Meetup is a New York based company with the goal of bringing users together who share common interests, which pays homage to its founding in 2001 after the World Trade Center attacks brought strangers together in New York City. Online groups seen on Meetup.com are a platform that brings people together who share a common denominator, to connect and socialize. Businesses can leverage this site to their advantage. As these Meetups need a meeting location, your business has the opportunity to be that place.

Finding a Meetup group is as easy as choosing a keyword or location, and depending on your brand, product, or service you can filter Meetup groups to align with your specific needs. Let’s say you’re running a restaurant in downtown San Diego and want to increase your Wednesday female traffic during happy hour. “Drinks” groups garner 90 search results, “Happy Hour” hits 91, and “Food” reaches 166 groups! While these may be a lot of groups to contact one after another, the key is to minimize your search to only a few keywords which are most relevant to your goal, such as “girls night out” or “women and drinks”.

Once you’ve determined a group within the realm of the demographic you’re trying to target, the outreach can begin. Research the groups you plan on inviting to determine if they are right for your business before setting up the initial contact. If you find that the group is mainly composed of married women, it probably won’t be best to invite them to a Speed Dating event at your bar. If your event has no relevance to the group, it’s unlikely that they are going to attend. You can join the group and suggest a future event, or contact the group administrator to have the event discussed for posting.

You want your business/event to stand out. When pitching an event to a group, be sure it’s fun, unique, and most of all, special. A simple personalization goes a long way versus a seemingly copy and paste e-mail blast.

If you succeed in coordinating a Meetup at your business, make sure that after your event you send an e-mail to find out what your attendees liked, and didn’t like about it. The only way to move your business forward is to listen to your customers. Find out what worked to repeat the next time and what mistakes not to make twice. Contacting just one group may not be enough to guarantee repeat customers. During tougher economic times it’s essential to become aggressive to bring in the clientele on a consistent basis. Being ahead of the game with social networking sites like Meetup will put your business at the top.