{"id":8512,"date":"2021-11-23T06:00:00","date_gmt":"2021-11-23T11:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.meetup.com\/blog\/?p=8512"},"modified":"2021-11-23T09:03:59","modified_gmt":"2021-11-23T14:03:59","slug":"recording-lessons-from-community-builders","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.meetup.com\/blog\/recording-lessons-from-community-builders\/","title":{"rendered":"Recording: Lessons from Community Builders"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Meetup organizers are the heart of our community. We want your groups to be successful, so it&#8217;s important to us to provide you with the tools and resources to continue to engage new members and bring people together over shared interests. In this Meetup Live event, we\u2019ve put together a panel of top organizers to share how they\u2019ve overcome some of the challenges that come with building communities.<br><br>Watch Max Morrongiello, organizer of Meetup group, \u201cNon-Scene\u201d Gay Friends of Greater Boston, and Doug Meil, organizer of Meetup group Cleveland Big Data, for a conversation as they discuss how they\u2019ve grown their groups and maintained engagement even through the pandemic. You\u2019ll learn the different tricks they use to encourage event attendance, to keep their members engaged during and in between events, and how they\u2019ve managed to meet in person safely.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Recording: Lessons from Community Builders\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/cpDd-_IYvjU?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-main-takeaways-from-community-builders\">Main Takeaways from Community Builders:<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul><li><em>Doug<\/em>: We got into a meeting cadence many years ago of meeting every other month. That seemed to be the right amount of content.<br>As a general recommendation for organizers, try to find the balance that works for you. For my group it happens to be every other month, but for other groups it can be different. Just find that balance and consistency.&nbsp;<\/li><li><em>Max<\/em>: \u200b\u200bRight now we\u2019re doing about two-thirds of our events in person and another third online. We\u2019ve had a lot of success.<br>We still have to be careful and take precautions. Having online events especially for people who are vulnerable is important.<br>I think people are really hungry for social interaction. Being able to provide opportunities during the pandemic for people to socialize is really helpful.&nbsp;<\/li><li><em>Max<\/em>: We usually get about half of the people who sign up show, and sometimes it doesn\u2019t matter, we expect that.<br>If there\u2019s a case where we need to make a reservation for a certain number of people, we\u2019ll charge a small, like $5, reservation fee. We\u2019ll refund it if they cancel before the reservation. If it\u2019s after, we\u2019ll say we\u2019ll refund it, but only if someone takes their spot.<br>Basically, people need to have skin in the game to keep their RSVP current.<\/li><li><em>Doug<\/em>: One key thing that I do is that, by the time the current [event] is about to happen, I want the next [event] already on the calendar. So that there\u2019s never a point when anyone looks at the [group page] and it says, \u201cfuture events &#8211; nothing.\u201d&nbsp;<br>I\u2019m always thinking at least one or two ahead. That way there\u2019s always something to look forward to.&nbsp;<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-top-q-a-questions\">Top Q&amp;A Questions:<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul><li>Without food, how do you give incentives for online meetings?<ul><li><em>Doug<\/em>: If it\u2019s a presentation style [event], then focus on content content content. And watch your time and respect the speakers and the audience. Make it worth people\u2019s time. And just keep going. If it\u2019s sporadically scheduled, you\u2019ll get sporadic attendance.&nbsp;<\/li><\/ul><\/li><li>Do you remove members from the group when they are inactive?<ul><li><em>Max<\/em>: If they\u2019re not doing anything, it\u2019s not hurting you.<br>It\u2019s nice to be able to say, when you\u2019re advertising the group, how many people are in it. Even though they\u2019re not doing anything, it still looks good.&nbsp;<\/li><\/ul><\/li><li>I\u2019m struggling to keep my motivation up as an organizer, any tips?<ul><li><em>Max<\/em>: Just think about the people you\u2019re going to be interacting with, the success it\u2019s going to be, being with people. If there\u2019s a way to make the planning of it fun too. Think about all the stuff you\u2019re learning about running an event.<br>It\u2019s a learning process. Learning in itself can sometimes be something that can motivate.&nbsp;<\/li><li><em>Doug<\/em>: Get a co-organizer. Sometimes organizing can feel like, \u201coh my god, this is so much work I can\u2019t pull it off.\u201d Having somebody to bounce ideas off of, that\u2019s important. Even if it\u2019s someone who is only doing a little bit, that\u2019s a little bit you\u2019re not doing. You feel like you\u2019re in it together instead of just doing it by yourself.<\/li><\/ul><\/li><\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<div class=\"post-excerpt\"><p>Watch two Meetup organizers, Max Morrongiello and Doug Meil, for an informative session full of tips on how to run your Meetup group. <\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":45,"featured_media":8515,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[127,28,43,46,44],"tags":[],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v21.2 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Recording: Lessons from Community Builders - Meetup Blog<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Learn from expert community builders. 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