The Beyond Open team, made up of staff and external consultants, proudly supported Foundation For The Carolinas (FFTC) in its mission to disperse $15M in grant awards over three rounds ($5M each round) to small business owners, including diverse owned, and select nonprofit leaders between 2022 and 2024 to help them to acquire capital assets needed to build wealth.
The grant dollars were made available from an investment from Wells Fargo’s Open For Business Fund. In addition to dispersing grant funding, FFTC sought to change the narrative about business ownership and pathways to wealth creation with a focus on historically underserved communities known as the “Corridors of Opportunity” and diverse (minorities, women, veterans, and individuals with disabilities) small business owners in Charlotte. The Foundation was in need of an integrated marketing communications campaign that would raise awareness, inspire action and ensure the successful distribution of available funds. Approximately $1M was allotted to hiring a team of consultants, led by Tracy Russ, and implementing a campaign for this opportunity.
The success of our campaign would be highly dependent on our ability to engage our diverse stakeholders and to include them in an investment opportunity that they may not have experienced before (63% of those surveyed in the first round had not applied for a competitive grant before.)
We had a few challenges to overcome:
With six weeks to launch the campaign before the first application deadline, we launched an aggressive campaign with a kick-off press event to capture the attention of many.
Round one outreach and communications yielded three times the number of anticipated applications, far exceeding the available $5M in funding. The program refined its focus by shifting eligibility from preferring to requiring businesses to be located in a Corridor. We needed to adjust communications to convey and reach the more targeted community.
The targeted audience was diverse in industries and backgrounds. To reach everyone, we created print and digital materials in English, Spanish and Vietnamese–primary languages spoken in the community. This required multiple rounds of edits to ensure final materials were relatable upon translation. It also required design adjustments for each flyer, poster and advertisement. We included media engagement with African-American, Spanish-speaking, LGBTQ+, Asian, alternative and mainstream publications.
With an advisory council and research, our strategies and tactics included:
Create a brand design that is captivating and includes people who reflect targeted stakeholders.
· Develop print and digital branded marketing materials (logo, banners, wayfinding signage, flyers, booklets, t-shirts, website and social media posts) that are vibrant, diverse and multilingual.
Appeal to existing business owners by sharing information, visuals and program details through a variety of mediums with a creative element.
· Distribute press releases to announce the launch, support and key dates for each grantmaking round, and each round's deadline.
· Produce “Grantee Stories” videos as 30 sec. vertical for social media and 2–3 min. horizontal for the website.
· Create a social media calendar with milestones and stories throughout the grant cycle.
· Design and place advertisements across diverse radio stations, print, digital, and social media platforms. Same messages with varying images to reflect audiences. ($45,000 budget)
· Collaborate with 50 organizations to share flyers and join meetings.
· Plan and host six in-person (one per Corridor) and six virtual Beyond Open Application Information Sessions for potential applicants. Hold in locations and/or in partnership with existing small business groups, neighborhood business associations, and small businesses who are trusted by business owners. Incorporate a spoken word artist to present a motivating poem. Include bilingual team members for support. Record and upload virtual events to the Beyond Open YouTube account and website.
·Share Info Session presentation and ask community partner organizations to host their own and provide technical assistance to business owners.
Communicate the grant opportunity to business owners within or near a Corridor of Opportunity.
· Weekly media pitches on the program’s intentions, deadlines and impact.
· Attend meetings and trainings hosted by Small Business Development organizations, small business groups, and community gatherings/events.
· Create and coordinate outreach materials for the advisory council to share.
·Grassroots canvassing through door to door outreach; flyers in co-working centers, coffee shops, small businesses, and public spaces; e-flyers via nonprofit, business and civic group newsletters.
Objective 1: Through clear communications and strategic brand development, we built a new brand and a community of over 7,600 individuals who subscribed to receive program updates. Of the selected grantees, 91% identified as people of color, 57% as women-owned, 7% are veteran-owned, 8% identify as disabled-owned, and 9% identify as LGBTQ+-owned; 85% were located within a Corridor of Opportunity.
Objective 2: Using a variety of communication channels—email, social media, radio, TV, digital media, and community outreach—we reached thousands of potential applicants. The campaign resulted in 179,000 total and 121,000 unique website visits; 92 media stories with a reach of 656,983,825; 72% e-newsletters open rate; 550+ in-person event attendance and 1,600 Application Information Session video views; Facebook reach of 12,500; 25,500 3-second or longer views of Grantee Stories videos; Instagram reach of 6,100 with 8,500 video views; LinkedIn impression of 6,409 in 2024; 480,000+ advertisement impressions across radio, podcast, print and digital media platforms.
Objective 3: Through creative outreach efforts and collaboration with small business development organizations, we received over 4,000 applications and awarded $16.3 million to 402 small business owners, exceeding the initial commitment of $15M in grant funding.
The Beyond Open team of staff and consultants is proud to have contributed to this impactful initiative, providing small businesses with the financial tools to thrive and helping to reshape access to capital and wealth creation.
