(FS10) Creating an Effective Marketing Plan for Your Franchises

So far we’ve covered everything from the first moment the idea of owning a franchise bubbles into your mind to now having it built. You know about your community support, your rights, and what to look for in your territory. So now that your store is built and you’re ready to open, the question is how do you attract consumers to your new store—and how do you get the word out about your franchises?

First it’s important to know these two words:

Marketing for Franchises

As a franchisee, marketing is your big picture tool for selling your products and services. This involves all aspects of getting a product into the buyer’s hands. In marketing terms, it’s often referred to as the four Ps: product, price, promotion, and place.

Advertising for Franchises

This is a paid, non-personal communication between you and the customer in order to inform, persuade, or create an image.  Advertising messages can be distributed through many different kinds of media (newspaper, television, radio, song, etc.).

Creating an Effective Marketing Plan for Your Franchises

Customers won’t show up at your door unless they know that you’re there. Customers also won’t show up at your door if they don’t know if they can trust you or not. Marketing is a way to not only let them know that you’re there, but to also introduce them to who you are. So clearly marketing is important, especially for the newly founded or opened franchise. On the other hand, marketing can be extremely costly and maybe not quite affordable to many franchises out there, so what can a franchisee do that is cost effective while also bringing people to their door?

Success in marketing can be found in a few steps that will help strengthen their campaign. It’s a unique blend of science and art as you capture the eye of consumers with your advertisements that are designed with the help of numbers and scientific studies. If you’re getting ready to start your own marketing plan, here are some suggestions to make it more effective:

Do your homework

When you’re going to advertise a product or franchise, learn as much as you can about it so that you can provide customers with all the information they could want, if they want it. You wouldn’t want to purchase anything from someone who didn’t know anything about the product, would you?

Create an offer that features your products that are in the most demand

You’ll need to research the market to find out what is popular and what features should be emphasized. When you make your advertisement, speak directly to the consumers by emphasizing what is popular and underlined by other companies. A good way to research this is through observing other franchises of the same industry.

Create a promotional message

Once you’ve done the research and you’ve picked the product and features to talk about, you will now have to create the promotional message. You’ll need to write a short script, hire the appropriate staff, and then film it (or record it if it’s a radio ad). You should budget how much you can spend before doing any of it and include the cost of running your ad into the overall cost of your message.

Properly deliver your message to your audience

When you’re doing your research, you should find the most effective way to reach your audience. Read and re-read your script then listen to the recordings over and over again to make sure there is nothing inappropriate or mis-said.

Continue Reading More From the Franchise Series 10:

• Methods to Keep Your Franchises in Front of Your Audience
• Evaluating National and Local Franchise Advertising Strategies
• If Your Franchise Doesn’t Have National Advertising
• Franchise Advertisements Will Effect Your Public Relations
• Respecting the Customer Base of Your Franchise Company
• Maintaining Good Relationships as a Part of Franchise Business
• Franchise Impressions Set By Non-Products In Your Business