Ohio University Southern Workforce Success hosted three marketing strategy workshops for small businesses in Southeast Ohio and the tri-state area.
The Workforce Success is a new focus for the OU Southern campus with the goal of providing workforce trainings and custom programs fixated on strengthening existing workforce skills, providing education and training for the future workforce, and supporting community development initiatives that impact workforce development.
Sarah Diamond Burroway, director of external relations, said the Workforce Initiative conducted the workshops in late September that targeted businesses with 50 or fewer employees.
The workshops focused on marketing, and showed participating business owners and entrepreneurs how to take a story-driven approach to their businesses, which gives local businesses a lot of strength, Burroway said.
The workshops, two held at OU Southern and one held at Shawnee State University, had costs covered by a USDA Rural Business Development grant, making it free for all attendants, Burroway said. The workshops were all led by representatives of Rebel Pilgrim Creative Agency of Cincinnati.
Angie Duduit, director of Workforce Development and Entrepreneurship at SSU, said Shawnee State was one of the locations that was included in the grant since it was one of the places training would be conducted.
“[The workshop] was a great opportunity for us,” Duduit said. “It was a high quality workshop by seasoned professionals who were able to provide their wealth of experience to locals in our area who are starting their own business, who want to learn how to tell their own story better and how to market their story, and who wants to tell others about what they do in their business.”
Rebel Pilgrim Creative Agency focuses on using the story of a business as a powerful and effective tool in marketing. Its involvement drew entrepreneurs to the workshop.
Gina Collinsworth, an entrepreneur and a cultural content creator developing a brand for the Appalachian Community, was one of around 50 small business owners and entrepreneurs who participated in the workshop.
Collinsworth said that she liked the idea and concept presented by Rebel Pilgrim Creative Agency that “your consumer is your hero.” The concept is to have business owners create content with the audience in mind and make it about the consumer, not the business.
“We wanted to attend because the company that was presenting, Rebel Pilgrim Creative Agency, is very innovative, and I thought I would be able to learn new things from them,” Collinsworth said.
