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Now that companies are less inclined to have meetups, meetup needs a way to bring the ecosystem back without tanking sales. I've thought about having a tech me

Now that companies are less inclined to have meetups, meetup needs a way to bring the ecosystem back without tanking sales. I've thought about having a tech meetup, and would like to leverage meetup's marketing, but 1. I don't know if this will be a recurring thing more than 2-3 times 2. Without company support, I have to put down my credit card as the organizer, even if the event fizzles out. I would pay for meetup! But I would not pay more than a fair rate for 2-3 events, unless it truly takes off. Looking at the contents of meetup, I'm guessing smaller organizers are in a similar boat. No one wants to pay a monthly subscription for small things, so people who are unsure stay out, and smaller metros just don't have anything but timeshare-y sales pitches that give the organizer an ROI. Meetup should 1. Make the organizer interface free. 2. If you want your upcoming meetup to show up in the list, you pay a one-time per-event fee that is more than the per-month cost of a subscription. This should hopefully bring their market back for tech meetups.

ivalm 3y ago
Not sure that’s the solution. I think the issue is poor attendance of existing events, not lack of events.
- jimberlage 3y ago
  My perception in a non-major metro is that the existing events are all really low quality, and that the quality passion project ones are gone. There are plenty of meetups for people trying to get me to buy their SaaS, but shared interest groups that don't stand to make money from their events have evaporated.
  - ivalm 3y ago
    I host a Meetup just to meet new people interested in startup. I started it because there wasn’t a startup focused Meetup in my area. It’s hard for me to imagine that the $70/6 months is what prevents someone from hosting a high quality Meetup. There is so much more time value (and even money) to hosting high quality Meetup than the fee they collect.
hugocast 3y ago
I've been hosting meetups online and in person since 2014 and launched a new one that meets monthly in the Southeast US in 2021. It's grown from 5 people to 45. We usually get 20-25 people per meetup nowadays. In person. I suggest you check out Eventbrite. Events with up to 25 tickets are free to publish. If you want to offer more tickets for an event, you can pay a one-time fee or sign up for the monthly subscription. If you are just testing the waters for your meetup you could run it for free with less than 25 tickets and see if there is interest without putting any money down. You would still need to promote the event where people you are targeting hang out. Social media, forums, town subreddits, etc
- jimberlage 3y ago
  Thanks! Yup, that sounds like what I need. The additional marketing to get people in the door would still be a thing with meetup too, but if Eventbrite will let me have a link to a meeting without signing up for a subscription, that would be a huge help! If any meetup people are looking at this - what Eventbrite offers is what I want from you! I would even pay for it on a one time basis, given that I know there are or were a lot of tech people who used to watch meetup for new events.

ivalm 3y ago

Not sure that’s the solution. I think the issue is poor attendance of existing events, not lack of events.

jimberlage 3y ago
My perception in a non-major metro is that the existing events are all really low quality, and that the quality passion project ones are gone. There are plenty of meetups for people trying to get me to buy their SaaS, but shared interest groups that don't stand to make money from their events have evaporated.
- ivalm 3y ago
  I host a Meetup just to meet new people interested in startup. I started it because there wasn’t a startup focused Meetup in my area. It’s hard for me to imagine that the $70/6 months is what prevents someone from hosting a high quality Meetup. There is so much more time value (and even money) to hosting high quality Meetup than the fee they collect.

hugocast 3y ago

I've been hosting meetups online and in person since 2014 and launched a new one that meets monthly in the Southeast US in 2021. It's grown from 5 people to 45. We usually get 20-25 people per meetup nowadays. In person. I suggest you check out Eventbrite. Events with up to 25 tickets are free to publish. If you want to offer more tickets for an event, you can pay a one-time fee or sign up for the monthly subscription. If you are just testing the waters for your meetup you could run it for free with less than 25 tickets and see if there is interest without putting any money down. You would still need to promote the event where people you are targeting hang out. Social media, forums, town subreddits, etc

jimberlage 3y ago
Thanks! Yup, that sounds like what I need. The additional marketing to get people in the door would still be a thing with meetup too, but if Eventbrite will let me have a link to a meeting without signing up for a subscription, that would be a huge help! If any meetup people are looking at this - what Eventbrite offers is what I want from you! I would even pay for it on a one time basis, given that I know there are or were a lot of tech people who used to watch meetup for new events.