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Franchise Development

Blog, Franchise Development, In The News, Marketing

Top Franchise Marketing Articles

By on

November 22, 2019

- Blog, Franchise Development, In The News, Marketing

6 Must-Read Articles about Franchise Marketing and Franchise Recruitment

Our team has assembled a list of franchise marketing articles worth consideration as you position your brand to reach its goals in growth and revenue in 2020 and beyond. From buttoning up your franchise recruitment strategy to leveraging the power of online conversation at the local level, a holistic franchise marketing campaign won’t ignore these powerful trends.

Successfully Marketing Your Franchise Opportunity

Forbes

The evolving digital marketing landscape has changed the way we need to reach and attract qualified new franchisees. From determining your franchise recruitment marketing budget to seeking new franchisee prospects within your current customer base, one of the best tips in this article is to clean up your brand’s online presence across all platforms before spending marketing dollars. Today’s savvy modern investor will check website content, review site responsiveness, and social media posting consistency before even expressing interest in your franchise opportunity.

Earning Five Stars

International Franchise Association
iluma Agency has been an IFA member since 2017.

As a franchisor, keep these three things in mind: 1) the majority of customers across all your locations expect a response to their Google review within a week; 2) approximately 80% of prospects will check reviews before deciding to try or buy; and 3) implementing a review monitoring process will provide valuable operations insight to dozens or hundreds of locations that would otherwise be impossible to visit and monitor yourself in person. If online reputation management is not currently part of both your local franchise marketing and franchise recruitment considerations, it should be.

Leverage Franchise Locations and Employees as Advocates

Sprout Social
iluma Agency uses Sprout Social to manage franchise social media content publishing, engagement, and review response.

Equipping your franchise brand with a well-planned employee advocacy program can make your franchisees’ marketing endeavors more cost-effective and successful. Brand messaging posted by employees sees nearly 25% more shares than other brand content and has even been linked to influencing new customers with a higher retention rate and longer lifetime value. Implementing a reward system to encourage employees to spread brand awareness can help transmit a sense of authenticity across your brand. Paired with high-quality and consistent brand messaging and social media content, you will generate unique and meaningful human engagement in saturated and highly competitive markets.

Establish brand standards, plus ‘why’ behind them
Franchise Times

Defining the difference between innovating within the brand and violating brand standards, makes it easier to enforce brand guidelines and may save you from time-consuming backtracking in the future. Being able to communicate the value of the proven, consistent brand your zees bought into—along with the adverse effects of an inconsistent customer experience—will help shift brand policing to proactive and constructive brand building. Follow this one up by reading this article about “glocalization” by Mike Kehoe, and consider creating a franchise Facebook Group as a way to communicate with your franchisees.

Maximize Local Franchise Awareness During Pre-Sales
iluma Agency

One of the best times for a new franchise location to reach their local market and create a big impact with an efficient marketing spend is before opening—or even before beginning construction. A regimented and replicable pre-sales marketing plan can help franchisees grow your brand. Building this into your franchisee onboarding process can also help attract new franchisees as you seek franchise recruitment and brand expansion.

When Is It Time to Leave Your Digital Marketing Agency?
Franchising.com

For franchise brands seeking frictionless communication and consistency across hundreds of locations, the importance of a good working relationship with your local marketing agency partner is paramount. If you have doubts about your current agency or agencies, consider their transparency and responsiveness in communication as well as their knowledge and use of data-driven technology and best practices.

With more than 10 years of experience helping franchise brands shine, iluma’s team of franchise focused marketing experts are fully immersed in the evolving trends of local franchise marketing and franchise recruitment. Please contact us for more information about working with us to grow your franchise.

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Blog, Franchise Development

Maximize Local Awareness

By on

October 8, 2018

- Blog, Franchise Development

Opening a New Franchise Location? Generate Local Awareness Fast

When a franchisee begins presales or signs a new location, they’re faced with a tough question: How do they quickly and efficiently raise enough local awareness that they’ll be flooded with business starting Day 1 of Grand Opening? The most successful marketing campaigns start well before a business actually opens.

