• Survey
  • Book Becky to speak
  • The book: Small Town Rules
  • Shop Local video
  • SaveYour.Town

Small Biz Survival

The small town and rural business resource

A row of small town shops
  • Front Page
  • Latest stories
  • About
  • Guided Tour
  • Subscribe
  • Privacy Policy
  • Contact
  • RSS

Rethinking local event calendars

By Becky McCray

Event scheduleWhen I checked into the Crystal Mountain Resort in Michigan, the desk staff person handed me a paper copy of the events and activities calendar for the week. That’s a tourism idea that has been around forever, and we can make something more of it.

First, let’s adapt it for a small town. 
Don’t think only of your big festivals and events, like the car show or craft fair. List activities of all kinds, especially your “insider” events. Your visitors from big towns would love to sit in your small town gym and cheer at the high school basketball game, or bid on cool junk at your country auctions, or watch movies without fighting a crowd at your local theatre.

Don’t think you have enough events? Cooperate with neighboring towns to add their events to yours.

Fill in empty spaces with “anytime” activities. Think about the experiences that make your small town special, like enjoying the walking trail, touring the historic neighborhood, playing at the playground, or laying out and watching the stars in the park at night.

And don’t get caught up in the pretty design in the example. Do a simple plain text listing instead. It fits your small town image better and takes much less work. Put your effort into the descriptions, so people can imagine the experience just from your words.

Second, let’s take it online.
How can you get this calendar into the hands of visitors and potential visitors? Of course you will hand out paper copies all around town: at the motels, the cafes, the gas stations. But you’ll also use some modern tools to share it online:

  • Post it on your local blog, and let the magic of RSS deliver it to interested readers every week. 
  • Set up email subscriptions to your blog through FeedBurner or FeedBlitz. 
  • Email your key influencers to invite them to subscribe: the regional and state tourism staff, regional reporters, your elected officials and legislators, local bloggers, and those same businesses you gave paper copies to.
  • Post it on your Facebook page (set it up to pick up the RSS feed automatically).
  • Set up a local Twitter account to share one-line event notices.
  • Call Utterli, and record the list in audio, shareable online. 
  • Show local bloggers how to use the RSS feed in a widget on their blog that will stay constantly up to date with local events.
  • List all these outposts (Facebook, Twitter, Utterli) on your main web page, so visitors can choose the method they prefer to get updates. 

Third, let’s add your ideas.

What ideas can you add? Do you have examples? Where did I get it wrong? Let me know in the comments.

This article is part of Tourism Tuesday, a series of posts for tourism businesses and associations in small towns and rural areas. If you have questions you’d like us to address in this series, leave a comment or send us an email at becky@smallbizsurvival.com. This is a community project!

  • About the Author
  • Latest Posts

About Becky McCray

Becky started Small Biz Survival in 2006 to share rural business and community building stories and ideas with other small town business people. She and her husband have a small cattle ranch and are lifelong entrepreneurs. Becky is an international speaker on small business and rural topics.
  • Downtown is your town’s core: How to make your case - February 22, 2021
  • Zoom Towns: attracting and supporting remote workers in rural small towns - December 10, 2020
  • In an economic crisis, spend your brainpower before your dollars - November 25, 2020
  • Video: How to fill empty car dealership buildings for the holidays - November 6, 2020
  • How has 2020 changed the challenges rural small towns face? Tell us here - October 20, 2020
  • The Idea Friendly Method to surviving a business crisis - October 6, 2020
  • Join me for the Rural Renewal Symposium online Oct 13 - September 26, 2020
  • Cheap placemaking idea: instant murals - September 11, 2020
  • Refilling the rural business pipeline - July 7, 2020
  • Huge vacant buildings: grants to renovate? - June 9, 2020

July 21, 2009 Filed Under: marketing, rural, tourism

Wondering what is and is not allowed in the comments?
Or how to get a nifty photo beside your name?
Check our commenting policy.
Use your real name, not a business name.


Don't see the comment form?
Comments are automatically closed on older posts, but you can send me your comment via this contact form and I'll add it manually for you. Thanks!

Comments

  1. Deb Brown says

    July 21, 2009 at 1:36 pm

    Wow Becky – great ideas! I already do an online calendar for my community at http://www.readhampton.com — now I’m going to send a press release to local and state reporters and get them to sign up for the email newsletter!
    @debworks

  2. Becky McCray says

    July 21, 2009 at 1:44 pm

    Deb, great! They need to know about you. :)

  3. Bobbie Stacey says

    July 21, 2009 at 2:25 pm

    I just forwarded this post to our local economic development organizations with a recommendation for your website. The beauty of this suggestion is in how simple it would be to implement.

