Where Accountants and "Sizzle" Meet

The October issue of EXHIBITOR magazine has given one of its annual Sizzle Awards to the American Institute for Certified Public Accountants. The prize is significant in many ways, not the least of which is that it is now possible to use the words "sizzle" and "accountants" in the same sentence without raising eyebrows. Ready for another surprise?

The award's category is "Best Internet - Website Promotion." That's right, there is not so much as a calculator to be found within this heralded software. The AICPA (www.aicpa.org) was given the award for a Custom Calendar ScreenSaver, with a built-in Reminder Feature, that links to their website. The software was developed for them by Roadless.com, a company that specializes in custom screensavers with advanced capabilities.

The AICPA's Trade Show Marketing Manager, Mary Maughan spearheaded the project after Vicky Franzese, their Senior Online Marketing Manager, saw EasySoft [Roadless.com] at, appropriately enough, a trade show. "We agreed right away that this wasn't just a screensaver; we saw it as more of a marketing communication tool. Especially the Reminders."

There are a couple of different marketing objectives that this project accomplishes. First off, the AICPA wants to promote their website. In short, they want to get the word out to increase site awareness and build traffic.

Not only does the Calendar ScreenSaver link to the AICPA's homepage, it contains over fifty (50) hypertext links to an assortment of sub-levels pages.

The AICPA also wanted to have an innovative giveaway for the various trade shows where they exhibit. Somewhat amazingly, their Calendar Screensaver, even with all its robust features and full screen photographs, still manages to fit on a single 3.5" floppy diskette. And the cost of the diskettes to the AICPA, even with development costs factored in, still fell within the budget for such promotional products.

Lastly, and perhaps most importantly, the AICPA wanted to use the software to promote the trade shows where they exhibit. They pulled this off in a couple of very clever ways. The photographs used are stunning cityscapes, landmarks and vista that just happen to depict the same cities where those shows take place. Then there's the Reminder Feature. This feature displays messages about the shows and does so right when the user boots up their computer.

If that wasn't enough, the Calendar ScreenSaver also contains a map of the United States that contains more information about the events and products related to the specific trade shows or seminars.

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