neg said:
Don't want to hijack this thread, so please bonk me on the head if you want me to start a new one.
I was curious, if you were a large or small d20 publisher, or heck even WoTC for that matter, what forums for advertising would best reach military personnel? I have never served so I don't know if there is one universal publication that most everybody reads, or if there are a handful that it would be of interest to advertise in.
Then I guess after finding a place to advertise, it would be just a matter of struggling to get military bases to actually carry the product.
Any insight would be appreciated and interesting.
Best-
neg
Each of the services also have a paper, well it isn't run by the service, but it caters to news for them. The Army, AF, Navy and Marine times. I know these accept advertising, but it might be a bit pricey for anyone that isn't a large company...they do have classifieds that could be used though. I imagine if you did a search for the army times or any of the others that you could find out more.
As said above, alot of places *local papers* that handle news for the base, theater, etc. Another option is the Stars and Stripes. They too accept advertising, but once again it might not be cost effective. I think their web address is the starsandstripes.com o9r something like that, I imagine you could google them as well.
I thought it would be a good marketing decision on wizarsd or anyone else's part to send gamer care packs to deployed troops, perhaps copies of the core books (even if they were a more cost effective spiral bound versaion), dice and stuff to maybe get people hooked on gaming. Granted troops fighting on the line wouldn't be able to make use of it, but people in the rear might enjoy having something to do during down time. Tobacco companies used tactics like this during the first gulf war to get people addicted to their products; they sent free cigs and dip... I imagine you could get peopel hooked on gaming...
Another option might be to seek out the AFN radio stations and donate products fo them to give away. If a small publisher gave a few copies to be given to "the 10th caller" or something like that, you might be able to get word out to people aboput your product...of course the AFN stations aren't allowed to advertise, but if they are giving something away, they will say who donated it, etc.
www.afnkorea.com is an address that comes to mind.
USOs might also be a good thing to contact. Also, AAfees (the PX) does carry some gaming stuff, but it is mostly wizards based stuff and depending where you are, it isnt always a steady stream of products. In Korea, the guy who placed orders was supposedly a gamer. When we got WotC stuff in, it sold out pretty fast. I imagine 3rd party stuff might sell well too. I don't know what it would take to get your stuff put on a list they could order from, but you might want to search for the Army Airforce exchange service and see if you can come up with an address.
Hope some of this has been helpful. As a gamer who spent most of my 8 years in service overseas, I would love to see gaming products become more easliy accessible.