  4. Rachel Euretig says

    July 21, 2009 at 2:50 pm

    Thanks for sharing these great tips, Becky! Our next Young Entrepreneur Cram Session (Aug 12) will focus on leveraging local so looking forward to the additional suggestions from your readers as well. Hope you all will be able to join us – we’ll post details soon at http://smallbusinessunitedblog.com.

  5. Becky McCray says

    July 21, 2009 at 6:26 pm

    Bobbie, thanks for passing our ideas along. I love reaching new folks.

    Rachel, thanks for sharing that link. We’ll be watching.

  6. Ken Burgin says

    July 22, 2009 at 1:54 am

    Good ideas – by creating a Google Calendar it gives events extra prominence and it can be embedded on a website or blog, with others contributing.

    Upcoming.org also excellent for getting attention…

  7. Sheila Scarborough says

    July 22, 2009 at 2:34 am

    Hi Becky,

    You are so right about local events; in Jamesport, Missouri I found out about the local weekly Amish produce auction and went to check it out. The experience added immeasurably to our stay there and became the lead for a Jamesport travel article that I wrote for the “Dallas Morning News.”

  8. Becky McCray says

    July 22, 2009 at 3:31 am

    Ken, Google Calendar and Upcoming are great ideas! Thanks for adding them.

    Sheila, experience is where it’s at! Like you and I talked about tonight, we don’t realize how many cool experiences we have to offer.

  9. Kevin says

    July 23, 2009 at 12:10 pm

    I am starting to use QR codes on business cards, posters, etc. to get folks to connect to my website with the camera in the pda’s.
    (neomedia has a reliable app and you can easily create codes, then integrate into your press materials and the like… works great on my bb!)

    a bit novel now, but when people see how they can instantly view examples of my work online when I meet them wherever, they are immediately impressed.

    developing a campaign linking codes to fact pages, videos and recreations for a historical site locally… can’t wait for the results!

    cool stuff so far.

    nice article!

  10. Chris Marsden says

    July 23, 2009 at 5:34 pm

    I think setting up your online listings with a short easy mobile version would be a huge plus. How great to hand out just a postcard or business card (maybe with a QR code as well) and they can get the whole list, sortable by tag, straight on their phone. As more people have mobile web enabled phones, this could be huge

  11. Becky McCray says

    July 23, 2009 at 11:03 pm

    Kevin and Chris, thank you for adding useful mobile ideas to this discussion! Excellent!

  12. Sandra Sims says

    July 30, 2009 at 12:25 am

    One advantage of Google Calendar is that it’s very easy to use. You can have multiple people adding/editing the calendar and as soon as they make the change it’s live. No need to wait on a “webmaster” anymore!

    Our church uses it and it’s working out very well: http://fumcwf.org/calendar

  13. Becky McCray says

    July 30, 2009 at 12:59 am

    Sandra, that is a terrific example. Thank you for sharing your real-world experience!

  14. Becky McCray says

    July 30, 2009 at 1:09 am

    Now I’ve been thinking about using Google Calendar for tourism promotion. It would still be useful to do a weekly summary as a blog post, which becomes and email and RSS item automatically, I think.

Howdy!

Glad you dropped in to the rural and small town business blog, established in 2006.

We want you to feel at home, so please take our guided tour.

Meet our authors on the About page.

Have something to say? You can give us a holler on the contact form.

If you would like permission to re-use an article you've read here, please make a Reprint Request.

Want to search our past articles? Catch up with the latest stories? Browse through the categories? All the good stuff is on the Front Page.

Shop Local

Buy local buttonReady to set up a shop local campaign in your small town? You'll need a guide who understands how we're different and what really works: Shop Local Campaigns for Small Towns.

Best of Small Biz Survival

What is holding us back? Why does every project take so long in small towns?

How any business can be part of downtown events by going mobile

Concert-goers talking and enjoying the evening in downtown Webster City, Iowa.

Why do people say there’s nothing to do here then not come to our concerts?

Retailers: Fill all empty space, floor to ceiling

More of the best of Small Biz Survival

Copyright © 2021 Becky McCray
Front Page · Log in