Promotions Chair

The Promotions Chair is responsible for the promotion of RoboJackets in the Georgia Tech community and beyond.

Responsibilities

The PR Chair will keep current promotional materials up to date, post to social media and the website with status updates and information about events, and plan and organize social events with the Secretary. The PR Chair will also be responsible for branding through clothing, business cards, and recruiting materials. Additionally, the PR Chair manages the RoboJackets Mailchimp account and formats all alumni newsletters.

Materials to Maintain

T-Shirts

T-shirts are created to serve as an item for give aways at events, propaganda, gifts to supporters, and other contacts. They should be ready to be ordered when all the dues are to be paid in Fall (around mid-October).

To make the T-shirts, collect the vector wire frame file of all the robots and create a design.  (Vector files are essential for quality of the picture)

Once completed, they should be uploaded here.

More information can be found here.

Polos

Polos are the corner stone of our appearance at events. They should be ready to be ordered when all the dues are to be paid in Spring (around mid-February).

More information can be found here.

Business Cards

Business Cards are created to promote our club and provide contact information. They should be ordered once all leaders have been elected (around late September).

Once completed, they should be uploaded here.

Sponsorship Packet

The Sponsorship Packets is vital for recruiting sponsors. It contains information about the different teams and RoboJackets as a whole. The PR chair will work with the Sponsorship Chair to update the packet over the summer, if necessary.

Branding Guide

The Logos and Style Guide should be maintained with current brand standards. If you would like to change the overall branding strategy for RoboJackets, make sure to receive approval at Core and then proceed to update the site with new content.

General PR Material

PR material is regularly updated and created, which includes:

• Once the new officers are official, the sign outside the shop should be updated with the officer's information, found in the root folder of dropbox.
• Flyers: Flyers are printed every year for recruitment which promotes our name, what we do, and website.  Flyers should be ready by the first FASET (around mid-June).  When the first General Meeting date is established, the flyers should be updated with that information.
• Banners and Sponsor banners: Banners should be regularly updated for quality and to reflect current sponsors.

Feel free to start more fun branding products. Use our Square marketplace to list novel products and conduct groupbuys. Here is an example of a popular "PR extra", RJ jackets. Other ideas include hats, socks, and plush toys. The process for groupbuys is as follows:

• Receive requests and/or gauge interest for a certain item.
• Shop around to find vendors online that can provide the item at a good price and quality.
• Quote the item at 50 pieces.
• List the item on the square site at the 50-piece price.
• Advertise the item and receive orders.
  • Allow orders to roll in for 6 weeks or until interest has dwindled.
  • Order the item in the amount requested (rounding up) or for 50 pieces, whichever is larger.
  • If the order was more than 50 pieces and therefore cheaper per piece, refund the difference.
• Distribute items to those who ordered, shipping items if necessary.
• If extra stock remains, leave the item listed with stock numbers on the Square site.

Event Advertising

The main event that needs to be advertised each year is our General Interest Meeting. Towards the end of July, reach out to all on-campus advertising outlets to ensure that the event is well-publicized.

Newsletters

Annually, the general interest meeting should be advertised in newsletters for all major disciplines that RoboJackets recruits from. The deadline for submission is usually 2 weeks before the event, but earlier is better. Send a short event description and a graphic for advertisement. I recommend creating a visual for digital signage on campus first, then using that for all newsletter advertising for consistency and simplicity.

• ECE: Jackie Nemeth, jackie.nemeth@ece.gatech.edu, can advertise to the undergraduate news email list and put the event on the website calendar. Her colleague, Ashlee Gardner, ashlee.gardner@ece.gatech.edu, handles the newsletter. Include an event title, description, and the graphic and CC both of them.
• CoC: Ann Claycombe, claycombe@cc.gatech.edu, handles all advertising in the CoC. Send her an event description and the graphic and she will include it in the CoC newsletter. She also handles the digital signage in CoC and Klaus, so if the graphic is the same for that just ask her for signage and newsletter postings together.
• AE: Kelsey Gulledge, kelsey.gulledge@aerospace.gatech.edu, will put the event in the AE weekly student newsletter for you. Include an event title, description, and graphic.
• ME: Ben Wright, ben.wright@me.gatech.edu, is the communications manager for the school of ME. He will forward the event information on to the person who handles the undergraduate newsletter, add digital signs to Love and MRDC, and maybe tweet the event. Include the event title, description, and graphic, and make sure the graphic is the same size as required for digital signage so there is less confusion (same as for CoC).
• WECE and other on-campus organizations: These officers change year by year, but you may look up their website for the current communications / newsletter chair.

The weekly digest and daily digest can be advertised in via Engage. Make sure the event is listed properly with a good description and graphic (if applicable).

Campus Signage

Requirements for digital signage for the CRC, student center, and other campus buildings can be found at https://comm.gatech.edu/campus-resources/advertising. Submit the various forms and email different contacts to get events advertised in high-profile places. Flyers can be posted outside, on the bulletin boards in Klaus first floor, and given to makerspaces such as the Hive and the Invention Studio.

Residence Halls

The contact for approving flyers in residence halls is Katrina White-Johnson: katrina.white@housing.gatech.edu. Requests for approval may take up to 2 weeks, so submit around 4 weeks in advance.

Alumni Newsletter

The PR chair is part of the alumni newsletter team and is responsible for finding stories within the organization, formatting the newsletter content, and sending out the newsletter via Mailchimp. You can gain access to the RoboJackets Mailchimp account by posting in it-helpdesk. The format should be consistent across different issues of the newsletter. If you want to make changes, make them slowly across several issues so the change isn't jarring to our readers.

You must gather 3 stories each month and work with the President, Vice President, and alumni volunteers to put together content for the monthly newsletter. Newsletters should be sent out on the first Wednesday of every month around 11 AM. Set a reminder and make sure the newsletter is formatted and ready for review a few days before sending it out.

The process for putting together a newsletter is as follows:

• Receive written content from alumni volunteers and find a few pictures or graphics for each story.
• Make a post on the website for each story and include the writer credit, all content, a featured picture, and additional pictures throughout.
• Put featured pictures, samples of each story, and links to the posts in the newsletter template, hosted on MailChimp. Make sure each picture and "Read More" links back to the appropriate post on the website.
• Send the draft of the newsletter to the newsletter team for review.
• On the day it will be sent out, publish all posts and double check the format once more. Then, write a subject line and send the newsletter.

Other Links and Resources

RoboJackets Cloud - Storage for old PR material
Logos and Style Guide - Style guide and current materials repository (contact it-helpdesk to receive access to edit this resource)

Keep all current work on the Core Google drive PR folder for easy access.

Photo Editing Software

Access to most Adobe products (Photoshop, Illustrator, Indesign...) is provided by the school.You can access it on any GT computer or through vlab (vlab.matrix.gatech.edu); these products can be found in the Library Desktop.