| Summary: | The purpose of this study was to compare two types of flyers used in the promotion of a recreational special event by a nonprofit agency. Informational and persuasive flyers were developed for an audience participation murder mystery play presented at Carswell Air Force Base near Fort Worth, Texas. Flyers were distributed throughout this military community. Only those individuals interested in attending a theatrical production registered for this program. A pretest and posttest were administered. Data were analyzed using Chi square goodness of fit tests, tests of proportions, and t-tests. Findings were: (a) persuasive flyers were more effective than the informational type in attracting potential patrons to register for an audience participation murder mystery play, (b) persuasive flyers were also more effective in attracting potential patrons to actually attend a murder mystery production, (c) however, persuasive flyers were not more effective in influencing the expectation or satisfaction of the patrons with the murder mystery production, and (d) neither type of flyer attracted patrons with any different demographic profiles who registered for or who attended this murder mystery production. In view of the findings of this study, the following recommendations for further study appear to be warranted: (a) further research on the use of flyers for advertising and marketing of recreational and leisure activities, programs and special events might be beneficial; (b) further research is also needed to validate that persuasive flyers are more effective in enticing the potential patron to register for and attend a recreation activity; and (c) more study is also required to see whether it is possible for flyers to influence patron expectation and satisfaction with a recreational program.
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