Cheltenham Social Media Café » social media cafe

#Cheltsocmedcafe event number 4 – Fri 3rd September

Rachel — Thu, 22 Jul 2010 09:52:59 +0000

We have set a date for our next café event and hope you can join us on Friday 3rd September from 6-8pm at Pepper Crescent. It’s the standard mix of coffee, cake and social media chat with social media geeks and newbies.

By then many of you will be back from your summer holidays and ready to swap anecdotes and compare tans so it’s an ideal opportunity to catch up with old and new acquaintances. As yet there are no plans for any pre-café talks but you can drop us a line if you’re interested.

We’ll be tweeting reminders and updates about the event using the #cheltsocmedcafe hashtag so remember to set up your search column and use the tag if you’re mentioning the event too.

See you soon!

PS. Remember you can also follow us on Facebook – just visit www.facebook.com/Cheltsocialmediacafe to browse the events, pictures, status updates and valuable comments.

Don’t forget – this Friday 9th from 6-8pm!

Rachel — Mon, 05 Jul 2010 10:28:30 +0000

Hello – this a quick reminder about our next event taking place this Friday at Pepper Crescent.

You can join us from 6pm for cake, drinks and chatter or come along at 5.30pm to see Jonathan Pollinger talk about the business benefits of using Foursquare.

We’re open to everyone – so long as you have an interest in social media and you’re happy to spend a few hours being sociable without giving any sales pitches! So far we’ve met lots of interesting, intelligent, charming and useful people so why not come along and be one of them?

Got any questions? You can post them here as a comment and someone will get back to you! Alternatively, talk to us on Twitter or Facebook.

Social Media Cafe 3

Rachel — Tue, 18 May 2010 08:48:01 +0000

We realised on the evening of the previous cafe event that people were quite keen to come again and wanted to know when the next one was. Sadly, this required more organisational skills than we were capable of but we have endeavoured to get it arranged as soon as possible.

The result? We have a new cafe event booked for the 8th July!

It’s another Thursday, from 6-8pm, with coffee, alcohol and cake on offer at Pepper Crescent. As usual, your comments and suggestions are welcome so feel free to get in touch using the comment box, email, Twitter or Facebook.

You can also find a few photos of the last event on our Facebook page which may encourage more new people to come along. (We are an attractive bunch after all!)

Remember, you don’t need to be an expert. All you need is to have an interest in social media, a free evening on the 8th July and an appreciation for networking without sales pitches. We look forward to seeing new and returning faces there!

25th March – Cheltenham Social Media Cafe needs you!

Rachel — Wed, 24 Feb 2010 07:46:33 +0000

We have set a date for our first café event and the lovely people at Pepper Crescent will be providing the venue and selling their usual fantastic array of coffees, cakes and other refreshments.

From 6-8pm you are cordially invited to share the evening with us discussing social media with like minded souls and no sales pitches over a cup of coffee or a glass of wine!

We want our first get together to be an informal affair so that we can all get to know each other and find out what people want to learn. Some of you will probably be experts in various social media subjects but we’re expecting a lot of people who just know a bit and are looking to learn more.

All levels of knowledge and experience are welcome – we’re looking for a good mix of people and you don’t need a Twitter account with 30,000 followers just to get in!

If you plan on attending please email / tweet us, add a comment under the blog post or RSVP on our Facebook Event Page to let us know.

We’d like to get a rough idea of numbers although people are welcome to just turn up on the night.

If you’re not sure whether to attend and you’re going to Digitalks at D’Fly this Thursday you can have a chat with Chris about our plans. He’d love to meet anyone interested in attending and he’ll be able to answer your questions in person which makes a nice change from DMing. Be warned though, he may talk for longer than 140 characters!

Spread the word

It’d be pretty awesome if people could spread the word about our meeting on the 25th March either by blogging, tweeting or even talking to their friends, family and colleagues.

We’d really love to see a load of people there ready to network and enjoy the brownies and semi-intellectual conversation on offer.

Please note – your Social Media Café needs you!

Cheltenham Social Media Cafe on Facebook

Rachel — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 15:19:35 +0000

First we conquered Twitter and next on the list is Facebook. Well, we are all about social media after all! Decisions about Ning, Friend Feed and other accounts have yet to be taken but two social media platforms seem plenty to start.

You can find our page and become a fan here.

