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So my husband and I had an idea for an ELL ad campaign to attract folks from under-represented English speaking regions to ELL, but I lack the artistic ability to pull it off and my husband is too busy to help right now. I probably should have mentioned that our brainstorming session was due to this discussion: How come I never see any Aussies on here?

The idea is to do a series of ads, each one with a different way to say hello and a graphic that evokes where the phrase might come from. For example, Howdy y'all/Texas, G'day mate/Australia, Aloha/Hawaii, How you doin'/Nate from NYC, or 'sup dawg/B-rad from the 'Bu.

Each ad would have the tag line "How do YOU 'hello'? and some text that might say something like "Stop by ELL and show us!". I think it would be really good to get several different but similar ads in rotation on different sites.

Obviously, it still needs some work and I could use some help to make it into something nice. Dammit Jim! I'm an engineer not a marketing guru or an artist! :)

Once we have something worked out, maybe folks active in other communities where it might be of interest (like Travel.SE) could suggest it as a community ad.

Here are the guidelines for community ads (size and such) for reference:
Community Promotion Ads - 2016

What do y'all think? (Oh and the verbing of hello was intentional, but I wonder if it would be better as "How do you say hello?")

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  • Dude! Righteous!
    – Andrew
    Jan 10, 2017 at 5:51
  • @Mari-Lou - Hmmm. I'm not sure why we'd pitch an ELL marketing campaign on ELU meta; I like the idea of casting a wider net to the whole SE community. As for the campaign itself, don't forget How ya doin' (Nate from NYC).
    – J.R. Mod
    Jan 10, 2017 at 10:01
  • @Mari-LouA I'm not sure I understand - I'm not actually looking for an answer to the question, but some help putting the idea into a graphic form that will catch someone's eye. I could go looking for clipart and try myself, but I guarantee you it would end up looking pretty amateurish and ugly :)
    – ColleenV
    Jan 10, 2017 at 12:22
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    It sounded like you were looking for further suggestions, in different dialects to the question "How do you say ‘Hello’?" That's what it says in the title, and the rest of the question I took as being context. I misread your post, you're asking if the community thinks the ad campaign is a good idea.
    – Mari-Lou A
    Jan 10, 2017 at 12:25
  • I can only blame my 3+ years as having deformed and warped my mind, I see single-word-requests were none were intended!
    – Mari-Lou A
    Jan 10, 2017 at 12:28
  • @Mari-LouA :) No I could have been more clear about what I was asking for but I was trying to be funny. Obviously I should stick to my day job!
    – ColleenV
    Jan 10, 2017 at 12:33

3 Answers 3

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Here's my idea:

Think of it like a globe; each phrase approximately lines up with where on earth people say it. Here's the dialects that go with each phrase:

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  • That's a neat idea!
    – ColleenV
    Jan 18, 2017 at 3:23
  • So I think now we just have to decide if the ad should point to the main page, or if we should making a "landing" here on meta to explain why we're asking them to say hello...
    – ColleenV
    Jan 23, 2017 at 14:02
  • I'm gonna take issue with this, purely because "Ayup" is definitiely not British English. You might hear a similar phrase in Yorkshire and Lancashire, but that'd be "'ey-up, chuck?". BBC America clearly didn't research that one too well.
    – ArtOfCode
    Jan 23, 2017 at 16:29
  • @ArtOfCode It's a clever marketing ploy to trick folks into coming to ELL to inform us that no-one says that any longer. What we need is some outrageous stereotype for Sub-Saharan and Caribbean English speakers to prompt them to drop by and maybe stay a while.
    – ColleenV
    Jan 23, 2017 at 20:45
  • @ColleenV Had me going :)
    – ArtOfCode
    Jan 23, 2017 at 21:11
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OK, this shows an embarrassing lack of artistry, but here's a mock-up of what I was thinking about.

Come share your flavor of English with with us on ELL!

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  • I have an idea but cannot figure out how to post an image from my desktop.
    – WRX
    Jan 10, 2017 at 19:16
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This is an idea. It is likely copyrighted or mostly.

This is likely a mostly copyrighted image -- so this is an idea only.

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    While I like this idea, I would like the ads to stick to just English, because that is the language the questions and answers need to be in. I would hope that the ads would attract learners as well as fluent speakers, but I don't want to give the wrong impression about which languages are supported.
    – ColleenV
    Jan 10, 2017 at 19:28
  • @ColleenV Okay, so then could 'we' gather a selection of ways to say hello in English and use this as a sort of template? I have rather painful arthritis and am not about spend time on something you don't want. It's fine that you don't! I just can't spend time on stuff that hurts if there's no reason. This is not meant to force you at all -- just meant to save my hands. I'd be happy if someone else helped you. No pressure at all!
    – WRX
    Jan 10, 2017 at 19:32
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    Well let's see what other folks think - mine isn't the only opinion that matters :)
    – ColleenV
    Jan 10, 2017 at 20:56
  • Fine with me. I think there are people who are actually talented with this stuff. I am not one of them.
    – WRX
    Jan 10, 2017 at 20:57

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