Grigori said:
Sure., but a clear and co-ordinated effort is not a group of 5 dayers refusing to sully themselves by interacting with the 1 day riff-raff. What is needed is a way to engage people at the level they are at and grow things from there.
The operative phrase is 'grow things from there'. If after 80 years of this approach you found that your Test performance had not improved but had actually got worse, you might begin to think there's something wrong with that strategy.
Grigori said:
I can relate to that, as a natural health practitioner that is the reality of my profession. And thank god for it. If there weren't constant reminders to people about the wonders of Vitamin C, folks wouldn't be thinking about us at all. A rule of marketing is people need to hear things (I think 7 or something) multiple times before they would pursue it. People will still buy watered down fluff which I would never recommend and it will fail, but it keeps the industry in the awareness of many who would not consider it otherwise, and that is reflected daily in my new patient bookings. I don't like much of the over the counter rubbish that is for sale out there, but I'm much more scared of it not being available (which is an increasing reality in many countries and is the death of the profession).
Well if you ONLY recommended Vitamin C as a 'cure-all' and put that on all your literature in the hope that this would bring in people who needed more, would you be surprised if the result was the complete opposite and people treated all forms of complementary medicine as 'Take vitamin C and you'll be OK'? (and of course such a perception means there's no need to consult a practioner) - I'm sure you wouldn't do this but I'm trying to illustrate what happens in the case of those Horoscope columns.
You are quite right, Astrology needs to engage those with interest and facilitate and enable their desire to learn more. But my point is that 'Horoscopes' don't actually do this - the take up rate is vanishingly small - it doesn't work. A forum like this, which also costs nothing to read, actually does a lot more good in that respect, as do the articles that your Astrologer writes. In order to entice in the 'customers' marketing needs to indicate that there's much more to be had - 'check it out'. If a car manufacturer advertised it's latest model as having a great stereo system, but never showed any photos or gave any more details would they be surprised if the take up was minimal. The strategy might work if there was more information supplied for those whose interest was piqued - in other words the strategy only works if the hook can be reeled in and the customer shown the full product. This just isn't happening in Astrology.
When I was a teenager, I read those Horoscope columns, quite avidly, and they convinced me that I was a Scorpio. I only realised that there was any more to Astrology when I bought a book on 'the dark arts' and found it had a chapter on Astrology (I was more interested in learning about Magic). through that book I learned what a real horoscope was, in simple terms and I got some interest.
In my quest to learn more I picked up a bit-part publication called 'Man Myth and Magic' and actually got a good introduction to Astrology (and Tarot) and from there I began to read more serious books. Now that's the way to develop a customer.
Horoscope column's don't teach or even inform readers about Astrology, they give short generalsed comments - many might hit the mark because it's a scattergun approach, most will miss but they don't provide a hook to learn more.
Edited to add:
My Sun is actually in Libra, which is another problem with Horoscope Columns, for people born near a sign cusp, going by the dates quoted may actually put them in the wrong sign, as the date (day and month) of ingress is not the same each year.
In short I want people to realise that there's more to Astrology than Sun Signs and they will never ever learn that through Horoscope columns