Dubai Cardano Meetup

The solution is to host meetups monthly in a public venue to leverage the Dubai Cardano community's social connections and drive awareness

I have personally organised and hosted over a dozen successful events in private venues for the last 14 years in Dubai, gathering some of the most influential people from diverse backgrounds and segments of the economic landscape.

[IMPACT]

By hosting engaging events that offer knowledge, content and opportunities to cross-pollinate, the Cardano Community in Dubai and the UAE as well, will have a chance to ramp up the awareness of Cardano as a fundamental building block of web3. The objective and impact of such events held monthly will be to allow people to ask questions, engage with other Cardano Community members. The events will have a short speech by select speakers,2-3 people speaking for 5 to 10minutes to offer their help in explaining crypto and blockchain and to help them overcome the knowledge gap.

The events will leverage the large number of venues that are seeking to drive traffic to them so getting the support of the hotels will be key, but essentially, this initiative is designed to act as a catalyst for what our Cardano is already doing and Dubai is known for which is a dynamic, socially dynamic population of locals and expats that are hungry for knowledge and opportunities.

By organising an event well, in a pleasant and attractive venue, supported by social media and word of mouth and offering the attendees the opportunities to learn from their peers in the community, the magic should then happen.

The essence of this initiative will be to offer a platform in a pleasant in-person format to allow the community to welcome newcomers and mingle centred around a content and knowledge rich theme offered by mentors and knowledgeable members.

Influencers in the region will be invited to participate and have the opportunity to grow their communities for a win-win opportunity.

This initiative should become a monthly fixture all year and the goal will be to have young team of volunteers, event organisers and social media pros manage it with the guidance of myself and other members of the Cardano Community.

The pandemic and certain restrictions remain a risk albeit a reduced one to having events.

The warm weather from June to October in Dubai will restrict us to indoor venues but the availability of large indoor venues should mitigate that risk.

Partnerships with hotel venues are key to ensure venues are available at low or no cost to attendees and even offering refreshments and bites at their cost when possible in return for the exposure.

[FEASIBILITY]

Host the second Cardano Meetup before in April prior to the disbursement of the funds support.

Setup Facebook, Instragram, Meetup and other social media groups to grow the current Whatsapp based group.

Define a strategy to make Dubai a hub of the global Cardano community.

Leverage the energy of young marketing and event interns who are seeking mentors and experience to reduce the cost of the initiative but also to allow funding to be used to fly in speakers and to host in more sophisticated venues.

For the first 4 monthly events:

Hire a part-time social media coordinator $300 a month ($1200 total)

Cost of the Meetups and other group memberships $300 a month ($1200 total)

Organise the agenda and speakers $300 a month ($1200)

Travel to and from to select the venues $150 a month ($600 total)

Equipment rentals (audio-visuals) $200 ($800 total)

Karim Sahyoun - lead organizer

Nadim Karam - Cardano Team liason

Social Media Coordinator - TBC

Various event volunteers

[AUDITABILITY]

Attendance of non-Cardano attendees

Mail list growth of community

Social Media buzz and engagement prior to and after the events

Attendance of current Cardano community members

Catalyst proposal submittals from Dubai

A growing Cardano community that is engaged in building on Cardano.

A growing developer and technical community that wish to build on Cardano.

A waiting list of attendees to the next event because of limited spots.

Well organised and hosted events in beautiful and engaging venues.

A list of hotels that wish to host venues offering perks for attendees.

A growth of the Cardano Catalyst proposals being being birthed in Dubai and the UAE.

This is a new initiative but an extension on the work Nadim Karam and other active community members of the community have done to grow it so far.

I have personally brought over 20 family members and friends to join and invest in Cardano including members of other groups that I am active in.