What is smaller Indiana – in 15 words or less?

Posted by Amy Stark on June 21, 2008 at 4:36pm in About Smaller Indiana

A few weeks ago Pat Coyle requested Smoosiers to submit an “elevator pitch” for Smaller Indiana. After staffing the Smaller Indiana Table for the Indy-volved event, I know first-hand why Pat was vexed. It became a challenge for me to answer the simple question, “So what is Smaller Indiana?”Aware that a person’s attention span rarely goes beyond 15 words at these events, it took me a while to fine tune a phrase to describe Smaller Indiana. Here are a few of the ones I tried that did NOT work:

1. Smaller Indiana is a virtual social networking platform used to build community and spark conversation — invariably this synopsis met with blank stares so I tried…

2. A collaborative public sphere to share ideas and information to build a stronger Indiana— more blank stares, so I tried a different tack…

3. It is a combination of TED and Linked IN — to my surprise there were only a handful who knew about Linked In, and no one knew about TED! For over a year now I have been a TED addict. I thought everybody knew about TED Talks!

The short phrase that seemed to work best:
A Facebook for Indiana professionals who share and collaborate on ideas and exchange information– this phrase was met with the “aha” look I was hoping to achieve–an expression that meant, “Ok, I get it,” rather than, “I have no clue what you are talking about.”

Even though this 14 word phrase seemed to work, is it the best representation of Smaller Indiana? Did I get it wrong? In 15 words or less what would your response be to the question, “So what is Smaller Indiana?”