Franchise sales and development is what drives the growth of a franchise system, especially early on, and it’s what most franchisors lose sleep over more than anything else. But what’s also crucial to the steady growth of a franchise is the support that corporate gives to existing franchisees, in terms of marketing and advertising, operational best practices, and ongoing training.

All too often, franchise support is skimped on and treated as an afterthought, which leaves franchisees feeling alienated from corporate and disenfranchised (pardon the pun).

One thing in particular that’s always changing, and which franchisees are desperately seeking guidance on from their franchisors, is online marketing – more specifically, how they can make sure they’re staying competitive online, attracting as many local customers as possible, and generating leads to grow their sales.

Here are 3 common mistakes to avoid in franchise local online marketing support:

1. Static Local Websites

Many franchisors, early in the growth process, publish basic landing pages for franchise locations with very little unique local content, and no easy way for the franchisee to make updates. This results in poor search rankings, pathetic conversion rates, and upset franchisees who often go rogue and create their own sites.

What should you do?

Provide a system like Empowerkit, where franchisees can easily make updates to their own websites, within the brand and content controls you set and can oversee at corporate.  Make sure the system is flexible and can adapt with your changing needs over time.

2. No Business Listings

Franchisees generally don’t know the first thing about submitting and maintaining their business listings on Google Places, Bing, Yahoo, Yelp, Yellow Pages, and other sites. So, if you don’t give them instructions and best practices, or provide an automated solution, then guess what…there are no business listings for your locations! Complete, comprehensive business listings are a key traffic driver and lead generation source, so don’t make this mistake.

What should you do?

First off, lead by example. Make sure your corporate listing is complete and consistently listed in all of the main search engines and directories. Next, decide whether to engage a specialized vendor, utilize an automated service, and/or provide documentation and best practices.

3. Ignoring Social Media

Whether you love it or hate it, social media is here to stay, and franchisees in almost every industry are trying to figure it out for their business. Franchisors who ignore social media are finding themselves chasing down compliance issues, and seeing dozens of disparate profiles and pages that are poorly managed. Translation – a nightmare for your branding. Don’t let this be you!

What should you do?

Don’t fight social media, embrace it. It’s the only communication channel that let’s a business directly interact with customers and other stakeholders, which is valuable to almost any type of business. Develop a strategy with defined goals at the local level, layout any necessary policy guidelines, and train franchisees on best practices. Consider working with an outside consultant initially, and remain flexible to adapt your strategy based on results and changing trends.

These are just three common mistakes that franchisors make. Please share other pitfalls to avoid, and let me know if you have any questions!

Photo credit: Carlos Almendarez (“regret”), Sean MacEntee (“no regrets”)

Franchise local online marketing is complicated and intimidating for most franchisees, especially if the franchisor isn’t proactive about providing strategies, best practices, and guidance. When done right it can be a powerful sales & marketing channel at the local level, but for most people the thought of juggling a local website, blog, SEO, social media, and email marketing will make your head spin! Well as with anything, it does take effort to see results, but the good news is it’s easier than ever to get started with affordable tools and strategies that get real results.

Here are my top 5 tips for franchisees to start making an impact with their local online marketing, to increase traffic and leads generated through the web:

1. Have a Central Hub – You need to have a centralized place online where you’ll consistently drive traffic to, and most importantly where you’ll convert visitors into customers. This should be your customized local website – don’t worry, it’s super easy to get set-up with tools like Empowerkit!

2. Get Listed – Make sure you have a completed business listing on Google Places, and as many other listing sites as possible. This helps you show up where potential customers are searching, and gives your website back-links to help you show up higher in local search results. And, it’s free!

3. Get Social – Create a free Facebook Page, and ask all of your customers to “Like” your Page. Make sure you keep your Facebook Page updated and engage with customers by quickly answering questions, making special offers, asking for feedback, etc.

4. Start an E-Newsletter – Having an e-newsletter is a great way for you to stay top-of-mind with your customers, and encourage them to refer you to others. MailChimp is a great tool for this, and you can start out with a free plan!

