11 Ways to Increase Visibility to Your Black-Owned Business
Getting your small business out there can be tough, especially at first! Use this list to help you get more visibility for your Black-owned business. 🙂
Contact your local Chamber of Commerce to get involved in your local area. There are also Black Chambers in some (usually larger) cities. These are invaluable resources to grow your local biz!
How to Increase Sales to Your Business
Note: Affiliate links may be used in this post. I earn a commission when you make a purchase through them. 🙂 Click to learn how to increase your affiliate earnings on your own blog.
With many of these websites and apps, you'll need to contact them to get featured or added. Some will charge a fee, others will not. I tried to do some of the legwork and find contact information and include it in this post, but this list is not exhaustive and you'll still have to do a little digging to get into some of them. I do have messages in to most of the websites and apps listed here, so I'll update if I get better information. 🙂
If you feature Black-owned businesses, please leave a comment or email me (sadie@sadiesmiley.com) so I can add you to the list. Be sure to include how much you charge (if anything), as I'd like to include that information.
The Mad Mommy's Black-Owned BIZ List (FREE!)
Not just for Etsy shops, I have a list here on The Mad Mommy that you can get featured on – for free! There's no sign up required, no fee, nada. And, the ad revenue made from that page is donated to organizations like these and these.
To get featured on my blog, visit the Black-owned Etsy shop list (we allow ALL businesses, not just Etsy shops) and fill out the form.
Get your Black-owned business featured on Etsy
Etsy finally has a Black-owned shop section. Follow these tips from Etsy to get featured. I haven't gotten a message back from Etsy explaining exactly how to get featured as a Black-owned shop, but I did read in some forums that if you add the tag “black owned” to your listings and make sure your profile picture reflects a photo of YOU, it can help.
If I get a response back from Etsy, I'll update this post! Until then, try the tag thing out and let me know if it works!
#BlackOwnedFriday
Share your Black-owned business on social media with the hashtag #blackownedfriday
You can also get your business featured on Google. Sign into your Google Business account (sign up at business.google.com if you don't have one), click “info”, scroll down to “highlights” and click the pencil icon. Click the “Black-owned” attribute, then click “apply”. This will help your business be discoverable when people are specifically searching to support Black-owned businesses in their area.
Yelp has something similar – where they will add a “Black-owned” badge to your shop. If you have a Brick & Mortar shop or can get featured on Yelp, be sure to get the badge added!
Black Wall Street
Thousands of Black businesses at your fingertips! Black businesses gain exposure to over 1.16 Million users on both the app and the website.
Black business owners can create a listing for their business through the app, and consumers can find Black-owned businesses of all kinds in their area, as well as receive alerts when they're near a Black-owned business so they can stop by! Get featured here. Contact: info@officialblackwallstreet.com
Black Nation – An app for Black business owners
Black-owned businesses can be featured on Black Nation, the first Black-owner social directory.
We Buy Black – Black Amazon
With We Buy Black, you aren't just getting a feature… you're getting support! They say, “We don't just promote you, we make sure you do well!”
WhereU Came From
WhereU Came From publishes crowd-sourced listings and referrals about Black-owned businesses. There WHERE-U app allows you to easily refer trusted businesses to friends and family through the referral function. This is where I'd recommend starting to try and get featured on the app.
I Am Black Business (FREE OPTION!)
The I Am Black Business website is a Black-owned business directory and they offer free and premium listings for your business! Go here to add your business.
Support Black-Owned (FREE OPTION!)
The SBO website is jam-packed with amazing Black-owned businesses not only to shop with and support but also to network with! You can get your own business added, for FREE or a fee. Go here to get your Black-owned business featured.
SBO even has tutorials so you know exactly how to get started with adding your business to their website.
Black Owned Everything
At the time of me typing this post, the Black-owned Everything site was not up yet – but the form to get your business featured is. Fill out the form and sign up for their newsletters to find out when they go live. Then, help them push their website when they launch! It will help you, and others.
By Black
Leverage a network of 140+ local Black chambers that support over 260K Black businesses.
Refer your business to get featured on By Black by clicking the “refer a business” button on the home page. I'm not sure how long it takes to get your business listed, so if you find out please let me know so I can add it to this post! 🙂
Why Black-owned?
I have been asked why I am “catering” to Black-owned businesses when I am not Black. The Black-owned Etsy list was the first post I made specifically attempting to assist Black business owners. In fact, I created it as a direct result of Nancy Badilla's Facebook group, and her allowing racist comments and NOT allowing Black-owned business support threads. Many of us spoke up and were shut down, but the racist comments NEVER were.
Because of that, I started collecting links to Black-owned shops. The goal was to create a list of 100 shops. I never dreamed it would be at 1,500 shops like it is today!
Nancy Badilla's Etsy group isn't the only place this type of thing happens (the screenshot above is from an Etsy forum).
Years ago, I was in blog groups where people were asking for Black-owned blog groups or hiring Black bloggers specifically and I had no idea why that would be necessary. “Aren't we all the same?” We may be the same inside, we may be the same human race, but our experiences are not the same and white people are afforded so many more resources, campaigns, and offers than our Black counterparts are. I was part of the problem. I am trying to be part of the solution.
My passion is helping women grow their businesses. Supporting Black-owned businesses aligns with my passion, and I will continue to use my platform to help Black-owned businesses grow. You are welcome to share your own passions and your own ideals on your own blog, but if you're here, you need to respect mine. Thank you.
White People: DO SOMETHING
If you're here to figure out what you can do to help Black business owners, start here:
If this post helped you, inspired you, or heck, even if you read this far… please take a moment to choose one of the pins below and PIN IT on Pinterest!
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