Recruitment Done Right: Avenues, Data, and Hard-Won Lessons

For many, the number one issue that is faced on a day-to-day basis is recruiting. Bringing in the next generation of members, and accumulating talent. It can seem like an unclimbable mountain at times.

The goal of this post is to shed some realities, avenues of recruitment, rules of thumb, data and personal experiences.

For the purposes of this post, we will consider recruitment everything up to someone actually joining your unit.

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The Realities of Recruiting

Think of this as fishing with a net, but the fish can swim through the net if they don't like it.

This is a topic that has a million different variables, tons of different personalities and interests. The best that YOU can do as a Unit Leader or Recruiter is to do the best that you can. You will never please every single prospective applicant. Oftentimes, you can do everything right but something minor has them moving on. The key here is introspection, putting yourself in the shoes of someone that is searching for a home to dedicate their time to. What do you see? What could you see someone not liking? This does not mean that your organization must cater to individuals, but the onus is on you to make it look like a desirable place from the outside looking in.

Let's cover a few of the realities off the bat:

Unit Type Matters

This is one that you have no control over, but should be aware of. The point of this sandbox that we love is that we can roleplay as or emulate whatever we like. It is incredible, and there are thriving communities throughout different time frames, themes, militaries and fantasy genres.

Right off the bat, when you are out there advertising you have already split the total pool into a smaller chunk. This is okay, it's just the reality.

The largest chunk of this is obviously United States Military Modern Milsim. Even within this, there are subcategories. You have unit-themed Conventional and Special Operations. You have non-US Militaries, PMC Groups and other eras. You also have groups that switch around and do whatever their community is feeling. None of these are wrong, but it is a good practice to recognize. This is especially true if you are an alternative or niche group, you are automatically appealing to a much smaller piece of the pie.

Presentation Matters

We have all seen an advertisement, pitch or Discord that makes us wonder if anything was double-checked. To most, this is an instant turn off and a good indication that nothing else is organized either. A strong, organized advertisement that encompasses all relevant information is extremely important. Just as important is public-facing information being clear, easy to navigate and informative. The recruiting process does not stop when someone joins your server. You earned those clicks, and need to convert on them.

Take some time, view your Discord from the guest role, have a buddy read through your advertisements or view your media. What does it say about you? Can you find relevant information?

Example (a biased one)

Only relevant information is displayed, in easy to recognize verbiage. A prospective recruit can view open positions, talk with someone in the unit and ask any questions, check out videos and media and view all unit information such as schedule, roster, and SOPs. There is no confusion about where to go, and the chat channel is not a bot talking to them, or a public channel where someone is talking about what flavor of apple sauce they rub on themselves.

The same goes for advertisements, a quick spell and grammar check goes a long way. Coupled with clear, concise information.

Time Slot Matters

Most of the time, this is not something to change lightly. However, it is something to keep in mind as you recruit and advertise. Many individuals pick units (that fit their wants) based on the ideal time slot. Over time, you build up a group of people where THAT is their play time.

But, it's good to keep in mind where that puts you up against the recruiting pool. For example, if you are West Coast US Hours and choose to do 8PM start times, you are excluding a large chunk of the US and definitely Europe. There will always be outliers, of course. Think about the pool you are aiming for (ex: We want NA & European Players) and assess your time against it.

You can't control it all

I briefly mentioned this above, but I cannot stress it enough. Put together the best product you can, get out there and advertise, but know that you cannot win them all. From passive recruitment, somewhere between 1 out of every 10 Discord joins equates to an application. If they are clicking on the link (and aren't a spam bot), they saw something they liked. They may have gotten cold feet, saw something they did not like, the time did not work out, your entry process isn't their speed, too many members, too few members, didn't like your avatar. The list could go on forever. The goal is to cast the widest possible net, but unlike actual fish, they can swim through the net if they choose to.

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Modes of Recruiting: Active and Passive

Really simple:

Active is going out there and getting these people in the door. Whether it be through DMs, public servers or tinder.

Passive is casting that net, and waiting for them to come in.

For most, a blend is likely what is used. It comes down to how much time you want to spend, and how strong your media is. There is no guarantee that investing time into conversation will develop into an applicant. We'll come back to these labels in the avenues of recruitment section.

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Avenues of Recruitment

We will break these down into a few separate categories. I will be providing data from both myself and our friends over in Ghost Platoon.

Discords

There are various Discords that allow promotion of MilSim groups, with varying audiences. ArmA Discord is by far the best, as it has an active Looking For Unit population and dedicated advertisement channel. Recruiters should apply the same principles in these avenues: clean, well put together advertisement with media if possible. Discords are a great place for active recruitment as well. Set the Looking For Unit channel to ping you when a post is made, see if their wants match what you have, and send them a pitch!

