Some ideas about User Groups for 2005

I've been thinking about ways to increase the visibility of UG's in 2005 with the idea that, through increased visibility we will be able to increase membership numbers.  Much of this comes from my exposure to both the Adelaide and Brisbane UG's.  I thought that I'd take this opportunity to jot down some of my thoughts.

Partnering

I think that, at a grass roots level, we should look toward "partnering" with organisations that we gain synergistic benefits from.  The industry which springs immediately to mind is the recruiting industry.  I've spent the past week in discussions with a recruitment firm in Adelaide - ChoiceIT - about the opportunity for them to foster a more retentive climate by pushing their clients towards our group.  It will show that they are interested in the skills and knowledge development of their candidates.  I also suggested that ChoiceIT could gain exposure by having a delegate attend the meeting to meet'n'mingle.

This idea was very well received.  ChoiceIT currently have approximately 50 current dev's on their books - over half of which are VB and C# users.

It would be good to also have some cards - like business cards - which outline our Groups details:

Group Name:

Adelaide .NET User Group

Meeting Location:

...

Meeting Dates:

every N Wednesday of the month

Meeting Format:  

pizza + drinks : cost x

Group Contacts

Group President

...

Website

...

Email

...

We could leave decks of these cards at various recruitment agencies for them to hand out to their .NET clients.

More Options

An emerging community activity is "Geek Dinners".  I think that it would be good to explore new options such as these in the hope that the variety will help with the "richness" of community.

My experience has been that there are 2 types of users which would embrace this idea:

1) The member who is already attending meetings but has a yearning for deeper discussion of topics and ideas.

2) The non-member who doesn't attend group meetings because either, a) a perception that nothing interesting happens at UG meetings; b) time is inconvenient.

Member Numbers

Now, this might be a bit of a left-field idea but... I think that we could look to increase the visibility of our successes both between UG's and also internally at Microsoft.  I wonder how UG's will feel about exposing "member activity data" on a regular basis? 

NOTE: this might ultimately get covered by the MsdnConnection program anyways???

Member Boards

As per my previous blog entry about member boards I think that this will be a great "ice-breaker" feature which will give members some insight into what other people in the room get up to.