New Ypsi DDA website offers free business profiles, event calendar, job board

On the Ground Ypsilanti is an “embedded journalism” program covering the city and township of Ypsilanti. It is supported by Ann Arbor SPARK, the Center for Health and Research Transformation, Destination Ann Arbor, Eastern Michigan University, Engage @ EMU, Washtenaw Community College, Washtenaw County Parks and Recreation Commission, and Washtenaw ISD.

The Ypsilanti Downtown Development Authority (DDA) has launched an updated website that gives downtown Ypsi businesses and organizations new ways to connect with residents while strengthening their online presence.

The redesigned site, launched at the end of July, allows businesses and nonprofits to create and manage their own profiles, improving their visibility in online searches while contributing directly to a community calendar, job board, and volunteer listings. DDA Executive Director Elize Jekabson says the project grew out of the DDA’s search for a better way to communicate with downtown businesses, but quickly evolved into something much larger.

“Like most organizations, we were looking to utilize technology to help us better deliver services,” Jekabson explains. “We were searching for a customer relationship management system that would help us communicate more frequently with the downtown Ypsilanti businesses, as well as keep track of what topics our local businesses are interested in, recognize anniversaries of how long they’ve been here, and make sure we’ve connected recently.”

While evaluating customer relationship management platforms, the DDA found one that also offered tools to address needs the organization had identified through years of community conversations.

Jekabson says the idea for a centralized community calendar had surfaced repeatedly in discussions among local arts and culture organizations. Meanwhile, a job board was inspired by feedback gathered during a listening session at the Ypsilanti Daytime Warming Shelter, where participants said it was difficult to find information about businesses hiring locally. 

Until now, maintaining those resources would have required more staff time than the DDA could dedicate. With this update to the website, the responsibility is now more evenly divided between DDA staff and business owners. Organizations can now post their own events, employment opportunities, and volunteer openings, creating what DDA staff hope will become a comprehensive source for everything happening in the downtown district.

“Our goal is that this is a place where anyone can see anything going on at any given time within the DDA districts, all in one place,” Jekabson says. “Because the content is small business- and community organization-generated, our business community has more ownership of it and there is more opportunity for collaboration.”

In addition to providing new ways to share information, the platform is intended to help businesses become more visible online through search engine optimization (SEO). Jekabson says that as online search continues evolving alongside generative artificial intelligence, maintaining an online presence is becoming increasingly important, particularly for small businesses that may not have their own websites.

“The SEO landscape is changing into a generative landscape, and small businesses need to make sure their businesses pop up in simple searches now more than ever,” Jekabson says. “Being able to provide this platform so that they can build out their own directory listing is beneficial for all businesses in the DDA whether they already have an online presence or not.”

Although the platform is still in its early stages, Jekabson says nonprofit partners have responded enthusiastically to the new tools and are already looking to use the shared calendar and job board. The DDA is also working directly with business owners to educate them about the platform’s benefits and encourage them to claim their profiles as the DDA continues expanding the online directory.

Business owners with questions can reach out through the website’s contact page. 

“This page is only as good as what the community decides to put into it,” Jekabson says. “We hope that the activity and collaboration on our page is attractive to the type of small business owner who wants to open their business in Ypsilanti and be an active participant in its success.”