I key element that was mentioned above - particularly in the sparser populated areas- is a community of developed chasers. Sure an alert posted the day before might garner a few contacts, but as seen in the admirably organised 6m/VHF/UHF day of action that got a few first time 6m operators (myself included) to not only built their own antennas but try out SSB and FM on that band - is the need for a community - for that event, like most VK1 events, emails go out weeks before etc.
That day I clocked 22 contacts and 11 summit to summits, all on 5w.
W
Good collection of contacts there Tom. Personally I listened and called on the FM segment and go nothing from my home QTH. Will get myself to Gummer’s How at some point and give it another go. What antennas were you using?
For the 2m FM and 70cm FM contacts, I used a SOTABEAMS MFD (vertical omni). For the 70cm SSB, it was the SOTABEAMS SB270, set as the 6 element Yagi for 70cm (horizontal beam).