Skift Take
CitySocialising is a great local service to help beating the personal barriers that prevent you from getting a better job, improving your social life, being active. Apart from that, it is an awesome threat to traditional event professionals.
Jo is organising Sunday lunch Hampstead and walk and has invited you to attend.
Graham is organising 18-20s west end drinks! and has invited you to attend.
Kelly is organising Cocktail tasting class and has invited you to attend.
I don’t know who Jo, Graham or Kelly are but hey, these events are cool! Usually these kind of mail makes it very quickly to my Spam folder but in this instance I just can’t do it. The events are very relevant, targeted on my area and to my needs. What if I’ll get a special invitation tomorrow to an unmissable event?
What is it?
I had the chance to have a look at how Sanchita, the CEO, explains the reasoning behind CitySocialising.com:
The idea for CitySocialising came from our research into the social requirements of professionals living and working in UK cities. We found that a huge percentage of those in their 20s and 30s were particularly interested in meeting people in London and expand their circle of friends, and identified that this was because:
– There’s a higher likelihood of people in this age group relocating to new cities for work or with partners, arriving with none or few friends in the area.
– Existing friends are more likely to be settling in relationships or moving away in their 20s & 30s, meaning that finding new friends to socialise with is more appealing.
– Social lives can become stale, or social circles dissipate after relationship breakdowns, and opportunities to meet new people are reduced.
– Increasing demands at work allows less time to organise the social lives that suit them.
I can immediately tell you this is not like Meetup.com.
Well, first of all you need to pay to attend members events. At the very beginning I thought this was not a good idea. 30K members in the UK answered my question though. Money is indeed a good way to test motivation and they priced very well.
Secondly they select event hosts in their user base.
Why should you care?
– If you got out from the “I am a professional planner and there is no one as cool as me, or if there is, I got better shoes” attitude, you realized your competition is now users. If you got skills you can make your way into whatever community, if you don’t … well, if you are still reading, I am sure you do!
– You should explore the pricing. I told you free is the new black, almost free is fine, giving the perception it is for free relying on an upfront payment it’s interesting.
– If your brand is out of ideas and you don’t know how to develop existing as well as new relationships, follow this suggestion. Throw your Kotler in the garbage because things are changing fast and only the skilled are taking advantage. Do your research, sponsor user generated events and you will develop intimate connections with your customers.
Link to CitySocialising.com
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