5. Publish, Publish, Publish! – It really is true…Content is King. Frequently publishing content on your website achieves a number of things: a.) it helps you improve in local search rankings and conversion rates, b.) it’s the content that can fuel your e-newsletters and your Facebook Page sharing, c.) it gives customers a reason to come back, in turn building loyalty and referrals.

Still overwhelmed? Take it one step at a time, and as you get more comfortable and start seeing results, it will be become easier and actually…fun! Have questions, or other tips to share? Please comment below!

Photo credit: Marco Fieber

I recently had the pleasure of co-presenting a webinar with Adam Enbar from HubSpot, titled “Inbound Marketing Strategies for Franchises.” We covered a lot of topics that franchisors and franchisees struggle with day in and day out in the franchise online marketing space, including SEO best practices, local franchisee websites, blogging, social media, and email marketing. But more importantly, we discussed these topics as they relate specifically to franchising, and presented examples and action items for how franchisors can help franchisees drive increased traffic and leads online.

Here’s a summary of what was covered in the webinar – click “Franchise Inbound Marketing Webinar” in the right sidebar to watch a full recording of the webinar for free:

• What is inbound marketing, and why is it important to franchises?
• How does local SEO work, and what should franchisees be doing to improve rankings?
• Why do online business listings matter so much, and what’s important to have in place?
• How can we maintain and strengthen our franchise brand online?
• Is blogging important, and how can it help drive traffic and leads?
• How can we boost lead generation at the local and national level?
• Why is social media important, and how do we approach social effectively?
• How can email marketing be used to improve customer loyalty, referrals, and repeat business?

We address these questions and many others in the webinar, and although the focus is geared towards local franchise online marketing, almost all of the material is directly applicable to franchise sales and development as well.

Click “Franchise Inbound Marketing Webinar” button in the right sidebar to watch the full webinar recording, and leave your comments and feedback below.

Ultimately, it’s less important which technologies are used in implementing a solution for your local franchisee websites, how long it takes, or how much the investment is. These are all very important considerations, but what trumps everything else is determining who is best equipped to comprehensively understand the business objectives and goals for franchisee websites, and execute the solution so that the ultimate level of value and ROI is realized.

Here are the recommended next steps based on your current stage in the process:

1. Starting to think about it:
There unfortunately are very few solutions on the market for deploying and managing a scalable network of franchisee websites, and as you probably recognize by this point, it’s unlikely that your IT team will be able to cost-effectively implement the best solution. You should clearly define your business objectives for this initiative, and carefully assess all of your options. Give us a call or email to schedule a demo of Empowerkit, to see how it can streamline the successful implementation of ROI-driven websites for your franchisees.

2. Midway through or just completed implementation:
Whether you’re in the midst of rolling out a solution for your franchisee websites, or you’ve just completed the project, it’s still important to ensure that you’ve made the best decision that will yield optimal long-term results. You’ll need some time to assess the effectiveness of the solution you’ve implemented – but if after reading this paper you’re starting to second guess your approach, it’s always better to cut your losses and implement the right solution then to let an unsuccessful initiative drag out, and lose time, money, and credibility with your franchisees in the process. Luckily, switching over to Empowerkit is both fast and cost-effective, so contact us if you’re interested in seeing another possible option that can produce better results.

3. Have had a solution for some time:
By now you’re really starting to rethink the effectiveness of your current franchisee websites, and the increase in revenue that could be generated through a better, more robust solution. Don’t worry, this is a very difficult problem to solve, and most franchisors lack the foresight you had early on when you identified the need, and actually did something about it. Give us a call – let’s take a closer look at what you have now, and the level of improvement in lead generation and customer conversions you could expect to see through switching to a solution like Empowerkit.
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Did you miss reading the first four posts in this series? Read the intro. to “Franchisee Websites: Build or Buy?” here, the second post, “Assessing Your Current Situation” here, the third post, “ROI – What Ultimately Matters” here, and the forth post, “Considerations to Weigh” here.