Just a quick list:

Platform	ArmA Reforger	ArmA 3
ArmA Discord	YES	YES
MilSim Units	YES	YES
KarmaCut/Drewski	YES	YES
Hatchet - Mod	NO	YES
GRS - Mod	YES	NO
CDD - Mod	YES	NO

I will loop in another tool here that is not a server: Disboard. This app will put a bot into your server, set up a channel and /bump every two hours.

Discord itself makes up 15.4% of our total recruitment (171/1108), with Disboard bringing in another 9.4% (104/1108). That is just over a quarter of total applicants. This data is corroborated by Ghost Platoon's data: 22.4% of total applicants.

MilSim Units

I'd hope we all know MilSim Units at this point. MilSim Units provides immense visibility potential, both directly through unit listings and side benefits. Daily Upvoting (especially with the 3x multiplier) will keep you extremely visible to the thousands that visit the site weekly. Additional benefits such as the podcast reach thousands of viewers on average, extending your unit's reach out even further.

Altogether, MilSim Units is at the top of the to-do list for any organization serious about recruiting.

LaFlash, the Owner of MilSim Units and CO of 3rd Infantry Division, wrote a great post on maximizing your use of the platform.

Reddit

Bringing up another solid pillar, r/findaunit. This subreddit is tailored to AR and A3 recruitment and has over 35,000 followers. It is upvote-driven, and mileage will vary. Although from personal experience, 5-10 upvotes will keep you near the top of the page for about 24 hours. Looking back through some posts, the average is somewhere between 700-1100 views. That is decent reach from a copy/paste.

Note: Reddit is media driven. The baseline is SOMETHING visual to display. This can be screenshots, preferably a video/trailer. Recruiters will want these to be attention-grabbing, and a good reflection of the organization.

On the numbers side: Reddit made up 17.1% (190/1108) of our applicants. For GPLT: 9.1% (107/1179).

These numbers are heavily tied to frequency and average upvote. Both of these reference points use video recruitment trailers.

Steam

Steam Recruitment has definitely died out over the years, but remains relevant and a low-maintenance recruitment platform. Steam offers recruitment forums for both ArmA 3 & Reforger. These posts can be bumped quite often, and offer embeds for media. Also offered through Steam are media channels (ArmA 3 example).

For the data: Steam makes up 9.7% (108/1108) for us, and 17.8% (208/1179) for GPLT.

Social Media

This is a very diverse one, and mileage will vary. Media platforms are an incredible way to reach new audiences, spread your brand, and display what you are all about. There are many different ways to go about this, from long-form operations footage, 1-2 minute hype videos, short-form content and instructional videos. A blend of all of these is the ideal path. An organization can make long-form content, split it into shorts, and greatly enhance its reach.

I will not get too far into the weeds with algorithms, but I would heavily advise reading into how each platform works. For Long Form (YouTube), the reality is that views will remain quite low unless you strike gold. Shorts can explode very quickly (and die very quickly). My personal approach is that full-fledged videos are the true display of our organization and culture, showing what the unit is actually like. Strong Trailers and Edits in this format are great for solidifying a brand. Short Form builds reach, and is a larger driver of recruitment.

There are many platforms out there, but the big ones:

• YouTube
• TikTok
• Instagram
• X (Twitter)

For YouTube: 6.0% (67/1108) for us, and 7.7% (91/1179) for GPLT.

For other Socials: 7.7% (85/1108) for us, no data for GPLT. Note: TikTok/Instagram/YouTube have been our ONLY recruitment platforms other than Word of Mouth for the past 6 months. If these numbers were extrapolated out over the life of our data, these platforms would make up over a third of total applicants.

Word of Mouth & Friends

Finally, we arrive at the largest and most important avenue. Word of Mouth & Friend invites. This is a product of all other methods, and a direct product of the experience that your organization creates.

The average hour count for our 1108 applications is ~557, with only 30 having zero hours. This means that the majority of folks have been around the game for some time, likely played in other groups and made some friends. If they join somewhere and try it out, and realize that this might be "the place," they will invite their friends. Strong culture and enjoyable gameplay are immensely important. The reality is simple: player A is friends with player B & C, all players are not content with their current organization. Players B & C have more organizational commitment, and don't really want to go look for something new. Player A leaves and looks for something new, finds your organization, everything clicks, and B & C join their friend. You have recruited three people for the price of one. This can very easily extrapolate when things are going well, I have seen instances of individuals bringing upwards of eight people in.

