Hi,
The website I write for and work with is setting up for extralife this year. Right now I am coordinating trying to find a place for us to gather to play games at. What kinda information should I give the owners to see what they are supporting if they allow us to use their store. Would it be wrong for them to charge a discounted rate or some type of price for us to be using their facilities or what. I know they need to be compensated some how but not sure how to go about this. Any advice would be helpful. We are a San Antonio, Tx based website planning on trying to get this event off the ground for our area. Also would trying to aware the press as a promotional tool be advisable to help draw attention and support. Thanks in advance for any help

Arcgore

This was how we went about securing a location here in Houston.

We first tried University of Houston Main. We figured a college would be ideal as there are many college kids that love games, it can be easily advertised, and there may be space available to us. You might want to check what their fees are for holding a fundraiser. That was something that changed our minds about UoH, the gigantic amount of fees and charges they had in place. Of course we looked otherwise.

I started talking to friends to see if the knew anyone willing to hold any events. I had a few churches that would have done it, but were picky about the types of games being played (i.e. fighters and shooters...) so I decided to ask around even more. I went on facebook and started asking everyone on my list and it wasn't until five minutes after sending those messages that I got a lot of responses. One of those was my friend's dance studio and she loved our idea so much that she is giving the place to us for free. In exchange I decided to do some advertising for her like taking flyers or cards from here and sending them out for her. I'd have to say we got lucky, but it didn't hurt to ask. It is charity after all.

You have to remember that it is a charity event and you can ask them to see if they can go easy on you if they charge you for the place in exchange for free advertising.

As for promotional tools for the event, I swear by Twitter and Facebook. We were at a meet and greet on Saturday that had Houston's top twitter people and organizations that I would not have known about if it wasn't for twitter. We talked to so many people with open ears and hearts that they loved our idea of Extra Life. We are hoping to be a featured speaker at their next event.

Facebook you can always arrange events and invite people to them. They can easily spread the word for you as well by forwarding the events you schedule. We also have a Facebook fan page for Extra Life. This kind of has our Houston events lined up, but if you would like I can put up the events in San Antonio too. Check it out here:

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Extra-Life/248740630334


We have a person on my committee who works for the website to one of the big news channels here in Houston and he will be putting up banner ads soon.

I was given the idea of advertising our gamer day when we get all the details finalized in Greensheet, that's a really good idea.

We also have a contact in the Vietnamese community that will send out an email blast to about 5000 contacts on his list for a fee. Another contact also works for the local Vietnamese news station as well and she might be able to help us as well.

Of course we got street teams doing the old school grass roots way of handing out flyers. We had a few of us cover the Madden launch and found the Gamestops and Best Buys doing midnight launches to hand out flyers to everyone waiting in line. We do have other plans like hitting up all the bars downtown and handing out flyers to people there and talking it up with those who will listen.

So that's some of the stuff we've been doing here. Of course, if things don't work out for you guys in San Antonio, you are more than welcome to join us here in Houston! If you have any questions, let me know.