Resources

Each year Venture Portland makes toolkits available on a variety of topics including fundraising, membership and social media. Providing best practice models through helpful templates and informative case studies, Venture Portland ensures major organizational endeavors are a learning experience for our members. We encourage you to utilize these valuable resources when working with your business district and business.


 

Videos

Lights, camera, action! Venture Portland’s training videos are quick and to the point presentations on everything from grantwriting, membership and design. Getting ready to re-brand your district, launch a website, or release a map? Learn how to effectively work with a professional designer to ensure your project is successful.

Governance Samples and Best Practices

Board and Officer Roles and Responsibilities – As a board member, you have fiduciary (legal) responsibility for everything that your business district organization does. Make sure that board members and officers have a clear understanding of their roles and responsibilities.

Board Committees – Your board committees are more than just a way to get work done. They’re your best way to engage future leaders who may become board members down the road.

Budgets, Fiscal Controls and Financial Policies – Your budget is a projection of how you plan to raise and spend money in the coming year. It’s your strategy for how you plan to provide member benefits. Fiscal controls establish who can spend money and how.

Business Association Bylaws – Bylaws are critical in dictating how your association is run and should be reviewed and updated on a regular basis.

Toolkits

Couldn’t make our last training or can’t find your handouts?  Don’t worry – we have you covered.  The toolkits below provide highlights and resources from our latest trainings.

Building Membership and Support

What benefits does your district offer? How can you convey the ROI of business district membership? Learn how to strengthen your district’s existing benefits, create new benefits, and plan, execute and track a membership campaign that brings more businesses into your district, more revenue into your bank account and more potential volunteers onto your board. Develop quantifiable benefits and a concrete plan for your campaign.

Still looking for help with your membership campaign? Venture Portland can help! Take advantage of our Fee-for-service Consulting and we can assess your district’s current membership and recommend strategies to increase and diversify your membership and target the greatest growth opportunities and/or create a well-designed membership packet that will put your association’s best foot forward.

Dr. Doctor – Give Me the News: Is Your Business District Healthy?

Is your business district in shape? Would your infrastructure receive a clean bill of health so you can provide the economic development services your business district needs to grow and thrive? Venture Portland’s Dr. Doctor Give Me the News toolkit provides a quick governance warm-up to help you focus on exercising your economic development muscles. Build your Business District Corporate Documents Binder to organize and safely keep everything you need to ensure continued nonprofit legal compliance including the Business District Annual Check-Up and Benchmarking Success to ensure your association and district’s good health.

Grantwriting

Writing a grant?  Read Grantwriting 101 to sharpen your grantsmanship skills and gain helpful tips on proposal writing, project planning, budgeting and evaluation.

Hottest Ticket in Town

Are the holidays the happiest season of all in your district or does business say “Bah Humbug”? Are you keeping your shops and shoppers safe during the festivities? Venture Portland’s Hottest Ticket in Town – Harnessing the Holidays for a Successful and Safe Season provides strategies to ensure your storefront’s window displays work effectively with your social gatherings and festive lighting events to bring in the critical foot traffic and year-end sales you need for a happy new year.

Meet the Media

How do you pitch a story? What’s the difference between a news release and a media advisory?  Get your news covered!  Venture Portland’s Meet the Media toolkit offers best practices for media relations, a glossary of terms and a media list to help facilitate your media outreach efforts.

Show Me the Money!

Looking for sponsorship dollars?  Venture Portland’s Show Me the Money! toolkit helps you unearth existing donor relationships and gain the proper planning tools you need to attain fundraising success.

Strategically Social

Want to increase your social media know-how?  Whether you are socially savvy or new to the social landscape, Venture Portland’s toolkits offer advice for beginners and experts to become strategically social.  Making Sense of Social Media gives an overview of today’s social media platforms. Using Facebook as Your Website offers an in-depth look at Facebook business pages. Building your Social Network provides strategy concepts to build a social network that benefits your bottom line. Venture Out Online gives tips on adding virtual curb appeal to all your online addresses. Extra! Extra! helps you generate great content and up your open rates for E-Newsletters. Say What? provides tips on crafting a compelling message for media interviews and public speaking tips. Content Control provides best practices for posting to engage your audience.

Case Studies

Venture Portland’s case studies document the organization’s large scale undertakings – offering best practices and advice for business districts and their members.

Templates

In addition to toolkits from past trainings, Venture Portland operations serve as models for business districts. Templates are available around board cultivation and orientation, internal controls, efficient meetings and policies.  Contact Venture Portland to request templates or discuss best practices.