It’s another platform for us to spread the word and connect with people who are interested in exploring social media – like you! It’s also an opportunity to get to know people by their actual names rather than their Twitter IDs which only seems polite if you’re planning on sharing a cup of coffee and some cake with them.

I’ve added a few discussion topics to get you started and of course you can start your own while you’re visiting. The most interesting discussions and comments generated in Facebook could form the basis of future meetings so if you have a burning question please let us know!

Hello – we’ve taken over the Cheltenham SMC!

Rachel — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 14:58:51 +0000

As Russell kindly mentioned – there are two heroes who have stepped into the breach. Allow me to introduce the new team!

Chris – Managing Director of Firehoop, a Cheltenham based Internet Development Company.

Rachel – That’s me, your friendly neighbourhood copywriter.

We’ll also be helped by Karen – Organiser and Social Butterfly.

And we’re looking for plenty of participation from you. You can suggest topics, speakers, venues and anything else required to run a vibrant social media café.

Our Plan for Chelt Soc Med Café

We have a couple of venues lined up as well as a fabulous cake supplier!

We want to meet up every couple of months, at different times and at different venues so that everyone (hopefully) gets a chance to come along.

Some events will feature guest speakers and some will be for informal networking. You can find out about the events by reading our blog posts.

Other ideas include social media ’speed networking’ and a cake give-away!

What do I do now?

Show your interest by emailing us or following CheltSocMedCafe on Twitter.

We’ll keep you updated on our plans and let you know when the first meeting is arranged.

We look forward to meeting you all soon…

Lack of progress – a quick update (updated again)

Russell — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 12:19:24 +0000

Hello all,

Just wanted to say a quick sorry for the lack of progress with setting up Cheltenham SMC.

Unfortunately a combination of work, sickness & life in general (plus a little bit of laziness) means I haven’t had much time to devote to getting things going.

However, I’m now hoping that the first Cheltenham SMC will happen in the first week of December – watch this space!

UPDATED 16 Dec 2009

Soooo…looks like holding the SMC in the first week of December didn’t happen. Life took over again, but I’ve pencilled in the third week of January for the 1st one to happen. Watch this space…again!

What next?

Russell — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 20:08:30 +0000

So, after visiting Derbyshire SMC and seeing how these things work, and having finally got the blog up and running, I’ve now got to get the Cheltenham Social Media Café happening.

The next step is to find a venue. I’ll be checking out places in Cheltenham over the next few weeks - I’m looking for somewhere with space, flexible seating, coffee (& cake!) and wifi (though a great venue without wifi might be alright if neccessary).

All suggestions are very welcome!

A research trip

Russell — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 19:05:50 +0000

Last week I visited Derby for the first Derbyshire Social Media Café to find out how it works and to see if I could get a few ideas for CheltSMC.

Lots of interesting conversations took place among a diverse group from a range of organisations and it took place in a great venue, the cafè bar in Quad, an arts centre in the heart of the city’s cathedral quarter.

The informality of the event worked well, allowing conversations to flow and develop naturally from subject to subject, and people to come and go through the afternoon.

The available wifi was really useful for looking at examples of websites and services that came up in conversation, as well as tweeting.

Sarah Lay, one of the organisers, wrote an interesting post before the SMC on what the event would & wouldn’t be. I think I’d like to follow a lot of those suggestions.

But I’m completely open to other people’s ideas – I want this to be an SMC for Cheltenham, not for me! So please feel free to contribute your ideas and do get in touch if you’d like to be involved in organising the events, either here or on Twitter.

Let’s have a social media cafe in Cheltenham!

Russell — Sun, 04 Oct 2009 09:07:44 +0000

Inspired by the Tuttle Club in London and the social media cafés springing up around the country, I thought it would be great to have something similar in Cheltenham.

There’s already loads of great activity in the Cheltenham area, including the excellent DigiTalks and I’d like the social media café to complement the things already happening.

Initial thoughts are that the cafe will run in the late afternoon/early evening, so it will be easy for people to drop in on their break or on their way home from work. There’ll be no agenda so that conversations can flow naturally. And there will definitely be cake!

It will be open to everyone – public, private or third sector, people who work with social media or those who want to find out more about it.

At the moment I’m looking for a suitable venue – all suggestions are welcome. If you’re interested in helping to organise the cafe or have any ideas, please let me know.