We’re big on community. Collaboration, brainstorming, etc. - these are the things that drive the creative engine. It’s fairly impossible to get along without them.
Therein lies the genesis of Outlet Baltimore, a semi-regular social event designed for Baltimore-area creative and tech professionals.
We looked for a sweet spot between highly organized events and purely informal meetups. From there we utilized tools like Twitter and WordPress to reach the folks we knew would be interested, and get them on board. We encouraged and supported word of mouth efforts, and combined that with targeted outreach to specific individuals.
The first event was staged during an ice storm (no, really) and drew roughly 15 people. The second drew about 25, and the third drew roughly 50. Each event has generated considerable buzz, and Outlet is now established as a “go-to” event. It’s on hiatus for the moment, but the success we had with it taught us a ton of things that we’ll implement both on other projects and on Outlet’s 2010 return.