If you’re like us, you love the Thornton Park District. But, with so many other communities and marketing noise in the Orlando area, how do you own your Thornton Park small business marketing?

Let’s take a second and just respect that you know you’re in a local community (like us), and you’re totally loving it (like us!) But, when it comes to your marketing, it’s not only about ‘what you do to promote yourself’ BUT it’s also about ‘what you CAN do to promote yourself.’

Here is what we do and what you can do to help your Thornton Park small business marketing thrive.

O N E: Join the Thornton Park District

The Thornton Park District (TPD) allows you to join them for a small fee. You can also join one of their boards too to give back and help them plan one of their awesome events.

But, if you’re not in the TPD, what else can you do? Lucky for you, Orlando is full of local communities. Here are the communities around the area:

• Mills 50 District
• Downtown Orlando District
• Milk District
• College Park
• Audubon Park
• Ivanhoe Village

Not only are these amazing communities within themselves, they all (or most of them) allow you to get involved, join and to volunteer by reaching out to a director. Not only that, but they’ll put you on their website too! This is an added bonus for SEO purposes and general exposure. Here’s what ours looks like on the TPD website:

T W O: Get involved

But how? What does this mean? Does this mean you can go home after work? No, you can’t go home after work night after night and not meet people. We try to scope out a local event at least once per month to meet people and to get out in the community. Some of the events we like are below:

• The Downtown Orlando Partnership’s Third Thursday Happy Hour
• The Thornton Park District’s Art & Wine Walk
• First Thursdays at the OMA
• Orlando Tech & Beer

Besides the ones above, the districts of Orlando host their own events. Here’s a snapshot of what the events look like on the TPD website for your Thornton Park small business marketing:

These events are just a couple of examples of ones we try to make it to at least once a quarter. Remember, do what you can. Don’t try to over-do it. Getting involved allows you to meet other locals and helps you get your company and its name out in the community.

T H R E E: Collaborate

One thing we’ve been trying to work on is collaboration. It’s amazing when two (or more) businesses get together and work on a common purpose. Since you’re within the realm of a district (if you decide to join) reach out to the local businesses to see if they’re open to pairing with you on project or upcoming events.

Here’s an example:

If you’re a yoga studio and there’s a juice bar within your new district, you can reach out to them to see if they’d be interested in speaking with your clients after classes about the pros of adding freshly squeezed juice to their diet. Another way is to offer people who are members an initial discount.

F O U R: Set Up A Booth

Depending on your business, setting up a booth could help your Thornton Park small business marketing a lot. If you’re a product based company, this could be great exposure to get you out in the local community.

A bonus too, the TPD offers a booth at their Art and Wine Walk! They do require you to provide wine or an adult beverage, BUT it’s a great opportunity to get out in the community with a table and have people come up to you.

Another thing you can do to make your table that much better is to do a giveaway. People love free stuff! If you’re a chiropractor, you can offer a free chair massage or adjustment for the winner. If you’re a candle maker, you can offer a free candle of someone’s choice. People then give you their name and email, and you just increased your email list in one night!

F I V E: Use The District To Help You

Not only do you want to give back to the district, you want the district to give back to you and, from what we’ve found, they’ll be over the moon to do this! So how do you start? A couple of ways. Reach out to them and ask the district to share your event on their social pages.

On the TPD Facebook page, they have over 20,000 followers! Now, we all know your post won’t reach all of those, but hey, a couple thousand additional eyeballs is worth it!

The TPD actively shares events that people are doing within their district, sometimes, without even having to be asked (which is the best!) They start following you and if they vibe with something they share it automatically – hello! This in itself is worth it! When we had our initial birthday bash last year, they helped us by promoting it multiple times and giving shout-outs too.

They also list all of their events on their Facebook page which makes it easy for you to share them too:

All in all, if you don’t know if you’re in a community, now’s the time to look because by joining one it could immensely help your small business marketing tactics and exposure.

If you are part of a community, consider how it could help your Thornton Park small business marketing and help your company grow! We look forward to seeing you at future events!

Need help with your marketing? Let’s chat!