“Business Networking That Doesn’t Suck”
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When a Seattle couple, self-described indie professionals, couldn’t find the kind of low-key business get-togethers they enjoyed, they decided to host some. 50 events later they’d founded an online community.
Members can volunteer to host the kind of comfy, relevant face-to-face gatherings and seminars in which they most wanted to participate.
It’s now called Biznik. In the delicate, ongoing art of managing a lively, sometimes out-spoken community, they walk the tightrope in hewing to their decidedly non-corporate motto, “Business Networking That Doesn’t Suck”. Indies can join, meet and talk with each other online for free or
choose from a two-tier, monthly membership level to host or attend gatherings (some like to meet while walking their dogs, others over after-dinner drinks) and to get more deeply involved online.
The more you contribute 
(writing articles, responding to queries, offering podcasts, teaching a seminar, etc.) the more visibility you earn on the site.Most gatherings are small (20 people or so) and the founders like that because participants are getting better acquainted and able to discuss ways to help each other.
As evident in our interviews with Anita Campbell, Diane Danielson, Dan and his wife, Lara Eve Feltin,
are experimenting as they go with their business model. They, too, are trying out ways to attract and keep locally-based, mutually-reinforcing, close-knit, niche-serving and profitable communities where members meet online and off, sell to and serve each other and get special offers from the companies that pay for access to the niche.
In this podcast interview, learn from Dan McComb the “go slow to go fast” methods that are attracting active, paying, active members.
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April 28th, 2008 at 7:44 am
Thanks for the post, Kare. I am a bit overwhelmed with all these links. Which one goes to the Seattle project?
April 30th, 2008 at 6:07 pm
Stephanie,
This post is about Biznik (per second graph) so you can click on Biznik
May 15th, 2008 at 9:46 am
You’ve done a great job of highlighting some of the many aspects of Biznik that make it special and set it apart from other means of getting to we.
As a member of Biznik since there were under 90 members and almost all were local to Seattle, it’s been a great pleasure to see it’s potential be appreciated by an ever-widening circle of people who want to make a difference and be part of something that fosters cooperation over competition.
Thanks,
Dennis
May 16th, 2008 at 4:16 pm
Thank you Dennis,
Here’s to my taking one of your classes when I am next in the Seattle areas!