5 Ways to Improve Franchise Marketing

One of the reasons that franchise marketing can be such a challenge is because it requires a somewhat different approach from marketing other organizations. While this type of marketing can present challenges, that doesn’t mean it has to be an uphill battle. As long as you know what works best and have a clear plan to follow, you can make your marketing efforts successful.

Since knowing where to focus and how to stay on the right track with marketing are some of the biggest challenges for franchises, we want to dive right into a handful of proven tips:

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Top 3 Marketing Strategies Franchise Owners Should Invest

Since all franchise owners want this year to be more successful than the last, the question is how best to make this happen. The key to success is with your marketing strategy, and as is true with any marketing effort, you want to continue to build your brand while at the same time bringing in new leads. The following are three areas you should focus your attention to achieve both brand building and lead generation: Continue reading

Local SEO Strategy: How to Increase the Local Influence of your Website by Michelle Hummel

Because more people than ever are now searching for local businesses using both standard and mobile devices, local SEO has become essential for any business that serves a specific geographic region. While it’s something that simply can’t be overlooked, it has actually become more complicated in recent years. Continue reading

Franchise Social Media Marketing Tips by Michelle Hummel

Successful social media marketing can be a challenge for any type of business. But this task can be especially challenging for franchises. One of the reasons is that it can be difficult for a franchise to strike the right balance between maintaining a consistent brand identity and giving individual locations their own personality.

Although franchise social media marketing can be quite challenging, there are ways to make it work. Proven social media marketing tips for franchises that work and will continue to be effective include:
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3 Must Know Success Factors When Marketing a Franchise by Michelle Hummel

Regardless of their specific industry, most businesses have come to the realization that they need to utilize social media. While that rule of thumb holds true for franchises, it’s important to note that they do present some unique challenges. Although it’s important to be aware of the considerations that apply directly to franchisee social media usage, the good news is once you know about those specific issues, you can adapt and ensure you’re making the most of your marketing strategy. Continue reading

SEO

5 Steps for SEO Success for Franchises by Michelle Hummel

SEO stands for search engine optimization. At its core, this practice is simply a way to ensure that a business website shows up in the top group of results when someone searches for a relevant keyword phrase. Because Google is always evolving, the best practices for SEO in 2018 look quite different than even a few years ago.

To help ensure that you’re on the right track with SEO, we want to cover the 5 steps for franchise SEO success during the upcoming year:

5 Steps for SEO Success

1. Start with Key Pages

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The Top 5 Reasons Why Women and Franchises Are the Perfect Business Match by Michelle Hummel

In recent months, there’s been a lot of attention on many of the extra obstacles women face in their professional lives. Although it may seem like the odds are impossibly stacked against women, there are some bright spots of very good news.

One of the brightest spots is in regard to women and entrepreneurship. Specifically, there are a lot of really compelling reasons why women and franchises are an incredible business match. We want to highlight the top 5 reasons why women and franchises are the perfect business match. Continue reading

Social Media Matters More Than Ever by Michelle Hummel

At the start of this year, analysts found that there were 2.8 billion active social media users around the globe. To put that number in perspective, 2.8 billion was the entire population of the world in 1955. This figure marks a global penetration of thirty-seven percent. What may come as an even bigger surprise is social media grew by twenty-two percent last year.

Based on those figures, it’s safe to say that just about anyone your business may want to reach is on social media. Of the billions of active social media users, 28% are on just one platform and another 24% are on two platforms. Active users of three platforms drop to 16%, then 8% for four platforms and only 4% for five. What those percentages show is when people find a platform they like, they’re going to stick with it. This is the first big lesson for franchisees that want to utilize social media marketing. You need a clear idea of exactly who you’re trying to reach so you can find the one or two platforms where most of those individuals are spending their time online.

Social Media Matters More Than Ever

Getting Your Audience’s Attention

When Facebook made a big change to its algorithm a few years ago, they explained that anytime someone visited their News Feed, there were over 1,500 possible stories that Facebook could show. Since then, the rate at which social media content is produced has only continued to grow. While social media usage (especially on mobile devices) has also continued to increase, competition for attention is fierce. Because major media publications and businesses of all sizes want to get their content in front of people on social media, identifying exactly who you want to reach and how to get their attention is an essential component of a successful franchise social media marketing strategy.

From Social Media to Customers

Once you have the attention of your target audience on social media, you’ll want to provide them with consistent value in the form of great content. By delivering value, you’ll establish a trusted relationship with your audience. Having this level of trust will then allow you to make compelling offers that successfully convert a meaningful percentage of your audience into customers.

How to Get An “Unfair” Advantage

Even though we only skimmed the surface of social media marketing, it’s clear that developing and executing an effective strategy requires a lot of work. If you know that you want to utilize social media to market your franchise but aren’t sure where to start, take a look at how expert franchise marketing services from Web Strategy Plus can put your organization on a path to online success.

Michelle has been a franchise advisor for 15+ years. She also holds a valuable Internet Marketing Degree – however, with the ever-changing world of web marketing she strives to learn something new every day. Michelle can help you develop marketing, sales, and lead generation strategies that produce real results.

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Michelle Hummel is CEO of Web Strategy Plus a full-service digital marketing agency focused on Franchise Marketing. She was recently nominated for the Woman-Owned Business of the Year! She’s a passionate Social Media Trainer with 15+ years of successful online business development, sales, and marketing experience. 

She travels Nationwide visiting her 22 Social Media Enthusiasts Chapters she developed Nationwide delivering in-depth social media training. She also provides Social Media Certifications through founding Web Media University. A current contributing editor to The Franchise Dictionary Magazine and she has written 3 books in her series called, “The Social Media Magnet: Everything You Need to Know to Attract Customers with Social Media”, where she shares her best-kept secrets to success. She also specializes in helping Franchisors and Franchisees develop an integrated web marketing program to drive leads. She’s available for interviews via email, telephone, Skype video, news segments on location, and more. Just let her know how she can help!

The 4 Essential Elements of a Franchise Marketing Plan by Michelle Hummel

Most franchisees are already aware that they need a strong marketing message. However, there’s often a significant disconnect between crafting the right message and having an audience to deliver it to. The reality of the franchise industry is very few sales happen by accident. Instead, the types of franchisors that are able to consistently sell new franchises do so by having a clear marketing plan that’s carefully crafted to attract a specific type of prospect. Continue reading