#CLTweetup

What is a Tweetup?

Most Tweetups are groups of people who met online using Twitter. When they converge to network, socialize, learn, and hang out, it’s called a Tweetup. Now Tweetups may also include people from other social media platforms, like Facebook. Sometimes even our non-Twitter friends make special appearances to see what we’re all about.

How did CLTweetup get started?

In the summer of 2009, four Tweeps realized they lived within a few miles of each other in south Charlotte. They decided to meet for dinner and publicly discussed their plans on Twitter. Within a few days, the group of four had grown into 15 Tweeps meeting at The Lodge for dinner & drinks. During that dinner, while discussing how much fun it was, someone asked Cara (much to her surprise) when and where she was planning the next Tweetup. We met the following month at Brio, where 25 Tweeps showed up for dinner. The rest is CLTweetup history.

What’s with the $5 charge for CLTweetups?

This is new as of February 2011, and it will be standard going forward. Most attendees have indicated they are more than happy to pay for what they consider a very worthwhile event. The organizers do this for fun, but please know that there is a lot of time and effort that goes into planning them, as well as some miscellaneous expenses. We love that our group has grown in popularity and usually all our monthly tickets are claimed in a very short time period. But with growth comes growing pains. We’ve seen an increase in the number of bogus orders and no-shows at our events. We can deal with those; however, they come at the expense of others who were not able to attend because all the slots were reserved. For most of our events, we will work to give your $5 back to you in the form of food or drinks. Any extra proceeds will be given to our charities. The organizers of CLTweetup do not plan to make money on these events.

Tell me more about your charitable Tweetups.

This is a new focus in 2011. The past two years, we’ve partnered with Toys for Tots in December to organize a toy drive. We’ve seen the generosity of our community as people donated toys and money to those less fortunate in Charlotte. We’d like to use the power of our network for more of these selfless efforts and see how that goes. We are tentatively planning to select a local charitable partner every other month. We’ll give the non-profit organization an opportunity to attend our event, educate us about their cause, and collect goods or financial assistance. You are not required to donate anything but you are encouraged to learn about the charity and help promote them.

Can anyone attend CLTweetup?

Yes, it’s open to anyone in the Charlotte area and our visitors from other areas. We just ask that you register in advance. You don’t have to be on Twitter or Facebook, but you’ll find that most of our attendees do use social media and that makes for lots of common ground and interests. We publicize our events via Facebook & Twitter and use Eventbrite to handle our ticket reservations.

Why do you limit the number of tickets available?

This is for several reasons. Often we have space constraints based on our location. Often our hosts are providing our group with free food and drink specials, so we have to limit the number of attendees to respect their generosity. We have also found that if our group gets too large for any one event, it’s harder for people to socialize and makes the event less fun and less useful.

Why would I want to sponsor or host CLTweetup?

We welcome any discussions you want to have about hosting or sponsoring our group. We usually host our monthly event at local restaurants or businesses conducive to allowing our group to socialize and network. Our group size usually ranges from 40-70 attendees. We promote our event and hosts on Twitter and Facebook, as do many of our followers and attendees. We have some other sponsorship opportunities, so please contact us on Facebook or Twitter.