The Fredericksburg Chapter of ASGA started from scratch to build the chapter initially with two former members of the Washington, DC Chapter and supported by a third DC Chapter member.  The “Burg” is using a website called Meetup.com as a communication tool for its members and a means to let the entire community know what is going on in the their little world. 

Meetup.com is a social networking tool available on the internet for any type of group and believe me they have some strange ones out there.  If you are looking for friends to play golf with, hike, kayak, or study supernatural beings from a far planet, Meetup.com has a place for you.  Initially, this writer, serving as the 2009 President of Fredericksburg ASGA viewed Meetup.com as a means to advertise the creation of F’burg ASGA and only intended to use this for a nominal period while the chapter was forming.  However, Meetup.com offers every aspect of any organization to run, communicate, and just stay in touch with its members.  Scheduling events was never so easy!  

Meetup.com allows the organizer to schedule events and email them directly to the members.  In turn the member can RSVP for themselves and a friend or two.  Both positive and negative RSVP’s are accepted, and each member can make a comment. 

After an event, Meetup.com offers each member to make comments about the event, the venue, and just about anything.  It has total interactive capabilities to communicate between the members. As a social networking tool, Meetup.com can work for you organization. 

Meetup.com can be a public forum or set as a private organization as to where an individual inquiring about joining would have to email the organizer of the group to request membership. 

The drawbacks to meetup.com are few, but one that comes to mind is that a member of your organization in meetup.com does not necessarily mean they are a member or your organization.  In our case, MeetUp is a shell for Fredericksburg ASGA. Currently, we are treating those non-ASGA members on our site as guests and as in all guests when they overstay their welcome without becoming a full-fledged member of ASGA.

Meetup.com offers the ability of the organizer to remove a member from Meetup.com.  The best part of Meetup.com that I like as the Chapter President is the immediate feedback you get from members.  One of my members RSVP’d ‘maybe’ to an event because she will be in the process of moving – she had the opportunity to ask for assistance on a note while RSVP’ing and a few of us have come to her rescue to help support that member, and maybe she can attend the scheduled event as well.

Meetup.com works well as a great communication tool, but as like all great computer programs, they have to be manipulated and just don’t happen automatically.  Someone has to set up the events, and people have to view their emails and respond to events. 

The initial organizer of Meetup.com can assign assistant organizers to the organization that have access to schedule events, post messages, and start a message board string that members can respond to.  In an organization like ASGA, the Golf Chair would have full control over scheduling of golf outings, the Social Chair could set up the social events, and the Communication Chair has a one-stop shop for getting the word out to the members.

Since Meetup.com is a public forum, which works best to keep your organization out there in the limelight (we tried the private route), when a new member joins your Meetup, it is up to someone to inform them what the ultimate goal is – becoming a member of ASGA.  This is where the Membership Chair would have to communicate to the potential new members that your particular meet-up group is more than just a website for social-networking. 

So now that the Golf Chair, Social Chair, Membership Chair, and Communications Chair have a function on Meetup.com, what does the President do?  Well, someone has to oversee the entire process.  And a bonus to Meetup.com, although it is not used in the Fredericksburg Chapter, there is a financial tool to track monies coming in and going out.  Wow, the perfect organization!

Not everything is perfect, but the energy put into the site can gain rewarding benefits coming out.  Meetup.com does cost to run, and the Fredericksburg Chapter of ASGA has tested this concept with a trial 3-month run, which cost $45 to the chapter.  A six-month subscription to MeetUp.com costs $72. 

Feel free to browse through our MeetUp site by going to the link below and you can view our members (some have photos attached to their profiles).  While The Fredricksburg Chapter has moved away from MeetUp, the Baltimore Chapter has continued to use the site with great success! You can view photos of our outings and social events, and read about what the members are doing within the chapter:

http://www.meetup.com/American-Singles-Golf-Association-Baltimore-Chapter/