Promoting Your Tournaments
Whether you're running officially sanctioned events or casual weekly leagues, you need to get the word out about your tournaments to make them a success.
Here are several great tips on promoting your events from other hobby retailers just like you.
- Print out a weekly or monthly calendar of events and have it out on the sales counter, or better yet, put one in every bag. If you have a web page for your store, take the time to keep the calendar updated online.
- Pre-sanction upcoming tournaments through MANTIS so that the event info is available in advance through the UDE website.
- Keep an updated player email list so that your regular players will know about all upcoming in-store activities. It helps to make sure that event emails go out the Monday or Tuesday prior to an event so that players will have time to make plans. Include a few weeks' worth of your schedule so there is plenty of advance warning.
- Post fliers on local college campuses or at a local library if they allow posting.
- Spread the word via online fan message boards for the game that the event is for.
- Advertise tournaments in your community newspaper's "Activities" section. This works great for the Yu-Gi-Oh! TCG because parents can find out about the events too.
