Small businesses are the lifeblood of the community. Even though APTCO is a national company, many of our clients are primarily focused on building and maintaining business in their local area. It’s safe to say that the pandemic has impacted small businesses more than large ones, and most small businesses are local. So we were very interested in this story from a colleague about a promotional program that helped a broad spectrum of local businesses. The promotion actually had the feel of a fun game.

Keep It Local was started to spread positivity, raise awareness for the small businesses throughout the community, and just encourage everyone to spend their dollars locally whenever possible. An informal partnership was formed with a local credit union, who loved the initiative enough to spread awareness about it. It started with yard signs and included a prominent billboard. Small business kits were created that had stickers to put on every package sold by a local business. There were postcards in it, there were display signs people could put on their counters, and posters for store windows, along with the yard signs.

At the beginning, the intention was just to have the yard signs at businesses, but with so many people out taking walks in residential neighborhoods, and a lot of these being high-traffic areas, the yard signs soon expanded to houses. The campaign included a big presence on social media, too, to create the awareness. “Proud Small Business Owner” signs were emailed it out to a large mailing list, with the help of the sponsor. Everyone was encouraged to take pictures of these signs wherever they might see them, but especially on the premises of local businesses. The final component of this program was through Instagram, a weekly “I-Spy” game. The reward for going out and finding the Keep It Local sign, and posting it, was a chance for a gift certificate for that business. This was especially helpful to promote businesses that don’t necessarily have the retail traffic, but need to create that visibility and awareness. The game has seen a few variations, to keep the local audience interested. In one version, envelopes that say “prize winner” and contain the gift certificate are hidden. Clues are hidden online. Whoever finds it first gets the gift certificate.

As the pandemic continues, and small businesses struggle while Amazon thrives, we believe there are many communities that could benefit from a program such as this. Can we help to build one for you?