You may have just opened your store or have been serving your community for years. Either way, you can involve your brand with the community in a new or maybe an unexpected way.

If you can involve your store with the people who live in your service area, you will create word of mouth, positive feelings, activity, free PR, and excitement, all of which will help grow your sales and add to the bottom line!

There are all the usual ways stores try to create excitement and more store to customer interactions. If you already are instituting some of these, great! Maybe there are some ways to increase their effectiveness.

Sponsoring a local youth sports team is a great way to get your logo out in public at a low cost, plus it helps the community! Maybe it’s a team that is not the one you first think of. If you approach a team that has challenges getting sponsors, those parents may tend to be more supportive of your store. The usual teams that get sponsored may take it for granted and might not make the effort to support your store as much as the less sponsored team.

Investigate offering an educational craft in a facility that has groups of people. For example, how to build a bird house in elementary school, a senior center or a church group meeting. Bring a coupon for bird feed as an extra reason for them to get to your store after the activity.

Join a community business group, or networking group. They are everywhere. It’s a great use of your time to build relationships with other professionals in your area. You can always learn something new, and maybe you can help others!

Do a special “day” or “weekend” at your store regularly. Try to target through your advertising and your social media activity, groups who might not automatically think of you when they need to purchase. Maybe during your themed event, bring in a community group with info about what they do, a local artist, a representative of the local adult continuing education program. Someone or something that goes along with the theme of your weekend that your customers didn’t know they needed to interact with. It doesn’t always have to be about a sale or a discount.

There are so many ways to make your brand presence larger in your community. Not only will it benefit you and your business, but it will benefit your community too!