Class Reunion Planning 101 (High School or College Reunions)

One of the most interesting things to come out of our recent class reunion was an interest in sharing information about the business skills and expertise that our classmates have. This got us thinking. While we would never use the class database as a marketing tool for personal enrichment, why not allow people to advertise on the class website for free or a minimal cost. We are currently investigating two options for classmates: 1. A list of subject areas of expertise. Need a lawyer. Click on "attorneys" and a list of classmate's names come up. Click on the names to get to their individual websites. Click on "plumbers" and a list of names pops up and so on. This would be a free option. 2. Buy a full page or half page add in the website. Money for this can go to maintaining the website. Hosting costs, survey subscriptions, email blast subscriptions, etc. When we get closer I'll share more on this subject. In the meanti...

A friend of this blog asked me today if planning a class reunion was similar to planning a family reunion. "Well," I answered, "planning a class reunion is no picnic." I believe school reunions are more challenging than family reunions. And I believe family reunions, for the most part, are just that - "picnics." 1. Class reunions are much larger. My class, for example, was 620 people, and it's a huge management effort to coordinate communication, databases, bank accounts, ticket sales, teams of people, etc. Planning the class reunion is a big management gig. 2. Classmates are not connected by family ties and therefore are not easily found, especially when women marry and change their names. That, in itself, makes a huge difference. Thankfully we have social networking tools - huge resources for finding classmates - like Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Classmates.com, and Google to find people. 3. Once we found the right location, (in our case a hotel with...

For the most part, people put themselves out there. They paste their pictures all over Facebook .com, share their family photos on Shutterfly .com, and put their entire resumes on LinkedIn .com. Twitter.com will tweet every last breath you take if you let it: "What are you doing now?" "I'm breathing." It's all voluntary. It's all good fun, and it's a great way to let people know you're still alive and well. With the special interest groups, you can direct people's attention to favorite charities, important public events, (like the reunion) and track your favorite celebrity's page. But there are some people who have no interest in social networking and prefer to remain private. They have not succumbed to the idea of Twittering their private thoughts in 50 characters or less. And some don't want to have anything to do with the reunion. So be cautious about posting private information on the class website when you have control of it. Re...