It is extremely important to make a sound determination on who is ultimately best suited to deliver the optimal results you’re looking to achieve for franchisee websites. In most cases, the decision is whether to task your IT department or a current vendor with implementing this new solution, or utilize an existing, specialized service such as Empowerkit.

Without fully understanding the implications of this critical decision, many franchisors assume that because their IT department should be skilled in all things technology, and should be able to deliver the expected results, they should be responsible for this new initiative. After all, they know your business better than any outside supplier, and you’ve entrusted them with your IT needs, so why would you look outside of your organization?

Well here are some very important considerations to carefully evaluate before making a decision:

1. Time Investment and Risk: How long will it take to completely get up and running?
In-House*: 6-12 months
Empowerkit: 1-2 weeks

Your IT department is likely very busy and overwhelmed maintaining and developing your current technology systems, and in most cases they have a backlog of feature bugs, system improvement requests, integration dilemmas, security-related challenges, and a host of other prioritized items they need to solve as soon as time permits. Have a frank conversation with your IT managers to understand their current and projected workload over the coming months, and then evaluate what kind of effect it would have to burden them with a completely new project which their team may or may not be able to adequately execute.

Will existing priorities be further delayed, and how may that cause a negative ripple effect in your organization? Also consider that if your IT team is not specifically skilled at designing and implementing this sort of web solution for franchisee websites, there will likely be a learning curve which will make the timeline for the project highly variable, and put other prioritized tasks in limbo.

2. Financial Investment: What is the initial and ongoing investment needed?
In-House*: $150,000-$250,000 initially; $500-$750/month in ongoing support & maintenance
Empowerkit: $0-$5,000 initially; $25 per site/month for ongoing support & maintenance

Directly tied to the aforementioned learning curve dilemma, which should be assumed from most IT departments (even the most talented and progressive ones) in franchises not focused on web technology at their core, is the more important financial investment in human resources that will need to be made. Implementing a proper system for franchisee websites that meets the essential requirements listed above can take upwards to $250,000+ to thoroughly plan, design, develop, and deploy. Moreover, if your IT team is not intimately familiar with and focused on the desired objectives and results for the project, and is not highly skilled at developing web-based properties of this kind, the inherent timeline variability also causes unpredictability in the associated price tag for the project, which makes budgeting very difficult.

With Empowerkit, the only upfront costs are if you wish to have a fully integrated brand identity into your franchisee websites, which represents a very minimal cost.

3. Focus of the Franchise: Should I focus on my franchise or developing a new technology?
In-House*: General focus on software & hardware systems, not specialized in web solutions
Empowerkit: Specialized, ready-to-deploy solution for franchisee websites

Let’s face it – you’re in the business of franchising and delivering outstanding value to your franchisees and customers. For the vast majority of franchisors, the IT department’s role (a very important and valuable one at that) is to develop, support, and maintain the software and hardware needs that are critical to your organization’s operations. Different from traditional IT functions including system administration, database management, system networking, and security risk management, creating and maintaining a system for your network of franchisee websites requires a very specialized set of skills. These skills involve a deep understanding of business objectives, user needs, information architecture, user experience design, brand continuity, workflow and content management, data modeling, application scalability, and myriad other specialty disciplines.

It’s important to assess if your IT department has well honed skills in these areas, and more importantly if this is something that’s actually advantageous and feasible to handle internally given your franchise’s core focus and workload. Leveraging a ready-to-deploy solution like Empowerkit that fits your exact needs can allow your IT department to remain focused on their immediate priorities, without derailing their focus with a new solution that requires a steep learning curve.

4. Opportunity Loss: What do I stand to gain if I were to do this internally?
In-House*: Stagnant online lead generation at unit-level
Empowerkit: 55% increase in traffic and 90% increase in leads for franchisees

When considering your IT department’s ability to execute such a web project successfully, consider the possibility that they will struggle due to the multitude of challenges, and ultimately deliver a sub-par or average solution. This is not to presume that your IT team is by any means incompetent or incapable to fulfilling well-defined functional requirements.

