It’s been a while since I’ve ventured out to network. It’s not that I haven’t wanted to, but I’ve actually been wonderfully busy. That’s a great problem to have. However, I did venture out to a meetup the other night. It was a great event. Well organized, large turnout, people I hadn’t met before, and I even won a bottle of wine at the raffle. Yippee! Most everyone was fabulous to connect with, except for one particular woman
I always attempt to ask people what they do first, if possible. This woman beat me to the punch and asked me what I did. I said I helped small business owners setup and operate their WordPress blogs. She immediately said, “Oh, my son does the same thing. . . SORRY!” Then she quickly whisked herself away to accost another person. I never heard what she did. It was all about what she could get from someone. Sorry, lady, I would never refer you business, because for one thing, you blew me off and never told me what you did. Besides, who would want to work with someone who is so incredibly rude?
Sheesh! What was that woman thinking? Who cares if I did the same thing her son did? If you come from a mindset of competition, you lose, big time.
I love Meetup.com. I think it’s a great way to find variety in networking In fact, up until recently, I ran my own meetup for an organization I am a member of. Because my new business was growing, I decided to step down as an organizer. I had wanted someone in my organization to take over my group but they were at the max as far as how many meetups they could run. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to find a replacement. (My bad) Someone else stepped up who is not a member of our organization and then began blasting out emails promoting his own agenda. Unfortunately, you cannot just delete a meetup group without asking everyone to remove themselves.
Everyone has the right to step up, but at least the guy could have changed the name of the meetup so it no longer had the name of the organization in the address or masthead. He hasn’t yet. Duh!
Here’s the deal though. He joined my meetup when it first started and never attended. He joins tons of meetups, that he doesn’t attend. One meetup is even a woman’s group. When someone steps down he takes over to use their lists. This is what I call a Meetup Stalker. I’m sorry, but I think it’s a shady practice.
I started emailing people on my list to remove themselves because our organization was being misrepresented. Unfortunately, most people do not know how to remove themselves from a meetup group. Here’s what you do.
Go to the particular group you belong to. Go to MEMBERS at the top left and click on PROFILE at the top of the page you will see LEAVE THE GROUP. Only join a meetup if you have the intention of attending it. If it flatlines, leave the group.
PS
The meetup in question was finally changed over. Thank you! However I still maintain that joining multiple meetups you never attend, and then taking one over when a spot opens up, for the purpose of using a list is not an ethical way to use Meetup.
Have you met any networking knuckleheads lately? Please share.
About Rebecca Olkowski
I'm a 30 + year voice over actor, blogger, WordPress Blog Consultant and a gal who loves to have fun. I'm on a mission to travel the world in style. Can you give me a lift?
