In early 2008, Nate Mook and I, Localist's founders, were in Los Angeles at a conference. After the day's sessions, we wanted to go out to a cool bar in town. At the time, there wasn't a way to see where the truly great places were, and equally important, where everyone else at the conference was planning to go. Localist was born from this problem.
Localist started as a destination site, serving as a resource for people in cities to discover all the events that were happening, and who was going, in real-time. Despite huge interest from audiences in our launch cities, creating and curating content was an ongoing challenge. We built powerful tools for automatically gathering and displaying event information, but missing just a single event meant our audience wasn't getting everything.
In 2009 we decided to offer Localist as a tool for businesses to promote their own events. Our customers don't have a content creation problem; they know what events they'd like to publish, but they don't have the time or resources to build a robust social calendar to efficiently manage events in the same way they manage other content.
Our mission is simple: we want to be the best way for our customers to connect their audience to events. We're dedicated to staying ahead of the curve, relentlessly innovating and challenging what's expected from a calendar. The result is the most powerful, flexible online calendar available, which is why organizations all over the world choose Localist to help them share events in a way their audience wants.
We've had an exciting journey so far; we'll continue to let our core principles drive where we go next.
Mykel Nahorniak, CEO
Myke develops and evolves the strategy of Localist as a product and company. His past experience includes serving as Chief Creative Officer at Betanews, managing media projects at The Baltimore Sun, and leading Web development teams at media companies, non-profits and PR firms.
Nate advises on the direction of Localist. He's a proven Internet entrepreneur, with successes including BetaNews, a technology news website, and PowerArchiver, an award-winning archiving utility. Nate also works with TED, helping give a voice to distressed communities around the world.
With strong expertise in Ruby on Rails, testing, optimization, and new web technologies, Eric has a hand in all facets of Localist. Eric has a BS in Computer Science from Grand Valley State University. Previously, he served as Head Systems Engineer at BetaNews.
Michael and his team at Right Source Marketing have been working with Localist since February, 2012. Michael leads efforts in sharing the uniqueness of Localist across a variety of channels. Michael's past successes include serving as CEO at Velaro, a live help product, and as President at TruePresence, an Internet marketing firm.
Will joined Localist in December, 2011. He is responsible for helping universities identify their challenges and communicating ways to address them with Localist. Will graduated with a BS in business, advertising and communications from West Virginia University.
Tom joined our growing sales team at Localist in June, 2012. He is a 2010 graduate of Salisbury University and a lifetime ‘Baltimorian, hon'. When he's not in the office driving business development or leading webinars, he's out running, exploring the city by bike, or hanging out with friends.
Tom advises on business development efforts in the media industry. Previously, he worked as a reporter and editor at various newspapers for more than 20 years, and spent the last 10 in the interactive division of Tribune Co. as general manager, and finally vice president of interactive content. He's currently the Publisher at PBS.org.
Jerry advises on company strategy and direction. He is an accomplished entrepreneur, having founded and run an instructional video company for thirty years. He served as chairman of the Washington, DC metro-area Vistage group and advises CEOs at dozens of technology companies.
Mark advises on financial strategy and planning. He has decades of experience starting companies and serving as Chief Financial Officer for organizations. He is currently the CFO at a high-frequency trading firm in New York City.
| Admin Task | Time Spent Per Week |
|---|---|
| Editing Events | 35 minutes |
| Reviewing Events | 10 minutes |
| Managing Places | 5 minutes |
| Managing Users | 2 minutes |
| Managing Newsletters | 3 minutes |
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Talk to a Localist team member to find out how Localist can work for you.