Strategic Community Engagement for Small Businesses
Helping businesses create intentional community impact that strengthens visibility, loyalty, and local relationships.
Many small businesses want to give back, support local causes, sponsor community events, or become more involved in their neighborhoods—but often don't know where to start. I provide a simple, affordable way to create a community engagement strategy that aligns with your business goals and budget.
The Community Impact Blueprint is a focused strategy session designed specifically for product-based, retail, and locally owned businesses that want to make a meaningful impact without adding more work to an already busy schedule.
For a flat fee of $425, we'll work together to identify opportunities that fit your business, your values, and your budget.
What's Included
Pre-Session Assessment
A brief questionnaire to understand your business, current community involvement, goals, and challenges.
90-Minute Strategy Session
Together we'll discuss:
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Current sponsorships, donations, and community involvement
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Business goals and growth priorities
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Causes and issues you care about
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Available budget and capacity
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Employee and customer engagement opportunities
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Community partnerships that align with your business
Community Impact Blueprint
Following our session, you'll receive a customized action plan that includes:
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Recommended focus areas
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Community partnership opportunities
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Giving and sponsorship recommendations
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Volunteer and engagement ideas
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Budget considerations
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Next-step action items you can implement immediately
Who This Is For?
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Retail businesses
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Product-based businesses
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Restaurants and hospitality businesses
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Family-owned companies
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Small businesses that want to become more visible and engaged in their community
Why It Matters
Strategic community engagement can help businesses:
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Strengthen customer loyalty
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Build brand awareness
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Increase staff morale and retention
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Deepen community relationships
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Support causes that matter
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Create a stronger local presence
Most importantly, it helps ensure your time, money, and efforts are creating meaningful impact for both your business and your community.
Investment
$425
Ready to get started? Let's build a community impact strategy that works for your business.
WHO I HELP
NONPROFITS
Helping mission-driven organizations lead with clarity, connect with purpose, and scale with intention.
We partner with nonprofits to build stronger strategies, deeper impact, and sustainable growth. Whether you're launching a new initiative, seeking funding, or refining your program model, I offer tailored guidance grounded in collaboration, data, and heart.
Every engagement is rooted in equity, empathy, and strategic clarity—because your mission deserves more than a one-size-fits-all approach.
COMMUNITY-FOCUSED LEADERS AND COMPANIES
Leading companies and organizations are more focused than ever on impacting their communities. But are they actually making a difference? I can help!
I bring over a decade of experience creating, implementing and evaluating strategies for organizations to create the greatest impact for the clients and communities.
HI, IT'S ME
Hey there—I’m Elizabeth Cizinsky. I build partnerships, programs, and plans that help mission-driven organizations stop spinning their wheels and start moving the needle. I’ve spent over a decade embedded in Milwaukee’s civic and nonprofit scene, connecting dots, building trust, and helping good people do great work—more strategically, more sustainably, and ideally with fewer 40-slide decks.
As Director of Community & Business Operations at a midwestern think tank, I wrangle our 75-person board, lead stakeholder strategy, and manage fundraising, finances, and operations—all while keeping one eye on long-term impact and the other on budget spreadsheets. Before that, I spent nearly 10 years leading Scale Up Milwaukee, where I designed and ran accelerator programs for hundreds of small businesses, turned curriculum into capital, and built partnerships with everyone from JPMorganChase to local government to neighborhood entrepreneurs.
At my core, I’m a builder: of programs that actually work, partnerships that actually last, and measurement strategies that prove the impact—not just promise it. I love the challenge of designing revenue-generating initiatives that make sense for both funders and communities, and I thrive in rooms where we can ask big questions, make bold bets, and then back them up with solid strategy and strong relationships.
Off the clock, I’m raising three wild and wonderful girls, diving headfirst into community boards and volunteer roles, and always keeping one hand on my coffee and the other on a color-coded to-do list. If you’re looking for someone who gets stuff done, makes it fun, and never forgets why the work matters—I’m your person.
WHAT WE'LL DO TOGETHER
DISCOVERY CALL
Share your pain points, your goals, your values, and what you're looking to accomplish.
FOR NONPROFITS
STRATEGIC PARTNERSHIPS
Develop meaningful alliances with corporate, philanthropic, and community partners. This service includes partnership strategy development, pitch material creation, outreach planning, and long-term engagement plans to build credibility and attract aligned partners.
STAKEHOLDER MANAGEMENT
Engage and align your internal and external stakeholders to foster collaboration and trust. Includes stakeholder mapping, engagement strategies, facilitation of listening sessions, and communication planning to ensure all voices are heard and your mission stays at the center.
IMPACT ANALYSIS
Build an evaluation framework that tells your story with credibility and clarity. Includes KPI development, theory of change support, survey tools, data collection templates, and outcome reporting. Ideal for funder reporting and internal strategy.
REVENUE-GENERATING PROGRAM DESIGN
Co-create or refine programs that are grounded in your mission, responsive to community needs, and designed for measurable outcomes. Includes landscape analysis, logic model development, goals and outcomes mapping, and budget alignment.
FOR INDIVIDUALS & COMPANIES
PHILANTHROPIC ADVISING
Support values-driven giving with structured guidance for individuals, families, or corporate social impact teams. Includes giving strategy development, nonprofit vetting, community research, and custom impact tracking tools.
COMMUNITY RELATIONS
Develop strategies that promote the company or organizational brand, aligning with partners sharing similar values and expansive audiences, garnering deeper relationships in the community.
The work and dedication of Scale Up Milwaukee was recently recognized with a nomination for the MANDIs,
aka the Oscars of Community Development in Milwaukee:
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