My Meetup Misadventures (Part 3)
Posted by Mark on October 22, 2018 at 06:23 | Last modified: January 16, 2019 15:50I wrote last time about the Meetup that never was. Today I want to talk about a couple other [failed] attempts.
Ann Arbor Algos was a Meetup I [successfully] posted in 2012 that garnered too little interest for a first meeting. The inclusion criteria I specified were very stringent. I wanted potential members to purchase AmiBroker and data. I wanted potential members to have experience programming in AmiBroker or be willing to spend the time learning how. I wanted potential members to have trading strategies available for testing. If all this weren’t enough, I wanted potential members to have time every day for project-related phone calls and e-mails.
If this were a posting for a full-time paid position, then I might [or might not] find applicants in the local area who met stated criteria. Looking back, I now think this was too extreme as a Meetup for people to do in their spare time.
That’s not to say I learned my lesson, though, as evidenced by a December 2014 contact. Through networking, I heard a particular IBD group included a number of options traders. I sent the following introductory message to the organizer:
> Options trading is what I do exclusively and I’m interested
> in networking with other traders. I want to trade stock options
> in my IRA and whether they be cash secured puts, covered calls,
> credit spreads, or long diagonals, IBD could be of use to
> select good stocks. However, the focus of my trading will never
> be just trading stocks. I’ve been to some IBD meetups before
> and really haven’t gotten much out of them because the focus
> is on stocks. Do you think there’s opportunity with this group
> or do you know if the group has serious options traders who
> would be interested in meeting separately to discuss the
> options piece? Thanks!
Reading this in retrospect, I don’t like the fact that I knocked stocks (i.e. “the focus… will never be just trading stocks”) or IBD meetups (i.e. “haven’t gotten much out of them”) to a guy who didn’t even know me. Nevertheless, he did respond:
> We have held several introductory options sessions after our
> IBD meetup. We do have 3-4 serious options traders that use
> IBD and the meeting to get on the right stocks. One member was
> an options floor trader for years on the CBOE.
>
> Our room costs $60 a night. If we could get interest from 8 or
> so to attend we could spin off of our IBD lease and keep the
> rate around $10 a person.
>
> I will float the idea at our January meet up and see if there
> is enough interest. We might start with an every-other month
> meeting. I would not associate this with IBD in any way. Let
> me know your thoughts.
I will continue next time.