Here are a few ways a strategic agency partner can help your franchise maximize this crucial stage of franchise business growth.

1. Announce your presence—and leverage your brand identity

A direct mail campaign can be considered when initially announcing that you’ll be joining the neighborhood, but for many markets, a digital campaign will provide the most trackable and budget-conscious results. Through paid social media and geo-fence ads, we can target select ages with specific interests in a local radius or even a precise location or event at a certain time. By using “coming soon” messaging that targets only those people who are likely to be interested in your business, your announcement will be heard loud and clear when and where it matters most—and you can start to build a loyal following.

As a franchisee who has bought into a national or possibly global brand, you fortunately won’t be starting from scratch. By using the brand guidelines, assets, and tools, available to you, you can reach local leads who already know, trust, and are excited about the brand. A franchise-focused agency partner will use those assets in a way that maximizes digital ad spend efficiency and success.

2. Engage your local community—and maximize visibility through digital

Now that you’ve started to make your digital footprint and your audience knows your business is on its way, it’s time to show them all you have to offer the community. Whether it’s a 5K for charity, campus activity, or sports game, actively getting involved by sponsoring and supporting local events can send a message that you’re joining the community—not taking advantage of it. And of course, these events will all serve as opportunities to interact with potential prospects and start building relationships with people who could end of being long-term members or customers.

You can also host your own events in the community before you have a brick-and-mortar location—such as a party to kick off membership presales, or an event where the community can sample products and services coming soon.

Be sure to take lots of pictures, videos, and boomerangs with prospects at all of these events so you can share them on platforms like Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, and YouTube. Encourage leads to follow you on social media so they can see (and share) the pictures they’re in. Taking the buzz from a physical event onto social media extends visibility and promotes viral exposure among your leads’ own networks of family and friends.

Ask your agency for best practices and to help you integrate that valuable content into your organic social media publishing schedule.

3. Create a sense of urgency

Do you know who your customers will be on Day 1? Pre-open lead capture and sign-ups can seem difficult when Grand Opening is more than a couple months out, but the right messaging and offer can help you lock in business well before Opening Day. Your agency partner will combine efficient ad targeting with “last chance,” “before we open only,” and countdown messaging about your pre-sales promotion, using click-worth calls to action to drive prospects to a lead-capture landing page focused on collecting the contact information of your future customers.

4. Don’t just generate leads—stay connected with them 

Once you’ve created an initial sense of urgency and excitement, your agency partner can help you keep your leads engaged in the months leading up to Grand Opening.

Email marketing has proven to be a cost-efficient, fast, and effective way to communicate with leads to stay top of mind, educate them about the brand, and to keep them in the loop about your opening dates and any events along the way. Because leads have already expressed interest and opted in to receive email updates, they are highly likely to open and engage with your email marketing campaign.

Social media is also an effective platform to connect with the audience you’ve built through digital advertising and local marketing efforts. In addition to consistently publishing informative and promotional branded content, your agency can help you leverage content that sparks engagement and conversation. Every comment on your social posts should be liked and/or responded to. In the long run, your engagement will catch the eye of prospects as well as their social networks, showing your franchise favorably as one that listens and cares.

Maximize your pre-open marketing

Pre-open marketing is an opportunity for business growth that deserves attention and expertise. To learn how your brand can optimize its hyperlocal marketing during the pre-open phase and all stages of growth, schedule a call with iluma Agency today.

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Blog, Franchise Development

The Lifecycle Approach

By on

March 1, 2018

- Blog, Franchise Development

Maximize Local Franchise Marketing Success at Every Stage

Fixated on growth, international franchise brands understandably focus on the big picture—quickly attracting franchisees, expanding into new markets, and improving profitability. While these benchmarks are essential indicators of brand health, this global success is critically dependent on local achievement. A multi-unit brand is as strong as its individual units.

Ensuring franchisee success requires local marketing support tailored not only to each individual market—but also to the lifecycle of each unit: pre-open, grand opening, and mature/established. Marketing strategy should also evolve as a franchisee begins opening additional locations or joins a co-op that requires a regional approach.

