CAN Local councils

CAN local brand

How our digital expertise can support your High Street recovery

We want to help UK councils in their support for local SMEs during the COVID-19 pandemic and beyond.

While High Street businesses are relying on increased sales to get back on their feet, your help as a council will make all the difference.

At CAN, we are offering councils free advertising technology and our marketing and sales expertise to promote your local SMEs and boost your High Street Recovery Plan.

Our CAN Local service will provide you with a very visible and practical way to support your local businesses to survive and thrive.

You have readymade marketing opportunities to help SMEs

People rediscovered their local High Streets during lockdown – and the powerful pull of the place they live in. Residents want to support their local businesses going forward, especially those who went the extra mile to help their communities.

The local council is one of the biggest media owners in its area and in a position to give SMEs access to prime space in which to advertise.

Local businesses could reach thousands of customers each month on your council website. And you can give them free access using the advertising tech we developed especially for the public sector. It is the ad tech that is behind our successful Council Advertising Network which has been earning income to support council services for a number of years.

Giving your SMEs ad space on your council website would provide them with a safe, clutter-free, and trusted environment in which to promote their products and services.

Local businesses need to be online for the digital future

SMEs often lack the knowledge and confidence to make sensible choices for how to market themselves online. They may have already been stung being sold unsuitable media. They might have relied solely on local print newspapers in the past.

The CAN Local service includes giving digital marketing advice to your SMEs so they spend their marketing budgets wisely in an environment appropriate for them.

This might mean signposting smaller neighbourhood concerns to localised Google and Facebook advertising to ensure they are visible online, as well as recommending the council website to those suitable.

How CAN Local will work for your council

We take the load off you, so you don’t have to use in-house resources to market local businesses, but can still demonstrate very visibly how you are backing your SMEs. We will:

  • Provide free ad tech for your website to enable you to host local ads (unless you are already on our Council Advertising Network, in which case you already have the necessary tech!).
  • Create an online form through which businesses contact us directly for free support to advertise online. And then advise your SMEs on the right digital marketing channels for their business – including the free ad space on your council website.
  • Help suitable local SMEs to get advertising campaigns up and running on your council website. The council’s print, social media and email publications could also be used to help advertise SMEs for free if you wish.
  • Provide marketing collateral so the council’s communications team can promote these ad opportunities to local businesses.
  • Report on how each local business advertising campaign is going via a dashboard they can access online, updated weekly.
  • Review CAN Local performance every three months to check it meets your council priorities.

Fill in our contact form with your details now and we’ll get in touch for a chat.

CAN Local advertising is also available to local businesses on an individual, paid-for basis. Businesses can place adverts on their local council website by filling in a self-service form.