Let's put some data to this: 30.1% (333/1108) of our total applicants were friend referrals. For GPLT, it is 29.8% (351/1179).

Public Servers

Two prongs to this one: hosting one and going out to them.

Hosting:

This is a method that was immensely potent back in the early days of ArmA 3, and has made an extremely strong comeback in ArmA Reforger with mods being downloaded by the server. Public PvE in particular is a great way to get people in, put on an operation for them and attempt to recruit them. As with anything, the presentation and execution matter. If folks have a poor time in your server, that will not translate to an application.

I do not have any personal data on this. But the 75th Ranger Regiment (ArmA Reforger) has recruited over 12,000 individuals over its 4-year life through its immensely popular public servers. That is a staggering figure, and is most definitely a record for recruitment in a four-year period.

Going Out:

Heading out into public servers (PvP or PvE) and playing with people, and eventually trying to get them on board. We have done this a few times on Reforger, mostly by accident. It is an extremely time-consuming method, with no guarantee of success. I would add as well, it is extremely frowned upon and will likely result in a server ban if done in other units' public servers.

Wrapping up Avenues

There is no single best source. The best approach is finding what takes the least amount of time for the most reward. For most purposes, this is daily posts and upvotes on the applicable avenues. Workflow for this would entail some quick links, saving your post formats and having media/videos labeled and filed ready to go.

A personal tidbit on upvoting: Find creative ways to get the links out to people that does not involve constant pings. The more @everyones that are thrown around, the less they will be looked at. When it comes time to get operation attendance or critical information, the pings are ignored. Use humor, ping sparingly, DM folks. This is a good practice overall. As a rule, I like to keep weekly pings under five total.

Remember: Recruitment is a marathon, not a race.

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Trends & Process Improvement

Trends

Spend enough time in the MilSim community, and you will pick up on trends over time, or as they are called in the MMO world: "Flavor of the Month". Styles, themes and formats go through periods of waxing and waning, perhaps not drawing the reach that they used to.

For the last ten years or so, this has definitely been skewed toward the Modern Special Operations format, with the last few years being dominated by "Tier 1" CAG / DEVGRU units. This is not a recommendation to change your style, just something to keep in mind. There are currently WAY more of these unit formats than conventional infantry units, for example. For those that are running conventional infantry groups, this can be a great thing. There are fewer options in your space, and that SOF format may completely turn off people that are looking for your particular type.

Time of Year

At the bottom of this post is a by-month breakdown of recruitment by month. Depending on the appealing age range, different months of the year may have vastly different pace for recruiting. For example, December/January is a whole lot of holidays,finals, and then back to school with a new semester. This can and does put a free time constraint on many people, where there just isn't an many people looking. The adverse is the May timeframe, where school-aged individuals have more freetime and may be interested in jumping back into a group. As the average population gets older, month-based activity is much less prevelant.

Process Improvement & Self Awareness

This bit is not just geared towards recruitment, but all aspects of running a MilSim Organization.

Perfect processes do not exist. No matter the state, dynamic recruiters & MilSim leaders will constantly be analyzing their approach, public-facing information, and how they operate. If a group is advertising through all the proper channels and not getting Discord joins, or getting Discord joins and not receiving applications, there is something wrong. It is time to look into WHY people may be leaving or not joining. What do your posts look like? What does your media look like? What do they see when they join?

Analyzing this and being self-aware that it may not be ideal is PIVOTAL to improving and seeing real gains. There is always something to improve. Perhaps your latest posts have some sort of weird text display or are very sloppy. Perhaps your imagery does not portray the experience in a good way. On the Discord side, maybe they just couldn't find the information they wanted in a reasonable timeframe. Have a buddy look through it, ask members what they didn't like about the entry process or recruitment.

This does not just go for recruitment. Every facet of a unit should be constantly tweaked and improved. That does not mean constantly rebranding or making sweeping changes, but tweaks to workflow and operation flow to better fit the desires of your playerbase. This is a complex subject, and perhaps best for a separate post.

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Lets wrap this up

We talked a about a whole bunch of different stuff in this post that is hopefully beneficial. The crucial piece is taking action and diversifying. Staying stagnant in one recruiting avenue, not making tweaks and enhancements is a great way to fizzle out. Do the work now, so that later you are just making changes to that work. For every platform other than media, the time investment outside organizing the post body should be fairly low. Find engaging ways to get the stuff out to your community, have them work for you.

I am sure that I missed some things here, and will aim to update this as time goes on. My DMs are always open, and the #unit-to-unit-recruiter-talk channel is a wealth of information.

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Data

Source Breakdown

Age Distribution

Per Month Distribution