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Case Studies, Franchise Development

Successful Marketing for Aveda Multi-Unit Business Growth

By on

February 15, 2018

- Case Studies, Franchise Development

iluma Agency Executes Successful Marketing Test for Aveda’s Diverse Multi-Unit Business Growth Needs


The client

Aveda, owned by Estee Lauder, is a leading botanical hair and skin brand with more than 9,000 salons and spas worldwide.

A distinct challenge and opportunity

Aveda faced increasing pressure from salon and spa owners to provide greater marketing support and help drive new business to their individual business locations. With strict brand identity standards to uphold, it was crucial for Aveda to gain a thorough understanding of proposed marketing solutions prior to rolling out any new strategy on a large scale.

Aveda business units vary in focus: some cater only to salon or spa services, while others include both. Thousands of individual business owners bring their own visions and demands to the table. All of them in different markets and at different stages in their business growth, their needs ranged from getting as many people in the door as possible to attracting only a very specific type and quality of client.

An innovative, data-driven solution

iluma Agency developed a four-phase marketing test for Aveda. Each phase included a Facebook advertising campaign, display advertising campaign, and pay-per-click ad campaign rolled out to a small group of salons and spas. These campaigns included full integration with a lead-capture landing page, call tracking, email follow-up automation, and a referral page. All marketing strategies and creative assets were presented to Aveda prior to execution to ensure their understanding and approval.

Within each campaign, iluma performed A/B testing to determine which creative images, videos, messaging, promotional offer, and call to action drove the best results—while also thoroughly tracking demographics and platform-specific performance data to optimize targeting.

In addition to quantitative data collected from campaign performance, iluma maintained a close working relationship and communication with each of the salons and spas in the test to gather insight about changes in business, conversions of leads into long-term repeat clients, and the business owners’ level of satisfaction with their results.

Each subsequent test phase was developed based on the results of the previous phase, with additional layers of testing added. Goals were updated to reflect the diverse and complex needs of Aveda’s business owners.

In addition to thorough internal tracking, all results and findings were shared and discussed with Aveda throughout the duration of the marketing test.

The results

iluma Agency developed successful digital marketing campaigns that yielded unprecedented business growth for Aveda salon and spa owners.

Phase 1 alone generated more than 6.5 million impressions and 30,000 clicks, with a click-through rate of 6.2%.

At multiple points in each testing phase, business owners requested to pause the campaign so they could handle the overwhelming amount of leads and new salon guests.

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Blog, Franchise Development, Uncategorized

Franchise Brand Growth through Local Event Marketing

By on

January 30, 2018

- Blog, Franchise Development, Uncategorized

Your franchise brand is growing, opening more operating units exponentially each year. You’re executing a successful marketing campaign at the national brand level, profits are steady, and you’ve got your eye on Entrepreneur’s Franchise 500 list—but you know you could grow faster if your franchisees were doing more at the local level. Your franchise location owners need to generate more leads, convert them into paying customers, and increase retention by maximizing engagement with current clientele.

Leveraging events through strategic digital and social media marketing tactics is crucial to boost local success across all markets and can elevate your brand’s growth from “good” to “great.”

Every business has marketable events, starting even before the business opens. Think pre-sales events, a “sneak peek” or open house sign-up event, and grand opening. Once open, a fitness franchise might host an annual weight loss challenge, and a salon might have a recurring makeover tutorial led by a popular stylist.

Powerful events do more than get customers in the door; they build awareness and excitement for your brand.

Many of these events can and should be planned and guided at the corporate brand level, but smart execution at the local level—including local digital marketing—is critical for success.

Think of local event marketing like a web. A single unit hosting a local event could garner a few thousand impressions, but a brand planning a nationwide event marketed through a multi-faceted digital approach could achieve exponentially more reach. If the event is promoted consistently, the same brand message will be delivered to hundreds of thousands of people, covering much more ground. With proper marketing before, during, and after the event, your customers and targeted leads are likely to share the event with their friends, creating viral visibility at no additional cost.

