Ideally as a merchant you belong to an organization — like a chamber, local merchant’s association or Main Street group — that helps bring customers in by running shop local campaigns throughout the year. Those types of programs help, so do the contests and incentives they usually run in conjunction Read more
Gift cards are extremely convenient but they’re not all the same. That’s obvious. There are gift cards for specific stores, restaurant gift cards, credit card gift cards that can be used anywhere, and gift cards to specific services that can be used at several locations nationwide. There’s also our personal favorite Read more
This Sunday kicks off National Small Business Week, an event of the US Small Business Administration. It’s held in order to bring attention and revenue to small businesses that make up the backbone of our communities through job creation and profitability. But it also encourages entrepreneurialism with its hashtag #DreamSmallBiz. If Read more
If you have a shop local program, or are thinking of starting one, you’ll quickly realize that marketing is one of the most important things you can do to ensure success. It’s also important that you employ all types of marketing including digital marketing, content marketing, event marketing, direct mail, Read more
We’ve talked about impediments to shop local and Main Street programs before. You can create a fabulous shop local campaign and local currency program, but if your community isn’t positioned for growth, you’ll be swimming upstream against hurricane tides. Does Your Community Have…. Ample parking. Visitors won’t come if Read more
This is not a dis on Quickbooks. It’s a great program, but if you are coordinating the printing of your local currency checks through it, you’re wasting your time. And who has any of that right now? If you use Quickbooks, the fastest way to create multiple checks is by Read more
Do you have a shop local program or campaign? What about local currency? If you have one, you should have the other. They go together like the Kardashians and bad jokes, or peas and carrots (if you’d prefer). Here’s why you need to make a local currency program part of your Read more
The trend in marketing towards personalization and giving your audience what they want, transcends just content. It needs to permeate your interactions with them. If you don’t take their preferences into account, there is always someone who will and when they do, it reflects poorly on your efforts no matter Read more
We talk quite often about the benefits of making your employees feel important and integral to your business’ success. It’s impossible to provide good customer service on behalf of a business if you feel undervalued by that company. Uninspired employees cost organizations money, customers, and employee moral. Ensuring your team Read more
If you have a local currency program, chances are there’s quite a bit of administrative processing you have to do. You have to: record each gift check sold verify its expiration date log when it’s spent reimburse your local merchants You also have to write-off the ones that have expired Read more
