Case Study | Cities of Newnan and Stockbridge, Georgia
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Cities of Newnan and Stockbridge
The Cities of Newnan and Stockbridge, GA hold annual Main Street events to help connect residents with local businesses and revitalize the economy in the historic downtown districts. Previously manually operated, the Economy Development team decided to digitize the citizen experience with a Mobile app.
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Support existing and welcome new local businesses by Increasing the public attendance in City Events by modernizing a digital experience for the community and visitors in the Cities of Newnan and Stockbridge, GA
For more than 40 years, the Main Street America program has strengthened communities through preservation-based economic development in older and historic downtowns and neighborhood commercial districts.
Since the cities of Newnan and Stockbridge, GA have joined Main Street America, they each managed their raffle-based prizes campaigns manually for frequent shoppers with the Stockbridge “Small Business Blitz” and Newnan “Downtown Restaurant Week”. They sent printed publications to citizens, specifying the businesses participating in the events and their promotions.
The shopping proof process for raffle participation was done manually by paper and stamps. With no digital software to track data, or updating changes of the participating businesses listings – the process was ineffective and led to unsatisfying event attendance and outcomes and waste of staff time and budget for paper and mailing expenses.
The cities were searching for a user-friendly digital solution that will allow people to quickly know about the event and comfortably navigate their way through the events, find information and quickly contact and visit participating businesses using nothing but their mobile devices.
The Cities Optimized Event Planning, sharing and participation with the Main Street Mobile App and Analytics Reports
The City of Stockbridge implemented a Main Street mobile app as an extension of the City app - It’sMyTown from ITsimple to help manage city events and news. After a successful “Small Business Blitz” event using the app implementation, the City of Newnan followed suit in technology adoption.
The Main Street mobile app is dedicated to both Stockbridge and Newnan’s Main Street events and allows residents and visitors to learn about the participating businesses and their offered promotions. The home page of the Main Street app shows an interactive map with a convenient full-screen option showing a numbered list of all businesses. Residents can easily see their distance from each business, select which business or restaurants they’d like to visit, can call the business directly and navigate to the location using their mobile phone map and navigation app with a tap of a button.
Clicking a business on the interactive map will provide details on special offerings by this business for the event, and a link to the business’s website. This feature provides a convenient tool for residents to plan their participation in the Main Street event.
To encourage resident participation, both the City of Stockbridge and the City of Newnan economy development departments offered a chance to win a prize pack of downtown restaurant gift cards and generous goodies baskets by submitting receipts from eligible purchases. This offer generated much traction to the events, and people uploaded dozens of receipts, directly from the Main Street mobile app.
ITsimple provides the cities with a dynamic analytics report, so that city staff can track the number of app users, predict event participation by tracking the app’s QR code usage, and plan and advertise accordingly. City staff also have online access to ITsimple’s customer portal for real-time updates of the listings and to the receipt uploads, where they know how many receipts were uploaded at any given time. They can also learn which businesses enjoyed higher popularity than others.
The Main Street events had considerably better turnout, and much of it, as Stockbridge and Newnan officials attest, was a result of this new technology.
Main Street event turnout was considerably higher than previous years, which city officials shared was mainly due to the Main Street application.
Event logistics automation and digitization saved time for city staff, resulting in more accurate event attendance and results tracking.
Reduction of paper and snail mail usage is greener and better for the environment.
Participants digitally uploaded receipts to the app to participate in the Main Street prize program, eliminating the need for manually stamp paper “passports” or submitting paper receipts.
Convenience for the citizen brings citizen satisfaction and participation.
Thinking out of the box, and adopting new technologies can lead to better outcomes, higher citizen satisfaction and greater efficiency.
Most citizen prefer mobile digital solutions to manual and paper.
Cities should adapt mobile-first digital solutions to better address the fact that everyone is on mobile.
ITsimple provided the solution and trained the designated staff in less than one month. Cities can expand the solution to an unlimited number of campaigns and use cases and even create interactive walking, biking or driving tours.
Any size cities with Economy Development departments and Convention Visitors Bureaus (CVB), Members of “Main Street America” or similar initiatives and cities with a high volume of visitors and tourists.
