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Promotion Tips from SAMHSA

To ensure high attendance levels at Town Hall Meetings (THMs), try some of the suggestions provided here. The resources listed have information on effective ways to promote your event.

Take the First Steps

  • Start as early as possible in marketing the event. Remember that the message needs to be heard more than once for the target audience to “get it.”
  • Use a diversified approach—a mixture of events, faces, voices, images, encounters, and conversations is more likely to be effective.

Choose a Convenient Location

  • Choose a venue convenient for your target audience, such as a gymnasium where parents and youth are accustomed to coming. A museum, arts center, zoo, or movie theater also might be a good location.

Localize Your Effort

  • Tailor messages to your community. Include local statistics and refer to recent events.

Involve Youth and VIPs

  • Ask youth to serve as spokespersons in contacting media and civic groups. Hearing about underage drinking prevention from young people may be more compelling.
  • Involve well-known local citizens whose names can attract media attention and help communicate the importance of the event.
  • Invite a local personality, such as a leading radio announcer or TV anchor, to kick off the meeting or greet participants.
  • Present an award to a community member who has contributed to underage drinking prevention in a big way.

Capitalize on Cyberspace

  • Create a THM section on your organization’s Web site. Include resources, panelist bios, and pictures.
  • Post a promotional banner on your homepage. Invite sponsors and partners to post the banner and link to help visitors learn more about preventing underage drinking.
  • Send e-mail alerts and announcements to listservs. Encourage recipients to pass on your message.
  • Ask staff members to place a promotional tag about the meeting on all e-mails and automated voicemails.

Ask and Ask Again

  • Ask partner organizations to mobilize their memberships, particularly parent/family-focused groups. Encourage them to deliver the message more than once.
  • Ask faith community members to promote the meeting in bulletins and on message boards.
  • Ask owners of alcoholic beverage stores to post signs.
  • Ask owners of family restaurants and places where youth gather to post table tent cards and flyers.
  • Ask permission to make a live announcement at important community meetings.

Reach Out to All Media

  • Send your news releases to a full media list, including local shopper guides, free weeklies, and publications like Creative Loafing as well as top TV and radio stations.
  • Encourage media outlets to run the Start Talking Before They Start Drinking public service announcements (PSAs) along with information about the meeting.
  • Distribute localized read-only radio PSAs found in the toolkit.
  • Fax or e-mail key media with an offer to arrange advance interviews with expert panelists.
  • Pick up the phone and make pitches for coverage. Direct contact pays off.
  • If an underage drinking-related tragedy occurs in your community, encourage local media to mention the meeting in follow-up stories.
  • For print media, provide a newsletter drop-in article, print ad, or opinion-editorial. See the toolkit for samples.

Promote Contests and Special Attractions

  • Sponsor a contest for youth who get the most adults to attend.
  • Ask business partners to provide prizes for drawings and giveaways, such as movie tickets, coupons for music downloads, or free ice cream.
Resources and More Ideas

Resources compiled by members of the Federal Interagency Coordinating Committee on the Prevention of Underage Drinking to assist communities with planning and implementing programs to prevent and reduce alcohol use by youth— http://www.stopalcoholabuse.gov/townhall/resources.aspx.