2020 Census
5 Ways to Promote the Online Census in Your Community
The U.S. Census is important for a myriad of reasons and from a business perspective it’s the largest set of population data that businesses can incorporate into their data-driven decisions. For the first time ever, the Census Bureau is implementing a tech-based census allowing people to fill out the survey online.
Narrowing the scope, retail and restaurant real estate executives utilize the Census as one data set when evaluating markets for expansion, specifically looking for population growth and density, high incomes, homes with a presence of children, etc. Real estate decisions are made with due diligence and caution, so having an accurate representation of your community from a retail attraction perspective is important.
Promoting the Census
As a city leader or economic development professional, now is the time to make sure your citizens know to fill out the Census online. We’ve compiled a list of ideas to promote the Census in your community:
- Contact the major employers in your community and ask how you can spread the word to their employees be it through fliers in the break room or writing an article for their employee newsletter.
- Download this poster to hang in City Hall, in the Chamber of Commerce and encourage local businesses to do the same. An accurate representation of the community affects local businesses as well. This graphic can be adapted to use for social media outreach as well.
- Distribute this Community Outreach Toolkit to educate your city staff about the importance of the Census. Provide them with talking points to ensure everyone is singing from the same hymnal. Be sure to include the fact that their information is protected by Title 13 which prevents the U.S. government from selling or distributing the information they collect.
- Include information about the online Census in monthly utility bills.
- Create short videos of the Mayor, local celebrities, business owners, news anchors, talking about the online Census and its importance to share it on social media.
With the majority of the U.S. population spending time at home right now, this is a great time for people to spend the time fulfilling their civic duty by filling out their form online.
