Community isn’t cancelled. Learn how NetSquared is adapting to our online-only world during COVID-19. All that and more in our quarterly video update.
Slide 1 — Introduction
Hi, it's Eli the NetSquared Community Manager. Join me for a lightning tour of highlights from NetSquared's last three months.
Slide 2 — Three Highlights
This quarter saw the arrival of COVID-19, which resulted in the cancellation of all live events. But Meetup changed their policies to allow online meetings, so NetSquared continues.
TechSoup also opened up a new benefit for our volunteers — organizers now get access to our educational offerings.
Slide 3 — COVID-19 Response
By early March all NetSquared groups had cancelled their live events. But community isn't cancelled — we're pivoting to online events. Leaders like Maria Zaghi in Guatemala are keeping the homefires burning with weekly zoom meetings.
Slide 4 — Change to Meetup
This was a big quarter for meetup too. They changed their longstanding policy against virtual events and added new features to support webinar links as "locations". And then in the final week of March WeWork sold meetup to a group of private investors — so the future of our events platform is in flux.
Slide 5 — Free TechSoup Courses
In happier news, TechSoup added a new benefit. Organizers now get free access of TechSoup Courses, which includes over 100 modules teaching skills from tech planning to Google Analytics to fundraising.
Slide 6 — Tech for Good Dublin
And it's worth investing in our local leaders because they are powerful influencers in their communities. Our Dublin organizers were selected by The Irish Times for their "50 People to Watch" list. Which is awesome!
Slide 7 — Global Map
NetSquared's reach continues to grow. In the last quarter we added 18 new and restarted groups.
Slide 8 — New and Restarted Groups
The most active countries were Canada and the USA, replacing Nigeria which has been the site with the most new groups over the last six months. The USA, UK, and Canada have been our most active countries since the early days, but Nigeria, with eight active groups, is likely to overtake the UK and Canada next year.
Slide 9 — Testimonial from @NeonTribe
I can't resist sharing another community testimonial. This tweet gives me all the sparkle hearts. Providing nonprofits with trusted tech advice is EXACTLY why NetSquared exists!
Slide 10 — The Numbers
There's a dip in the number of RSVPs compared to this time last year, which we can blame on COVID-19. But it's still an impressive number — every quarter we bring together are many nonprofits as NTEN's cancelled Nonprofit Technology Conference. That shows the power of our distributed, volunteer-led model of community organizing. Our reach is simply tremendous given the resources TechSoup invests in NetSquared.
Slide 11 — Top Events
When we look at the most popular events across the network digital marketing and fundraising meetups remain the most attended events. But, unsurprisingly, remote working best practices is rising to the top and is sure to dominate next quarter.
Slide 12 — Disaster Resilency Workshop
TechSoup turns to NetSquared leaders for their local expertise. Two organizers were featured in our Disaster Recovery workshop in Houston. Local leader Dhruv Khattar and Carolyn Appleton of Austin helped shape the campaign and participated in a panel discussion.
Slide 13 — What's Next?
What's next? SO MUCH! This is a very exciting time because TechSoup just created an integrated Community Team, which means for the first time we are bringing together our social channels, forums, and community events like NetSquared. With leadership from Susan Tenby we will be offering expanded support to our meetup leaders, so stay tuned!
In in the meantime, work continues to adapt to our new online-only reality as NetSquared pivots to virtual meetups
That's all for now — but we'll talk again in three months with my End of Year report.