BEFORE THE EVENT

The success of an event depends on local marketing executed well before the event begins.

Franchisees can encourage a sense of urgency by creating a Facebook event page and scheduling social media posts counting down to the event. Local e-blasts can include messaging about the event and drive traffic to an RSVP page or lead-capture landing page designed specifically for an event.

Digital ads as well as boosted, sponsored, or pinned posts on social media can generate a high level of buzz about an upcoming event while simultaneously boosting brand awareness. Strategic targeting and ad spend deliver an event to current and prospective customers who are a fit for your brand in a specific local market.

Consistent use of on-brand event assets throughout integrated marketing activities across all locations drives a unified, recognizable message that showcases what’s unique and special about your brand. Typos, improper logo use, and clip-art at the local level can dilute the brand, show it in a negative light, and fail to attract new customers.

DURING THE EVENT

While marketing prior to an event is key to participation, keeping the momentum going throughout the event’s duration is equally important for engagement and retention. Whether an event is a few hours or a few weeks long, thoughtful digital marketing tactics can foster a sense of community that increases brand loyalty and referrals.

With attention to brand messaging and consistency, franchisees can employ these digital marketing activities to maximize event engagement online:

  • Set up a branded Snapchat geofilter to make it fun for customers to share pictures of the event with their friends
  • Upload videos from the event to Youtube and share them across multiple channels
  • Share fun event pictures and videos during the event via Instagram Stories
  • Communicate with event participants in a Facebook Group, where members of the group, including customers and staff, can all post to and interact with each other

AFTER THE EVENT

When an event ends, it’s instinctive to move right into what’s coming up next. But the best event marketing continues to keep up the buzz of an event well after it’s over.

Through email newsletters, social media, and blog content, franchisees can showcase an event’s best moments, promoting a sense of pride in attendees and a strong push for others to join in next time.

This is an ideal time to curate user-generated content by searching for event- and location-specific hashtags. Incorporating user-generated content shows customers your brand is listening and engaging—and encourages other customers to share their own content about your brand in the future.

MANAGING EVENT MARKETING ACROSS 100s OF LOCATIONS

Brands can encourage all open and pre-open franchise locations to follow these simple, replicable event marketing strategies. Before the event, develop cohesive brand assets to increase awareness across all units. During, build a sense of community by encouraging discussion and user-generated content through social media. At the event’s end, recap and repurpose content from their location for future events.

While important, managing hundreds of individual franchise locations’ events isn’t the best use of time for your corporate marketing team. Working with a franchise-focused digital agency partner for localized marketing support can help streamline event marketing success across all markets while protecting the brand. A branded event, promoted properly in all markets throughout its life cycle, earns interest from new clients, loyalty from current customers, and engagement from all—for growth at the local and brand level.

To learn more about how iluma Agency can make your brand shine with frictionless franchise digital marketing, contact us today.

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Case Studies, Franchise Development

Marketing Campaign Leads Massage Envy Co-Op to Success

By on

December 14, 2017

- Case Studies, Franchise Development

iluma Agency’s Comprehensive Marketing Campaign Leads Massage Envy’s South Florida Regional Co-Op to Growth and Success


The client 

Massage Envy is the first and largest massage and spa franchise in the market, with more than 1,000 locations and 1.5 million members nationally.

A distinct challenge and opportunity

Massage Envy’s individual franchise locations are grouped into regional co-ops. Spanning a large geographical area with diverse target client demographics, Massage Envy South Florida needed to provide their spa owners with individually focused marketing and increase return on regional marketing to justify pooled spend. National campaigns, branding, and promotions would also have to be adhered to, leveraged, and maximized at the local level. But with South Florida locations as far south as Homestead and as far north as Jupiter, even differences in culture and language would need to be considered. At the same time, new spa franchises entering the South Florida market were adding fierce competition, siphoning away ideal members and employees, especially as negative reviews and comments about Massage Envy’s membership pricing began to surface.

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