Report about AUG Marketing
by Tom Piper, Coordinator
This Apple World User Group University online gathering of Apple user group leaders was held at 5:00pm CDST, on October 18, 2021, via Zoom. We had 28 participants for the topic of “AUG Marketing”. The 62-minute video can be viewed at: https://youtu.be/yrTWnChvnM0 (unlisted on YouTube).
This session opened with my welcome, plus a quick review of the meeting protocols and a brief discussion about the products introduced at Apple’s “Unleashed” event earlier in the day. Doug Smith, Chair of the Apple User Group Advisory Board (AUGAB), was present to support this call.
Nicholas Pyers of AppleUsers.org led off the discussion about how to market for new members and retain existing members. This was followed by experiences and suggestions by George Brooks, George Rubin, Steve Welsh, Dan Wassink, Doug Smith, Curt Blanchart, Frank Salvanti, and others who joined in this discussion to provide more information.
The following links were offered for further information on this meeting’s topic:
• Dan Wassink: https://akappleug.com
• Nicholas Pyers (JCN) : 
• Steve OMUG: Oregon MacPioneers statewide users group:  https://omug.usergroupresources.com
• Russ Conte: 
– iQR codes at Chicago AUG use iQR that allows addition of logos INSIDE the iQR image: https://iqr.hrubasko.com/
– Raffle: did one on Zoom, speaker choose three random numbers, members post three numbers in the meeting chat, and the three closest were winners
• Andrea Suhaka : do raffles on Zoom for Take Control books
 
We are very pleased with this ninth meeting of 2021. Files related to this meeting are available on our AWUGU shared folder: https://www.icloud.com/iclouddrive/0kF7XwYI98VG0fqvL86PJm02g#AWUGU
Ideas about updating the Apple User Group Locator and end-of-year activities discussed and selected as the topic for our next meeting, to be called “AUG Updates & Planning”, which is tentatively scheduled for November 18, 2021, at 5:00pm Central Daylight Savings Time.
AWUGU registrants will receive an invitation to all future meetings. To become a participant, any interested Apple User Group leader must first register with the AWUGU Coordinator by emailing their name, location, and user group name and web link to macquest@mac.com. Registration must be received by November 16 in order to receive a Zoom Meeting invitation (a download of the free Zoom app in advance is also necessary, and an update will be important for existing users).