Hi all. My last recap was quite lengthy because I’m still deciding how to write them. I usually like telling a story and making them entertaining, but I don’t think these recaps need to be structured in that way. So this one will be as short & sweet as possible instead. Please let me know what you prefer to read in the comments below.

July’s Theme: Community In Real Life

Meetup Everywhere

First up, the always positive Kathryn Fink from Meetup.com, and her presentation centered around using Meetup Everywhere to build offline communities.

There are many tools for conversations but we are not conversation managers.  Conversation is limiting, and when we limit it to just online, it underutilizes our ability to create actual community.

Remember, people want to help, but how do you turn your fans into ambassadors? Give them something to do

The next wave of social media will not be media, it will be social” @Heif (Founder of meetup.com

“There is now a new meetup happening every 13 seconds worldwide” — whoa

Important point: Using Meetup Everywhere, brands can hold meetup days to activate members and foster meaningful offline connections

How to set a successful meetup

Step 1: Choose a day 

Mashable chose June 30th as the official day to celebrate Social Media Day worldwide

Step 2: Pick a hook  Runkeeper used platform to get members together and run

Zynga holds Farmville/Mafia Wars meetups

Keep in mind: The more organic the tie in, the better

Step 3: Get the word out

Foursquare Day utilized videos and social to promote events

Keep in mind: Excitement breeds excitement

Step 4: Show some love

Etsy gives cool things away at meetups

Provide downloadable meetup kits for people to use

Include a Q&A about the meetup

Send “lovebombs” (awesome, branded packages to largest meetups)

Step 5: Celebrate

Soundcloud created one large track with snippets of music from each meetup allowing people to “take a musical tour of the meetups”

Digital Dumbo

Next up was Andrew Zarick and Kait Villanova and how they build community offline

Background

Digital Dumbo has been called Brooklyn’s “Madison Avenue” because of an impressive 88 digital companies in a 5 block radius.  It was founded in 2009 to showcase talent, educate the community and facilitate an idea exchange

Since its inception, there has been free PBR and wine and every event (this will never change).

Digital Dumbo events primarily fall into one (or more) of three categories

Recruiting

Showcasing of creative work

Raising money for charities

Why it works?

It’s an open and flexible platform

Each event is different

There is plenty of attendee diversity

Events are fun

How do you build community IRL according to Digital Dumbo?

Identify an opportunity for community

Make it “sticky”

Know & listen to your community

Consistently deliver a good experience

Be a good matchmaker

Sonar

Next up was Brett Martin from Sonar, which is an app that helps you “uncover the hidden connections you miss everyday, in real time, in the palm of your hand.”

Brett believes hyper-local social has failed up to this point

How do you make strangers appealing? Stand on the shoulders of giants –> Harness all data to make connections

Once you see how you are connected to another person using Sonar, you can send them a targeted message

Goal: Add context & make incremental steps toward meeting

Closing statement: Data = peanut butter, spread it all over the place.  If you remember one thing, remember this:

Bring online conversations offline, and bring offline conversations online

NYC Instagram Community

Last of the speakers was Brian DiFeo, the community manager for Hive at 55 and founder of NYC Instagram Community, shared his story + thoughts on utilizing your power users to help build these communities:

Instagram has many “hyper users” who are an engaged and dedicated community existing on the app (no website)

Instagram’s Community Manager created #Instameet idea and turned to hyper users to organize these meetups

Successful components of NYC Instagram Community meetups:

Variety – Each meetup offers different experiences

Divide into random groups – This gets everyone interacting and allows for new connections to be made

Have Q&A – People always have questions!

Keep it balanced

Engage throughout the process

If you remember one thing, remember this:

The community meets IRL, but the bond is even stronger when they go back to the app and interact with each other on it

Last but not least, I presented this month’s Hi-5. Everyone was pretty worn out by this time so I flew through them as quick as possible. If you missed any, here is a bundle of all of them, neatly packed thanks to our friends at Bitly. P.S. I threw a few bonus ones in there 🙂

Oh yeah, and I gave away this awesome GetSatisfaction poster to a lucky attendee! Woo!