Grow with Google
In 2023 an innovative new partnership between Main Street America and Google was launched to bring digital skills trainings to rural businesses across the country. As part of this new pilot program, Downtown Wytheville Incorporated was selected as 1 of 10 organizations to represent not only our hometown and Southwest Virginia but the entire Commonwealth of Virginia in bringing digital skills training to small, rural businesses. During the pandemic, we found out just how important e-commerce and virtual integration are to the success of a business; however, small businesses in rural areas have less experience with this “bricks and clicks” model. This new Grow with Google training program begins addressing this through new resources, one-on-one assistance, and in-person and virtual classes taught by our local Grow with Google coach, Courtney Conner-Stringer.
Through the work of our Grow with Google coach, staff, and community partners, Downtown Wytheville, Inc. was able to offer 16 workshops and countless one-on-one trainings that have reached over 1,902 participants. Our Virginia team has been one of the most successful of the 10 states selected and this outstanding result led Google, Main Street America, and the Downtown Wytheville Board of Directors to extend these trainings past the original deadline of December 2023 until March 2024. This has been a transformative program that has helped small rural businesses not only in Wytheville and Southwest Virginia but across the country. To learn more about the final results of this program, check out this article from Main Street America:
At the 2024 Virginia Economic Developers Association’s Summer Meeting, Downtown Wytheville’s Grow with Google program was awarded the “Entrepreneurial Gamechanger” award by Virginia Main Street for it's reach in leveling up the digital capacity of small businesses in Wytheville, Southwest Virginia, and the entire Commonwealth.
