My Kailua

108,000 followers on Facebook and 87,700 on Instagram

Daniel Casler says he created My Kailua first as a Facebook page to reconnect with the community he grew up in after moving to California and touring the world with his rock ’n’ roll band, Pennywise. Casler visited Hawai‘i frequently during that whirlwind chapter of his life before eventually settling down on O‘ahu.

“I think Kailua is such a magical place. Growing up, being in waterfalls and rivers and surfing and paddling out to the Mokes, and just having that life was like, ‘God, I wish everybody could experience that,’ you know?” Casler says. So, he created an account dedicated to the east side of O‘ahu, which he considers everything from Kahuku to Hawai‘i Kai.

“Sometimes I post stuff that’s outside of the community if I think it’s important because it brings awareness to a situation, but I try and really focus on Kailua and the Windward Side,” says Casler.

Casler says he used to run free advertisements on his page, but that ended when the pandemic led to the demise of the Pacific Ink & Art Expo, one of his moneymaking ventures. After the expo was cancelled, he says “local businesses started coming to me and being like, ‘Hey, you really helped my business through the years. … I saw that your business is shut down, and I really want to help you.’ ”

Casler says he didn’t want to accept money at first, but reluctantly agreed after his wife told him “they’re blessing you, and you bless them.” And once he received his first $500 for helping a company with its own social media – he used the money to support his two newborn babies – he recognized that the community was willing to pay for social media help.

He and his wife now help other businesses with social media, marketing and even responding to Google and Yelp reviews. They charge based on what the business needs help with.

“It can be very simple, or it can be way more involved,” Casler says. “That’s where I’ve kind of grown into, I don’t want to call it an agency, but me and my wife have grown and understood how to work this social media thing and so it’s enabled us to be a proxy of these businesses and help them run their business.”

One of their clients, Ali‘i Animal Hospital, started with one location and, since working with Casler, has added five more locations, with further expansion expected. “That’s what social media can do,” he says. “When you work with the right people – not saying we are – but if you work with the right people that can really get your message out there to the demographic that you’re trying to reach, you can have a lot of success with that.”

Like hhhnewz and 808 Viral, My Kailua mostly posts items sent in from the community, along with original and promotional content. Although their feeds are comparable, they each have their own flare – hhhnewz posts more graphic content and 808 Viral more comedy, while My Kailua posts a lot of scenic photos and videos.

“Over the years, it became a very powerful networking and news sharing site,” says Casler. And he says it’s led him to connect with leaders in the community, including some of the state’s highest officials. “Next thing you know, I’m sitting with the governor and the mayor, and we’re talking about what we can do with policy,” he says.

Politicians aren’t the only ones who see the benefit of connecting with local news content curators. “It’s also attractive to law enforcement, because they’re like, ‘Hey, you’re getting information that way. So how do we partner?’ ” says Casler, who adds that he often meets with law enforcement officials behind the scenes. “It’s a part of My Kailua that nobody really knows about.”

Casler says My Kailua “changed my life because it gave me a perspective, to see different sides of my community that I didn’t know existed, to meet different individuals I would have never met. Like, I’m just a regular guy, but now I’m sitting with different organizations of the government. I’m sitting with the mayor and the governor and then I’m meeting like the historic families of my town that I would have never met before.”