It is simply a reality that expectations from customers and franchisees alike are very high given the level of sophistication and innovation happening on the web today, and the associated benefits and value of excellent websites for franchisees focused on achieving real business objectives are steadily increasing – it’s not an easy task to deliver on these high expectations, especially when the required skill set deviates from your IT team’s core expertise and prior training.

Franchisee Websites: In-House vs. Empowerkit

How could this potential for mediocre results affect your franchise’s image, internal morale, and competitive edge? More importantly, what is the monetary opportunity loss for not optimally achieving the business objectives and/or resolving the problems that you defined from the outset? These are very important questions to assess prior to deciding whether or not to engage your IT department or use Empowerkit for your franchisee websites.
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Read the next post in this series to learn about the next steps that you can take in choosing to implement or improve your local franchise websites.

Did you miss reading the first three posts in this series? Read the intro. to “Franchisee Websites: Build or Buy?” here, the second post, “Assessing Your Current Situation” here, and the third post, “ROI – What Ultimately Matters” here.

*Note: these figures are estimates; actual numbers will depend on the number of dedicated resources assigned to the project and the skill level of your in-house team.

When assessing what’s important for your franchisee websites, what matters most is the return on investment (ROI). In most cases the success metrics you should assess for franchisee websites to help define the ROI, in order of importance, are:

1. Lead-to-Customer Conversions: Website leads that convert to paying customers.
2. Lead Generation: Visitors that complete a call to action form on the site.
3. Website Traffic: The amount of traffic generated to the website from various sources.
4. Search Rankings: Search engine rankings for targeted key words in local search results.

When considering the rate of success you can achieve on these key metrics for your franchisee websites, to ultimately increase unit-level sales and royalties, there are certain features and capabilities your solution will need in order to produce positive results in the long run. Below is a list of the most important features and capabilities you should require to achieve optimal results:

Frequent Updates
Static, unchanging websites yield low, stagnant placement in search engine results. Experts agree that the strongest impact on higher search rankings, by far, is effected by frequent content updates to a website, which has shown to yield a 55% increase in traffic and a 90% increase in leads.

Local Content
Franchisees must be able to publish some degree of original content to their local franchise websites. For one, local content directly increases local search rankings, in turn driving more targeted traffic; secondly, local-centric content ensures a unique and engaging experience for the local market, in turn increasing conversion rates.

Franchisor Control
Although local websites are specifically geared towards increasing unit-level performance, it’s important that franchisors maintain a comfortable level of oversight and control. There needs to be easy mechanisms for the franchisor to distribute certain content to franchisee websites, and ensure brand consistency across all sites.

Ease of Use
It’s imperative that the content management system for franchisee websites is extremely simple to use for those who are non-technical. Franchisees are slow to adopt software solutions that are complicated to learn and use. Strong franchisee adoption is a must, so the system’s ease of use will be a major factor in its ultimate success.

Scalability
You need an easy way to deploy new franchisee websites quickly and cost-effectively, and take websites down if need be. There should be a management interface which allows a non-technical staff member to effortlessly deploy new franchisee websites, and deactivate those for locations that close, without having to bother (and pay) your IT team for it.

Performance Insights
There must be a way to measure results. Ensure there are comprehensive analytics available to the franchisor, and more simplified analytics for franchisees. Being able to show franchisees performance insights of their local websites in an easy to understand and digestible manner is a powerful way to gain broad adoption and support.

There are numerous other features you’ll likely want, but the above chart outlines the fundamental capabilities you’ll need for the solution powering your franchisee websites in order for it to be a successful undertaking. Since Empowerkit was designed specifically to meet the needs of franchisors and franchisees, it accounts for all of these capabilities and much more.
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Read the next post in this series to learn about the a number of key considerations to weigh in making a decision for your local franchise websites.

