dawnjensen | Virtual Options

Top Strategies for Franchise Owners to Boost their Brand and Connect with Customers

by dawnjensen | Sep 19, 2023 | Digital Marketing, Franchise Marketing, Social Media

According to a study by Franchise Business Review, franchise owners who use social media as part of their marketing strategy are more likely to see growth in their businesses compared to those who don’t use social media. Since there are more than 3.8 billion social media users globally, it is essential for franchise owners to use social media to market their brand and connect with potential clients.

According to Statista, the number of social media users worldwide is expected to reach 4.41 billion by 2025.

Identify Your Target Market

Identifying your target market is the first stage in any marketing approach. Who are the target audiences for your message? Understanding your potential consumers’ demographics, including their age, gender, income, and geography, is crucial for franchise owners. You may use this knowledge to create relevant messages that people will respond to.

54% of social browsers use social media to research products (GlobalWebIndex).

The Best Social Media Platforms to Use

After identifying your target market, you must pick the best social media channels to connect with them. You should select the social media platforms that are most compatible with your target market and your marketing objectives because they have distinct audiences and features. For instance, networks like TikTok and Instagram may be more beneficial than Facebook if you’re trying to reach younger consumers.

Produce Interesting Content

In social media, interaction with your audience is key. You must provide visually beautiful, educational, and interesting material in order to achieve that.To pique the interest of your audience, you can publish images, movies, blog articles, infographics, and other kinds of information. Make sure your content delivers value and is pertinent to your business and audience.

Post Regularly

In social media marketing, consistency is crucial. In order to remain top-of-mind with your audience, you must post frequently. Create a content calendar that specifies the kinds of content you’ll share and the times at which you’ll do it. You’ll be able to keep on course and won’t miss any chances to engage your audience.

Engage Your Audience

The use of social media is reciprocal. It is an effective way to build brand loyalty. A survey by Sprout Social found that 70% of consumers feel more connected to a brand that has an active presence on social media. By answering their questions, messages, and reviews, you should be conversing with your audience on a regular basis. This will demonstrate to your consumers how much you appreciate and care about their interaction with your brand.

According to a report by Hootsuite, social media advertising spend is expected to reach $102 billion by 2023.

Use paid advertising as a tool

You may expand your audience and increase internet traffic for your franchise by using paid advertising. On social media sites like Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn, you may run advertisements that are specifically aimed at your target market. This might assist your company generate leads and spread brand awareness. Social media marketing can be more cost-effective than traditional marketing channels. For example, according to AdEspresso, the average cost per click for a Facebook ad is $1.72, compared to $2.69 for a Google AdWords ad.

Track Your Progress

The effectiveness of your social media marketing initiatives should also be evaluated. Utilize social media analytics tools to monitor your interaction, exposure, and sales. You can use this information to determine what is working and what is not so that you can modify your plan as necessary. Finally, franchise owners can use social media marketing to effectively market their brand and connect with potential customers.

When franchise owners employ these top social media marketing strategies, they can promote and amplify their brand and connect with potential customers. You can develop a social media strategy that helps your franchise grow and thrive by defining your target audience, selecting the right platforms, creating engaging content, posting consistently, engaging with your audience, leveraging paid advertising, and measuring your results.

Top Social Media Challenges Franchisors Must Resolve

by dawnjensen | Nov 23, 2022 | Social Media

Top Social Media Challenges Franchisors Must Resolve

Business owners today are overwhelmingly using social media as an integral part of their marketing strategy, and this includes franchisors. If you lead a franchise there are several steps we recommend taking to ensure a cohesive and successful social media outreach among all franchisees, which are as follows:

Develop a Handbook Spelling Out Your Social Media Style/Guidelines

Franchisors are responsible for maintaining the image and reputation of a prominent brand, and social media is a vital part of that. It’s important that a consistent brand voice be established across all platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and others. You also need to ensure that your franchisees consistently match this voice throughout their own social media accounts.

Implementing this practice will likely require you providing them with a social media handbook that addresses the following aspects:

Overall voice
Type and tone of content
How to engage and respond to comments and reviews
Style of images

One of the most difficult challenges will be developing this handbook, but it’s importance cannot be minimized as it will have a huge impact on your business. Your handbook will help your franchisees create and manage their own social media accounts successfully. Plus, an easy-to-follow handbook will strengthen your brand’s social media profile.

Form an Overall Social Media Strategy for Your Brand

This is in addition to developing your social media handbook. Depending on the type of franchise you own, your strategy may involve your separate franchise locations. It may be that you would rather not allow your franchisees to create their own social media profiles, and instead manage all social media outreach and activities from headquarters, to include promoting each of your franchisee’s locations.

If you’ve determined that your franchises can have their own social media profiles, your strategy guidelines should be spelled out in your handbook. Your guidelines should tackle how to set up a social media profile for success, best practices, and recommend tactics and strategies. Developing a successful strategy will require research, so this will take time.

Keep Track of Your Return on Investment

As a franchisor, it is important that you find ways to keep track of your ROI from your social media efforts. It may be fairly easy to track the performance of your own social media accounts, but it will likely be more challenging to track those of your franchisees. However, this is no less important, especially if you provide them with marketing funds.

Conclusion

It’s important for most businesses today to have an aggressive social media presence. There are millions of active users across all platforms, so where better to reach out to potential customers if you are running a well-known franchise? Take the advice outlined in this article as you get started.