>So I literally just finished my presentation where I “officially” launched the YES CU Community – the first social network created for a credit union conference. I’ve been working on it for months and it was great to share it with everyone.

This new community—called the YES CU Community— serves two purposes:

1. To encourage a lively discussion on the challenges of better serving young adults during and after the Summit.
2. Hands-on experience for credit union people to learn how social networking works, what these sites offer, and how their credit unions can create their own networks.

Josh Jones and I really wanted to bring another practical tool for attendees to the conference. The summit already has a blog year-round—the YES CU Blog: Serving 18-to-30s (which you are reading…). Social networking sites, such as MySpace and Facebook, are growing immensely and are a huge untapped market for credit unions reaching out to young adults.

The YES CU Community has all the basic social networking tools:

• Profiles
• “Friending” – ability to add friends
• “Chatter-wall” – Ability to write messages on other’s profiles
• Forums
• Blogs
• Groups (Marketing staff, CEOs, etc)
• Video & Photo Sharing

70% of young adults are on these sites – but many credit unions are not because they don’t know where to start and can’t get over the mystique. This ‘social networking sandbox’ will allow attendees to play around and get comfortable with the technology – all with the support of each other. I was actually impressed by how many attendees said that they have a personal MySpace or Facebook account. Only 2 or 3 said that their credit union has a presence. Many attendees said they don’t blog regularly, so I hope they leverage the blogging functionality in the new site for practice.

At the end of the session, I gave out my “homework” to do different activities in the network, such as setting up their profile, joining a group, adding a friend, and so on. I also pointed out that everyone who registers by 8 AM Wednesday morning is entered to win a brand-new 8GB Ipod Touch. That got everyone very excited.

The Yes CU Community is open to anyone associated with the credit union movement that is looking to network with others on better serving young adults. Simply request access by visiting the site and follow the prompts to sign up. You can click one of the badges on the right of the blog or visit:

http://www.yescucommunity.com/

For those of you who missed my presentation, here it is in all its ten-slide glory:

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