How to Support Your Franchisees to Entice Local Customers

LET'S GET SOCIAL?

When franchise owners are diving into a franchise business, they do it because they are assured to be associated with the particular brand, and the brand image. Needless to say, they might not be well-versed in the marketing strategies or other aspects of brand marketing. The franchisees expect the franchisors to plunge into the mud and save them. The industry standards proclaim to embrace the franchisees and train them to follow the standard of procedure as directed by the franchise head office, wherever it might be located. However, the expectations of the franchisees are not met at most times.

The marketing structure through the franchises is resilient to the brand value and brand image on a broader spectrum. This over time leads to neglect of the potential business acquisition from the local customers. The franchisees need training, SOPs, technology and a support system from the franchises to empower their business.

Here are three tips on how to support your franchisees to differentiate the potential business from local customers and entice them to do business.

Strategizing the local marketing approach

Local marketing is a far more important aspect than brand image. If a franchise is well-known among people, that’s because of the word of mouth the local customers give the brand which results in a heightened brand image and eventually forms a strong brand image. This can be achieved by training the franchisees and providing them with everything that they need to know about the brand so that they can promote exactly what is expected of them. Training acts as moral support and boosts their confidence to run the business fiercely.

2. Sense of individuality to franchise owners

Many franchise owners take up franchise businesses because, firstly the ideologies match with that of the franchisors, and secondly, they have some initial knowledge about running a business and they can be creative in their approach. Giving the franchisees a little space of their own can fetch profits for the business in the long run. This wouldn’t imply giving complete freedom to act beyond the essence of the franchise. For example, if the franchise could offer a pre-planned template open to customization according to the location can do wonders. This would give the franchisees a push to promote, create content and do everything necessary to fetch the local customers. After all franchise owners prefer to locate the store in a particular neighborhood that they are aware of. This keeps the franchise owners on the upper hand to lead the franchise to a profitable business.

3. Providing essentials for organic lead generation

Franchise owners come with scarce knowledge about Search Engine Optimisation, lead generation, converting leads to the business, and so on. A brand’s local identity and reach depend on how organically they can be found over the internet in today’s digital world. Customers love to surf through the easiest ways to buy things from a store. They prefer to check the online store with the availability of a particular item from their shopping list, rather than checking the stores directly. This information is a much-valued piece, since many a time the business owners fail to put themselves in the organic feed.

Train the franchise owner about the tools that are used to up the game digitally by driving the traffic to the local landing page.
Provide the franchise owners with the necessary tools to make their workforce competent enough to stand in the local market.
Improve the SEO score and map findability of the store by providing necessary directions and giving the customers a point of contact at the local store.