For a lot of self-employed professionals, it can be hard to find time to meet with peers and independents in different professions. I often plan events for photographers, but don’t get to engage with designers, writers, and other creatives as much as I’d like. A friend of mine who is a professional writer, Jennifer Fink, has her own network of independent writers that she connects with on a regular basis, but doesn’t often network with other creatives. Luckily, Jennifer and I were already friends (from the same hometown) and when she suggested holding a joint-networking session, I was more than delighted to help plan it.
Together, we reached out to all the creatives we knew, many we didn’t know but hoped to meet, and to people who hire creatives. The Big Shoes Network kindly donated some door prizes in the form of “Premium Listings” at their site’s directory! Anodyne Coffee was generous enough to let us use their meeting room for our MKE Creatives event, and on Feb 26, a whole lot of us came out to chat, connect, and enjoy great coffee!
There were writers, editors, photographers, graphic designers, videographers, marketing consultants, and intellectual property attorneys present – people from both the client and vendor side of things!
Here’s who I all got to talk with:
Deni Storm – photographer; Jodi Marose – communications at Alverno College; Jennifer L. W. Fink – writer/registered nurse; John Marszalkowski – video/multi-media; Mary Dally-Muenzmaier – arts blogger/marketing; Aurelia Schultz – Attorney-at-Law; Aubry McKinley – VP of sales at Cory Graphics; Erin O-Donnell – writer/editor; Kelly Andrews – biz/marketing consultant; Kristine Hansen – travel writer; Jenny Bohr – photographer; Nicole Etter – writer/editor; Paula Wheeler – writer/project manager; Tanner Johnson – media production/videographer/socmed at Rogers Hospital; Michelle Owczarski – voice actor/video editing+production. And, naturally, I was there, too! 🙂
The event went GREAT; everyone got a chance to introduce themselves and their business, helping to increase the odds that everyone would have good networking. Many people expressed an interest in creating an online forum for MKE’s creatives and for making the MKE Creatives’ meet-up a regular occurrence!
