Seattle CiviCRM User Group Meeting, May 27th

Submitted by Gregory Heller

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May 7, 2010

Seattle CiviCRM User Group Meeting, May 27th

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There seems to be growing interest in CiviCRM in Seattle. People want to know more about what it is, how it works and how they can harness the power for their clients or their own organizations.

Recently at DrupalCon in San Francisco I ran a training on CiviCRM that was attended by a fellow Seattlite, and in the weeks just before that I was introduced to a few other folks in Seattle using CiviCRM. And before that I helped out a locally based organization, Voices Education Project, with their migration to CiviCRM. So it seems like it is time to starting bringing people together. It was nearly 4 years ago that I started the Seattle Drupal User Group with the June 2006 Seattle Drupal Camp and some subsequent small group meetings. I can only hope for similar success with the Seattle CiviCRM User Group (SEACUG)

In this first Seattle CiviCRM User Group meeting we will share introductions, experiences and talk about growing the community of CiviCRM users and implementers in Seattle. Not formal experience with CiviCRM is necessary, just a curiosity and a willingness to learn.

Where: Office Nomads1617 Boylston Ave, Second Floor, Seattle, WA 98122 - (north of Pine) on Capitol Hill When: Thursday, May 27th 5pm until 7pm, at which time we may adjourn to a local establishment for food and beverage.

Please RSVP over on Groups.Drupal.org.

Gregory Heller May 28, 2010

Last night we had 11 people turn out for the first Seattle CiviCRM User Group Meeting. A number of people had only just discovered CiviCRM and were there to learn more about its capabilites. A few SEADUG regulars also showed up looking to learn a bit more about CiviCRM as they planned to evaluate it for current clients.

After introductions, we set an agenda that was largely made up of questions:

General Capabilities Over View
Examples of CiviCRM in Use
How does CiviCRM manage a whole member relationship (getting extra value from the relationship with the organization)
Payment Processors
List segmentation
civicrm for drupal 7
CiviCRM for conferences
CiviCRM for politics and advocacy

I started in on a basic overview of CiviCRM and then answered questions along the way for about two hours. I pointed out the list of improvements that were featured in my CiviCON lightning talk and explained a few of them that came up in our discussion.

I'd say, from what I have been hearing from clients and potential clients and at the SEACUG last night that people are interested in two uses of CiviCRM that are not necessarily dialed in yet:

CiviCRM For politics and advocacy -- which is getting better with CiviEngage work, though there is still the pesky issue of getting the district information for your constituents
CiviCRM for conferences that have more complex registration workflows, different tracks or workshops that also have limited attendance requirements, or extra costs

Just before we left we set out some next steps:

Next SEACUG will likely be in September, 4th thursday is September 23rd. Location, date and time to-be-confirmed in the weeks ahead.
Full Day CiviCRM training that I will run will likely be in July, probably the week of July 12th pending finding a location, so stay tuned for more information about this event.