BTW: Apologies if you all get this twice - I'm having trouble with my "identies" in Thunderbird :-)
================================== Right - I'll step forward as a marketeer :-) However, in typical marketing style, I'm going to answer the question I wish you'd asked instead... hence I'm going to talk about the general "flyers for use at shows" issue, rather than the specifics of "how to craft a flyer that explicitly has the purpose of answering questions." We had a long discussion discussion in the Sussex LUG about the leaflets to use for the British Computer Fair stands that the LUG runs each month. The FLYER that we designed at that point (and reportedly worked well at attracting attention) can be found at http://www.youraffiliateexpert.com/temp/ - versions in ODP and PDF formats I ought now to explain WHY I recommended this approach. - The purpose of the flyer was to make people stop at the stand, and ask more. It was NOT to answer people's questions. The logic was that it was far more effective to "hook" someone with a bold leaflet, and then get them into a 1-1 conversation with someone who could relate to their issues, than to try to create a "reference document" for people to take away and not read. I'm in favour, BTW, of creating a takeaway reference document as proposed, but I think that a flyer to get people to "stop at the table" is helpful at any show. - This is ONE example to show the format of the leaflet. There were several others, each with a photo, a name, a job title and a catchy soundbite. At BCF, the majority of attendees are NOT IT professionals, so we deliberately tried to pick references who worked outside the IT industry as well to plant some rapport into the minds of the passers-by that this WASN'T something that only appealed to "geeks". Obviously, at an IT-industry event, it would be far more sensible to pick people/soundbites that were from the industry ; or if it were a travel industry event, to pick them from the travel industry, or for a local government event, to pick them from local government, or... well you get the idea - create a feeling in the mind of the passerby that the person on the leaflet is similar to them, and faces similar issues. - Each flyer had a consistent layout - name/title top left, photo top right, quote middle, "...just another person to <b>switch to linux</b>" bottom middle, Tux bottom left. Obviously, this was for a LUG - if the Ubuntu_UK list wants to do something, then it should have an Ubuntu logo instead. - The tagline "just another person to <b>switch to linux</b>" is important, since it contains what is known in NLP as an embedded command. There are parts of the brain that process the entire structure of the sentence literally. However, modern thinking in neuroscience is that there are independent "clusters" within the brain that just store particular entities. In this case, I used the <b> .. </b> to discretely highlight the phrase "switch to linux" as a discretely parsable entity. The entity as part of the whole sentence is just a subsidiary clause - however the entity on its own is a command.... "switch to Linux", hence the use of the term "embedded command". I'd still go with the phrase but make it specific, so "Just another person to switch to Ubuntu". Again, it's critical that this phrase is common, and used across various slides, each of which carries a different name, face and quote. I will come to the question of the "FAQ flyer" though. What I would strongly suggest is that the place to start is experience of discussions with a typical show attendee (you'll have to profile them somehow if it's the first time you're going to a given show", and try to work out what the FREQUENTLY asked questions are. Too often, FAQs are a mis-acronym for "questions our marketing people wish you'd asked", presumably on the basis that QOMPWYA doesn't form an easy-to-say word :-) Oh, and you're welcome to use the flyer if you want, particularly if you change Tux to Ubuntu logo, and change the word Linux to Ubuntu. The author photo is copyright ric bacon, and I have a waiver from him allowing me to use it for unlimited purposes (including commercial purposes.) 'Twas a good deal - he assigned me those rights in exchange for a photographer credit in my book - see even my marketing material doesn't breach copyright :-) Regards, Mark Harrison Ad follows - feel free to stop reading now:-) ....Mark Harrison is available for (paid) marketing consultancy. He specialises in taking firms from the sub-million turnover mark to flotation. He is not cheap, but very, very, busy. Next available consultancy days are in July. -- ubuntu-uk@lists.ubuntu.com https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-uk https://wiki.kubuntu.org/UKTeam/
