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Small businesses can partner with other small businesses for mutual benefit. Two or more businesses coming together can create more attention and excitement than either one acting alone.
All kinds of excuses can be used to put together an informal partnering. Hold workshops and seminars, informational meetings, networking events, or sponsor events that raise funds for a good cause. Partnering ahead is NOT about holding a sale or setting up a town-wide event.
Getting together with one or two other businesses to hold an event helps promote and grow each of them.
Example: A health foods store partners with a nutritionist. Monthly sessions are announced, the event is posted on Facebook and other social media, a news release is sent to local papers, and store customers are reminded of the upcoming events. The sessions are popular and draw new customers to the store and new clients to the nutritionist.
Example: A bicycle shop partners with a fitness operation to hold Saturday morning riding sessions. They meet in the parking lot of a local restaurant. The charge is $5 per rider with all the money going to a local charity. This event attracts new people to all three businesses--the bicycle shop, the fitness operation and the restaurant.
Example: A potter and a florist put together a workshop. Attendees can learn hands-on how to throw a pot on the potter's wheel and learn how to make flower arrangements and take care of house plants. The workshop, held in the pottery studio, attracts more people that either business acting alone. And the pictures on Facebook attract even more attention.
Partnering to hold events helps to expand the participating businesses. Partnering puts a fresh face on what you do, and it offers opportunities to post pictures--before and after the event--on social media. This attracts even more attention.
Partnering with other businesses is a way of getting ahead, planning for growth, attracting a wider base of customers/clients.