Did you miss reading the first two posts in this series? Read the intro. to “Franchisee Websites: Build or Buy?” here, and the second post, “Assessing Your Current Situation” here.

Franchisors considering the effectiveness of their franchisee websites and overall online presence are generally in one of the following stages:

1. Starting to think about it:
You’ve realized the need for local websites to empower franchisees with a better way to increase awareness and customer acquisition in their local markets, but you’re unsure about how to proceed in finding and implementing a solution. The primary focus of this paper is addressing franchisors at this stage.

2. Midway through implementation:
In this stage, you’ve already identified the need for franchisee websites, and are currently in the process of implementing a solution, which may be a built-from-scratch system your IT team is working on, or something you’ve tasked a vendor with. In this stage, it’s important to reassess the effectiveness and viability of the approach you’ve chosen, and this paper will give you some great information to consider.

3. Just completed and launched:
You’ve finally rolled out your local franchise websites and are anxious to get feedback and see the results. What’s critical at this stage is ensuring that the most optimal solution has properly been implemented for your needs, and that you have defined success metrics in place to monitor results over time. In this paper you’ll learn some critical features and capabilities you should have in place, and better understand the ongoing time and financial commitment you should anticipate moving forward.

4. Have had a solution for some time:
If you’re reading this, you’re probably questioning the effectiveness of the solution you currently have in place for your franchisee websites. Are you seeing the increases in traffic and lead generation you had projected? Are franchisees able to leverage the system to post locally relevant content, and are they happy with the results? If you’ve had the same solution for some time now, and you’re unhappy or unsure about its real value, it’s time to consider a better option – and this paper will show you how.

Read the next post in this series to learn about the ROI of local franchisee websites, and what criteria you should use in evaluating the right solution for your franchise.

Did you miss reading the first post in this series? Read the intro. to “Franchisee Websites: Build or Buy?” here.

Franchisors are quickly realizing just how important it is for their franchisees to have a strong online presence these days, to spread awareness of their locations in local markets, increase lead generation and customer acquisition levels, and help improve customer loyalty and retention – all of which directly benefit the franchisor by increasing royalty streams, expanding market share, and strengthening the brand. Exemplifying this point, the number one reason customers visit a franchise’s website today is to find information about nearby locations on their franchisee websites.

But when there is a lack of relevant, local content about the franchisee’s location presented on the website (often times little more than a phone number and address is provided), customers are left doubting the business’s credibility, and disappointed at the lack of information. This results in stagnant website traffic and lead generation numbers, especially if franchisees do not have dynamic web pages that are updated frequently with fresh content to boost placement in local search engine results.

Furthermore, an ever increasing number of franchisees who understand the value of a strong web presence have independently initiated their own Internet marketing programs, by launching their own local websites, creating social media profiles (such as Facebook and Twitter), and advertising online. The result of this is a very fragmented and muddled representation of the franchise brand on the web, not to mention the frustration franchisees endure while trying to navigate the complex and convoluted world of Internet marketing on their own.

What’s worse is franchisors are losing control over their brand online, and franchisee confidence and satisfaction is waning because these essential marketing tools are not being adequately provided by the franchisor. This shift has created a great dilemma for franchisors, especially those whose core business is not focused on web-based marketing and technology, since solutions for this unique problem have in the past been mediocre at best, costly, and time-consuming to implement and maintain.

Perhaps most difficult is the question of whether to develop the needed solution for franchisee websites in-house, work with an existing supplier, or leverage a specialized platform such as Empowerkit. We will examine some of the key issues to consider when evaluating this consideration, and offer a framework for prudent decision-making.

Read on to part 2, “Franchisee Websites – Assessing Your Current Situation“

It’s shocking that in 2011, so many small businesses and franchisees are still without a proper marketing website to help boost lead generation, sales, and if nothing else just to get on the radar of would-be customers. Blaming the poor economy is a tired excuse for why your business is suffering. Stop worrying about things you can’t control, and start focusing on the things you can…like having a real website!