Mrs. Kira Harris, City of Stockbridge Main Street Manager
Mrs. Lisa Fareed, City of Stockbridge Main Street Coordinator
Mrs. Abigail Strickland, City of Newnan Main Street Manager
Mrs. Jesse Branch, City of Newnan Special Events Coordinator
Problem Addressed
Support existing and welcome new local businesses by Increasing the public attendance in City Events by modernizing a digital experience for the community and visitors in the Cities of Newnan and Stockbridge, GA
For more than 40 years, the Main Street America program has strengthened communities through preservation-based economic development in older and historic downtowns and neighborhood commercial districts.
Since the cities of Newnan and Stockbridge, GA have joined Main Street America, they each managed their raffle-based prizes campaigns manually for frequent shoppers with the Stockbridge “Small Business Blitz” and Newnan “Downtown Restaurant Week”. They sent printed publications to citizens, specifying the businesses participating in the events and their promotions.
The shopping proof process for raffle participation was done manually by paper and stamps. With no digital software to track data, or updating changes of the participating businesses listings – the process was ineffective and led to unsatisfying event attendance and outcomes and waste of staff time and budget for paper and mailing expenses.
The cities were searching for a user-friendly digital solution that will allow people to quickly know about the event and comfortably navigate their way through the events, find information and quickly contact and visit participating businesses using nothing but their mobile devices.
Solutions Used
The Cities Optimized Event Planning, sharing and participation with the Main Street Mobile App and Analytics Reports
The City of Stockbridge implemented a Main Street mobile app as an extension of the City app - It’sMyTown from ITsimple to help manage city events and news. After a successful “Small Business Blitz” event using the app implementation, the City of Newnan followed suit in technology adoption.
The Main Street mobile app is dedicated to both Stockbridge and Newnan’s Main Street events and allows residents and visitors to learn about the participating businesses and their offered promotions. The home page of the Main Street app shows an interactive map with a convenient full-screen option showing a numbered list of all businesses. Residents can easily see their distance from each business, select which business or restaurants they’d like to visit, can call the business directly and navigate to the location using their mobile phone map and navigation app with a tap of a button.
Clicking a business on the interactive map will provide details on special offerings by this business for the event, and a link to the business’s website. This feature provides a convenient tool for residents to plan their participation in the Main Street event.
To encourage resident participation, both the City of Stockbridge and the City of Newnan economy development departments offered a chance to win a prize pack of downtown restaurant gift cards and generous goodies baskets by submitting receipts from eligible purchases. This offer generated much traction to the events, and people uploaded dozens of receipts, directly from the Main Street mobile app.
ITsimple provides the cities with a dynamic analytics report, so that city staff can track the number of app users, predict event participation by tracking the app’s QR code usage, and plan and advertise accordingly. City staff also have online access to ITsimple’s customer portal for real-time updates of the listings and to the receipt uploads, where they know how many receipts were uploaded at any given time. They can also learn which businesses enjoyed higher popularity than others.
The Main Street events had considerably better turnout, and much of it, as Stockbridge and Newnan officials attest, was a result of this new technology.
Outcomes
Main Street event turnout was considerably higher than previous years, which city officials shared was mainly due to the Main Street application.
Event logistics automation and digitization saved time for city staff, resulting in more accurate event attendance and results tracking.
Reduction of paper and snail mail usage is greener and better for the environment.
Participants digitally uploaded receipts to the app to participate in the Main Street prize program, eliminating the need for manually stamp paper “passports” or submitting paper receipts.
Convenience for the citizen brings citizen satisfaction and participation.
Lessons Learned
Thinking out of the box, and adopting new technologies can lead to better outcomes, higher citizen satisfaction and greater efficiency.
Most citizen prefer mobile digital solutions to manual and paper.
Cities should adapt mobile-first digital solutions to better address the fact that everyone is on mobile.
Something Unique
ITsimple provided the solution and trained the designated staff in less than one month. Cities can expand the solution to an unlimited number of campaigns and use cases and even create interactive walking, biking or driving tours.
Who Should Consider
Any size cities with Economy Development departments and Convention Visitors Bureaus (CVB), Members of “Main Street America” or similar initiatives and cities with a high volume of visitors and tourists.
Government Project Team
