Power Down and Meet Up: Using Online Social Communities to Create Real-Life Interaction

I went to the “Austin Area Scrapbookers” meetup not too long ago and met a fellow twenty-something scrapbooking junkie who happened to live literally a block away. That wasn’t the first “small world” experience I’ve had at a meetup—ever since becoming a member of Meetup.com, I’ve been fascinated by the online organizing network’s ability to redefine the “community” aspect of online social communities. Unlike the groups you can create and join on traditional social networking sites like Facebook and LinkedIn, the purpose of Meetup.com groups are not only to connect people with shared interests, but to encourage them to power down the computer and get up close and personal. Like local tweetups, but on a much larger scale.
 
The sentiment behind this growing movement away from the virtual reality we’ve become increasingly immersed in is summed up nicely by Meetup.com’s original tagline: “Maybe it’s time for a little less face-to-screen and a little more face-to-face” (it was recently updated to the more action-oriented "Do something, Learn something, Share something, Change something"). This same flavor of real-world social organizing played a massive role in the historic victory of Barack Obama—and may be a sign that in a world of iPhones, instant messages and avatars, Gen Y (or the Millennials, or iGeneration, or whatever you want to call us) is ready for a shift back toward personal connection and interaction.
 
As we enter a new decade, marketers have a unique opportunity to play in that space between emerging social technology and real world experience. How can we diversify our “interactive” campaigns to offer user-empowered opportunities for customers and prospects to connect with each other and our brands IRL [in real life]? How can we create brand experiences that leverage the power of face-to-face engagement? Product or service-centric interest groups and user conferences, peer-to-peer roundtables and roadshows are all steps in the right direction. It will be interesting to see what we can dream up in 2010—streaming webinar in the park with complimentary whitepaper reading, anyone?