For all of the franchisors out there with your heads in the sand, here are some of the top reasons you NEED to have effective websites for your franchisees (and for those reading who simply have cookie-cutter, template pages that are almost exactly the same across the board, this applies to you too):

1. Investing Time in Social Media is a Waste Without a Website
Take a look at your social media presence, and research your franchisees’ Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter profiles – surprised to see how much activity there is? Now, look closer to see if there’s an underlying strategy to convert those discussions in social media into leads and ultimately sales. Chances are this is where the ball is dropped. That’s where a website comes into play – all of that great momentum can be channeled to a controlled website optimized to convert traffic in paying customers.

2. Control Your Business’s Voice Online
With a website that is designed to have frequent content updates, you can take control of the messaging, and have a strong positive influence on your search engine rankings (SEO). Social media is the great equalizer allowing customers to join the conversation without barriers to entry. But owning the control of your brand and messaging through having a website is still vital.

3. Gather Customer Information
Collecting visitors’ emails and other information through your website opens an amazing opportunity to maintain communication with potential and existing customers through email marketing, which can have a strong impact on customer retention. It’s also a great way to disperse new promotions to an audience who has already volunteered to stay updated about news and happenings related to your franchise.

4. Have a Homebase to Point Customers To
In today’s fragmented social media and Internet marketing arena, it’s very easy to become completely disorganized and lose control of your lead conversion funnel – not to mention convoluting the experience for potential customers looking to purchase your products or services, or just learn more. The solution is to have a website that you can ALWAYS point people to, regardless of the communication channel (traditional advertising, banner ads, PPC, social media, etc.).

5. Generate Leads and Sell!
Most importantly, you need to have a SALES channel online that is the hub where you’re looking to convert traffic into leads, leads into customers, and customer into evangelists. Social media is an excellent vehicle to connect with people, build personal relationships, improve branding, and a host of other benefits, but it’s pretty tough to convert those warm fuzzy discussions into sales. With a website, you can have a prominent sales call to action and an easy way to collect customer information, and you can constantly work towards increasing your conversion rates.

Do you just have basic template pages, or worse listings, for your franchisees, and are now reconsidering doing it the right way? Email me for a personal demo to see how easy it is to make a change to having search engine optimized, lead converting, social media integrated websites for your franchisees. Or, if you’re more of a do-it-yourself guy or gal, click the big “Try it Free” button at the top and you can dive into a free trial.

Photo credit: http://bit.ly/cidpd4 (franchise local websites)

We put together this video to put a humorous spin on what many distributors experience when they first enroll in a new opportunity.  It’ll crack you up (promise), so check it out – please share with your co-workers and associates if you like it!

But in all seriousness, a new distributor’s first 30 days are extremely critical. It’s during this “honeymoon” phase that the majority of new distributors feel the sting of rejection, get discouraged, and give up. Yes, we’re talking about that nagging issue that’s hindered the direct selling industry for decades – sales force attrition.

And let’s face it, the leading cause of high attrition rates today is distributors’ failure to generate qualified leads. Many distributors go online to attract prospects, drum up leads, and expand beyond their warm markets. When the company’s replicated website isn’t effective at attracting and generating leads (the case with most direct selling companies), distributors go to Facebook, Twitter and YouTube, and create their own blogs.

This approach is fragmented and non-scalable, it removes the company from the equation (diluting the company’s value), and it causes many distributors to burn through lots of money and time, aimlessly struggling to get leads any way possible.

Here’s an idea – give distributors an option to have a better online lead generation website that integrates with their social media profiles and your enrollment process, and handles e-commerce seamlessly with your current systems. This way, you can proactively fill this growing need, maintain a level of control and oversight, and give your field more value which will effect higher retention and sales volume. Want to learn how to do this easily – without spending a dime or interrupting your IT systems at all? Empowerkit is a specialized solution that zeroes in on solving this hairy problem in direct selling, so click “Try it Free” at the upper right, or contact me directly to discuss further: 415-512-1565 or chris@empowerkit.com.