I met John Chow

Tonight I had the unique experience of hanging out with John Chow when I went to my first meeting of the Seattle Bloggers Meetup group. John was in Seattle with his wife Sarah for some business, and he decided to drop in at the Meetup to connect with some new people. I got to talk to John for about an hour and a half about investment strategies for the wealthy, soccer, and upcoming conventions and trade shows. It was definitely fun to hear about some of his experiences at the trade shows. I might see John again when I attend Affiliate Summit 2008 in Las Vegas near the end of February. He’ll be doing a workshop at the Summit about Super Affiliate Strategies that Work, according to the agenda.

I also met another local blogger named Chris Guthrie. Chris has pretty extensive experience operating forums, so it will be interesting getting to know him better, since I’ve been exploring and learning about forums in my own studies. Chris was nice enough to email me this picture of John and I that he took with his camera.

All in all, I found the Meetup group to be dynamic and fun. The people were very nice. I’m interested in seeing if there’s a way to participate further… I think I might like to attend the Meetups regularly, and possibly help to organize or facilitate the group a bit more, after they get to know me better.

Getting out of the box

Taking a break from the computer and getting out to network a little bit in person was a good move, in my opinion. There are some connections that you aren’t normally able to make online, and the person-to-person element to my meeting with John was very exciting. I recommend exploring social groups like the ones you can find on Meetup.com, and I think it’s wise to consider attending trade shows as a way to make person-to-person connections and market yourself a little bit. Who knows if you might be able to meet your favorite blogger?