, banners, logos and social media posts that have been developed and available for staff and partners to use.

Let's Go Hunting Toolkit
To obtain access to the toolkit, contact Megan Wisecup at megan.wisecup@dnr.iowa.gov.

Mentoring:

Have questions about the outdoors but not sure where to go or who to ask? Check out Powderhook, an application developed to serve as an outdoor helpdesk.

Interested in becoming a digital mentor for Iowa? Contact Megan Wisecup at megan.wisecup@dnr.iowa.gov.