There’s an old adage in the sales and marketing world that goes something like this: “Someone has to know, like and trust you before they buy from you”. This applies to all small businesses and entrepreneurial endeavors, whether you are a freelance graphic designer, a real estate agent, auto mechanic or art dealer. If you want to quickly build solid, trusting relationships with your prospects so that they turn into paying customers, you should be meeting them in person. Every interaction doesn’t need to be in person, but in my experience, someone who you have met in person is about three times more likely to become a customer than someone that has only seen a video of you online, or opted in to your email marketing list, etc. So, it’s worth it to occasionally, if not frequently, get out there and “press the flesh” like you’re running for office!

The primary modes of sensing and judging the world around us are visual, auditory and kinesthetic. (That’s seeing, hearing and touching.) Guess what the fastest and easiest way is to connect with someone on all three levels, so that they are most likely to trust you and therefore invest in your product or service? That’s right, it’s live, face-to-face meetings. And guess which online tool is the easiest and most effective way to set up, promote, organize and manage such live meetings? You guessed it: Meetup.com. This is a very, very easy to use and intuitive online tool that allows you to easily define your topic and also find and connect with people that are interested in your subject matter. To be the “Organizer” of a Meetup Group only costs $45 for three months, or $19 for one month, and in return for that small investment you get the ability to connect in person with your best prospects – i.e. those that are so enthusiastic about your subject or industry that they are willing to actually show up in person!

I have been truly impressed with the power of Meetup. Probably the best part of my experience with Meetup was the realization that they use the authority of Meetup as a company to essentially market your new group on your behalf, right when you are starting your group. When you start a group, 72 hours after the official launch time, Meetup automatically sends out an email blast to everyone in your geographic area that has indicated they are interested in whatever your subject matter is. This means that, unless you do a really poor job of describing your group and making it sound compelling, you will get some people joining right away. This is very powerful, because you now have an open line of communication with these folks since you are the Organizer of the Meetup Group. Even if you are new to online marketing, or promoting live meetings or seminars, you will have some momentum right away. My experience with Meetup was that when launching my first ever Meetup Group, 4 or 5 days after launching my Group, I had about 35 members! After three months and three actual live meetings, I had about 75. Your actual attendance at live events will be about 10-25% of your total membership, if your results are similar to mine.

Here are my best lessons learned and most productive ideas for using Meetup to grow your business:

1. Do a great job making your Meetup homepage professional and legitimate sounding. I spent at least three hours working on the copy (writing) and setting up all the group settings so that it would give the impression of a serious, organized, focused and helpful Meetup group. Many groups on Meetup just don’t look well cared-for, and there’s really no excuse for that. Take the time to do a good job, so that when people check out your group, they actually join your group. If no one joins, you won’t be able to grow your business, following, charity organization, etc.

2. Include a photo of yourself in your profile. This will let people see that you are a real person, and not some sketchy type hiding behind a photo of a sunset or their dog or something. You should always be careful with privacy online, but when trying to encourage people to meet you in person, live, you need to get them comfortable with you online first.

3. Always hold your Meetups in a public location. This is for your safety and the safety of your attendees. And, you will have a much easier time attracting folks to a nice, well-populated Starbucks or restaurant or hotel, rather than your house or some other private location.

4. Hold your meetup in a location that is easy to get to for your geographic area. I held mine at a Perkins restaurant at the intersection of the most major highway in our area and another well-populated road with lots of shopping and restaurants. This increased my turnout, because people could easily get to me by taking highways, even if they lived one town away.

5. Schedule your first meetup right away so that people have something to RSVP “Yes” to! Your prospects are the “hottest” when they are first looking at your Meetup Group’s page, so give them the chance to opt-in to a live meeting while they’re “hot”!

6. Don’t let your Meetup group sit idle for more than two weeks. After that, especially at the beginning, people will begin to forget who you are and lose interest, or they will figure you are not that serious. There are lots of meetups that never actually meet in person. What a waste! Make yours a very active, or at least semi-active group. The best other meetups I attend are actually weekly, and these take a lot of time and effort on the Organizer’s part, but they are well-attended and constantly growing the membership ranks.

7. Promise to give people some kind of incentive to show up. I chose to give out handouts of the slides in the presentation so that people wouldn’t have to scribble notes furiously the whole time.

8. Keep the time frame reasonable. For example, my Meetups are 7:00 – 8:30pm on Mondays or Wednesdays. I feel that going to 9:00 or 10:00 on a weeknight will make people less likely to attend in the future, after they realize that the Meetup group is pretty much killing their whole night and they can’t get home to tuck their kids into bed or watch their favorite TV show or whatever else is going on in their lives. So, my advice is to keep it concise, productive and efficient so you are respectful of everyone’s most valuable resource – their time.

9. Bring in guest speakers occasionally to spice things up. It gets pretty boring to hear the same person droning on every week or every month, so I think you will find better attendance and also better growth for your business if you reach out to other people in your niche and have them speak at your Meetup sometimes.

Author Bio: There are many ways to make money online, but nothing works unless you’re implementing the key, fundamental strategies. With tons of traffic in your niche, you can monetize it and generate cash. Sign up now for Taylor Garland’s FREE newsletter to learn how-Go here: http://CriticalInternetSecrets.com

Category: Marketing
Keywords: meetup, meetup group, live event, seminar, marketing, small business, public speaking, networking