At Functional Software, we run several meetup groups:
We have learned a lot along the way and want to share a few tips in case you’re thinking of hosting your own meetup.
What is a meetup?
What is a meetup? In short, a meetup is a group of enthusiasts coming together to discuss their special interest.
- Meetups are typically held on weekdays, after working hours
- There might be some light food, snacks and beverages
- Optionally, a member of the community holds a short presentation
Create or join a meetup group
Unless you’re already an organizer, the first step is to join a meetup group, or to create one of your own. If there already is a meetup group in your area, they will probably be delighted to have another organizer!
The most popular service for organizing meetups is still Meetup.com—note that you need an Organizer account to create a meetup group, which costs $30 / month (you can get a slight discount if you pay annually).
If Meetup.com is too expensive, there are free alternatives:
- Odd Circles has pretty much the exact same features as Meetup.com, and comes with a generous free plan.
- Luma is similar to Meetup.com, but focuses more on individual events rather than community features. You can host unlimited events on the free plan.
- Confetti lets you collect RSVPs for free, but it lacks community features. However, if your community is already gathered elsewhere, this might not be a problem.
Finding a venue, sponsors and speakers
Unless you want to charge money for your meetup, you will probably need a sponsor to help you with food and a venue. If you ask around, you can probably find a business willing to help you out.
When asking for sponsorship, it can be a good idea to inform the company of what they can expect in return:
- Increase brand awareness. Hosting a meetup is a great way for companies to advertise themselves employers. It’s usually a good idea to offer the company various ways to advertise themselves during the meetup, such as roll-ups, a short introduction at the start of the meetup, and so on.
- Finding talent. People who attend meetups are usually passionate about their craft, skilled, and highly motivated. Hosting a meetup is a great way for the company to find quality candidates.
- Employee perk. Meetups are fun for the employees as well! It also shows that their employer cares about the community.
If you find a company willing to host your meetup, be clear about what is expected of them as hosts:
- If food is to be served, they need to order food and beverages.
- Ensure there is enough seating for all the attendees
- Might need to let organizers in earlier to help with prep work
- Have a projector, monitor or similar to show presenter slides. If the venue is large, the organizers might also need a PA system.
A tip: When trying to find sponsors, look for companies that have active job listings! As mentioned above, hosting a meetup is a great way to find good candidates.
Finding speakers
Here are some tips for finding speakers for your meetup:
- Ask the meetup group if anyone wants to hold a presentation. Make sure to do this well in advance, as speakers might need a few weeks to prepare.
- If a company is hosting the event, ask if they have someone willing to present
- Reach out to people who have presented at meetups or conferences before. Check out conference websites or meetup groups to find previous presenters that you can contact.
Foundations
Some languages and technologies also have a foundation, or registered ambassadors, that can help you out in various ways, e.g. finding speakers or other forms of sponsorship.
Here’s a partial list—if you know of a foundation or ambassador registry that’s missing please let us know!
Food and drinks
If you’re responsible for ordering food and drinks, make sure to arrange catering well in advance! Most caterers need their orders between one week and 48 hours in advance. (Note that you can usually make small adjustments after that). At a previous workplace we once tried to order 100 burritos on the day of the event—don’t do this.
What food should you order? Anything that doesn’t strictly require plates and cutlery usually works well, as long as it’s not too messy. We usually go for something like pizza, burritos or sandwiches.
It’s a good idea to ask attendees about their food preferences. Meetup.com lets you ask attendees a question when they RSVP—you can use this feature to collect dietary requirements.
Advertising the meetup
“Build it and they will come” worked out great for Kevin Costner in Field of Dreams, but it usually works less well in reality. You need to advertise your meetup, especially if it’s a new meetup group! Once you’ve set up your meetup page, share it on social media, LinkedIn and community forums.
The meetup event page
No matter how you manage your meetup, it’s always good to have some kind of event page. The event page should have the following information:
- What the event is about
- Why people should attend the event (your sales pitch, essentially)
- Information about any speakers and their talks
- Schedule
- Location of the venue, and how to get in
- If food will be served
Safety
We have hosted a dozen or so meetups, and have never had any problems with safety. However, it is still something you need to keep in mind.
- Watch out for bad behavior by the attendees. Make sure attendees know who to talk to in case something happens, or if they feel unsafe.
- Be sure not to violate safety codes, e.g. by blocking fire exits or letting too many people into the venue.
- Do not let unknown people into the meetup; make sure they are on the RSVP list.
- Restrict access to off-limits areas.
Meetup schedule
Here is a rough template schedule that we usually use:
- 17:30 Doors open
- 18:00 First speaker
- 18:40 Break
- 19:00 Second speaker, if any
- 20:00 Meetup closes
Make sure to check at what time attendees need to leave at the latest.
Before the meetup
- Arrive 1-2 hours before the meetup starts, so you have time to set everything up.
- Help the host arrange chairs, put up food, etc. This always takes longer than expected.
- Plug in and test presentation equipment (projector, microphone, etc). If you will be recording the event, check your recording equipment.
- It can be a good idea to assign someone to greet early arrivals 20-30 minutes before the meetup starts.
During the meetup
- Greet attendees at the door; we usually print a paper copy of the RSVP list and check people off as they come in
- Before the first speaker comes on, the organizers usually do a short
introduction. Here’s a rough outline:
- Welcome people to the meetup
- Thank the hosts
- Tell people where the emergency exits and bathrooms are
- Let people know you are available if they have questions or concerns
- Present the speaker
Closing the meetup
- Inform people that they have to leave about 30 minutes before you need to close
- If people still want to hang out, we usually direct them to a pub that’s close to the venue. You can ask the hosts to recommend you a place in advance.
- Check that everyone has left; look out for belongings that attendees might have left behind!
Recording the meetup
If the meetup has a presentation, recording it and putting it online can be a nice service to the community. You can get really far with modest means nowadays; your average smartphone usually has a camera that’s good enough for recording a presentation, and you can get a good microphone for cheap.
The sound is the most critical part of the presentation, so we recommend investing in a lavalier microphone to get a high-quality recording.
This is our current recording setup:
- A smartphone with a decent camera
- A camera tripod with a smartphone mount
- Hollyland Lark M2 lavalier microphone—it’s cheap, has good sound quality and plugs directly into your smartphone. This video was recorded with a Lark M2, if you want to know what it sounds like.
Recording tips:
- Check if the presenter wants their talk to be recorded! Before the presentation starts, you should tell the audience that it will be recorded, and offer them to opt out; even if they don’t appear on camera, audience members might still object.
- Make sure your smartphone has enough storage and battery power to last the entire recording.
- Ask the presenter to record their screen! This is essential if the presenter wants to do live coding, but even if they just have a slideshow it helps capture slide transitions and so on.
Wrapping up
We hope these tips will inspire you to host your own meetup! If you do, get in touch with us—we’d love to hear about it!