Category: Digital Marketing

Social media is no longer a mystery to everyday users. While everyone tends to think of its personal use and B2C applications, we’re now realizing the power of social media for B2B companies! A company’s presence on social media in the digital age is no longer up for debate; however, being on every platform isn’t essential for every business. For franchisors, it’s a highly effective tool for recruiting franchise candidates. Check out our tips for finding franchise candidates on LinkedIn. B2B and B2C: Each Platform Has Its Own Target Audience Hold on a minute! If you’re here, you probably know the difference between B2B and B2C, but did you know that the target audience and tone differ on each platform? Instagram and TikTok are the ideal platforms for B2C, but for B2B, we primarily recommend using LinkedIn, the professional social network par excellence. LinkedIn is a social network in its own right. If you’re in B2B, your customers are on LinkedIn; in B2C, it’s your suppliers or distributors who are there! This platform is full of opportunities, especially because not everyone is active on a daily basis, so it’s easier to get noticed.   In franchising, you need to know how to properly address your target audience. LinkedIn is the network designed for businesses: with over 800 million professionals and 57 million business accounts, it’s now the professional social network to use. According to LinkedIn Business, for B2B marketers, 80% of leads generated through social media come from this platform—which underscores the importance of incorporating LinkedIn into your social media strategy.  LinkedIn: A Gold Mine of Tailored Tools First and foremost: a free B2B database. If you want to reach professionals—whether they’re future franchisees or simply franchisors—there’s simply no better place than LinkedIn. Users of this platform want to connect with like-minded professionals, apply for jobs and recruit candidates, and follow the latest news from companies and influential people around the world. Once you understand how LinkedIn members and brands use the platform, you’ll gain valuable insights into how you can integrate LinkedIn into your social media strategy. From the outside, you might think LinkedIn is just a network of job seekers, but that’s not true! Everyone is there for various reasons—personal branding, following news about a brand or company, searching for opportunities, and even looking for clients! Everyone markets themselves in their own way. The advantage of LinkedIn is that you can truly customize your profile to reflect who you are. The B2B database is therefore immense; there are countless prospects on the lookout for the next opportunity. LinkedIn: A Search Engine. LinkedIn is certainly a professional social network, but it’s also a search engine—a place where people seek to make connections and expand their network. It works through a network of connections. A is connected to B, who is connected to C; C sees that B has reacted to an offer or a post from A, so C wants to connect with A. Thus, the reach of posts can be infinite, and it’s a shame to miss out on that.  The first thing to know is that it’s not a sales platform. People go on LinkedIn to stay informed, network, and exchange ideas—not to make purchases. On LinkedIn, you build your reputation, brand image, and positioning. It’s the best place to establish yourself as an expert in your field.  The search engine is ideal for growing your community; you’re looking to connect with interesting people with whom you might have things in common, to propose opportunities, to share experiences, and to learn from one another. All of this happens through the search engine. To make this work, your LinkedIn profile must be properly filled out with the right information. You need to appeal to the algorithm and to the people who land on your page so they’ll stay.  To do this, you need a catchy headline, a banner that matches your brand’s visual style, an “About” section that summarizes your value proposition and mission, and a direct link to your website. On LinkedIn, the goal is to address your customers indirectly—by showing how your offering meets their needs—through storytelling, in particular. LinkedIn also lets you post images and videos to illustrate your points.  Once someone finds you, they’ll want to get in touch—so make sure your franchise contact landing page is easily accessible! Useful Tools LinkedIn is full of handy tips you can use as often as you like. Here are a few: On every profile, you’ll see a “Similar Profiles” column on the side—a feature that can be particularly useful when searching for specific profiles, such as when recruiting in a particular region! It’s a tool that makes cold outreach easier.  You can drive engagement on your posts using polls, and on a standard post, if you use CTAs, you’ll encourage a response, which will help your post reach a wider audience.  You can reach out to your network when you’re looking for a location, a rare find, a specific supplier, an investor, or even an opinion on a topic—your network is usually happy to share their thoughts or offer help in the comments.  The profile title is important; for example, on the profile of the person handling recruitment for you, it should be clear what they’re offering and what your opportunity entails. Users are more likely to click on it than if the person simply lists their role as a recruiter within the company. Manage my candidates with Cerca How to prospect on LinkedIn? Best practices If you’re looking for specific profiles to recruit, you can write posts or create videos[…]

For several years now, franchisees have been facing changes in communication methods. Digital media has gradually taken precedence over print, billboards, and traditional media such as radio, newspapers, and television. Today, Google, Meta, and digital platforms account for the vast majority of the advertising audience. But it can be risky to hire a digital agency to promote your offerings to customers in your catchment area. Will your budget be sufficient to get noticed? Will the campaign be effective? For a franchisee, there are many questions, and they require a level of expertise that’s difficult to master. However, technology now makes it easier to meet this need for digital communication, especially when the franchise network—at the corporate headquarters level—implements the right tools for its retailers. The Challenges Facing Franchises in Making an Impact on Digital Media The adage “Think Global, Act Local” holds true in digital advertising. The brand must be able to simplify access to local digital advertising by offering ready-to-use ad modules for its franchisees. These include generic campaign packages centered on the brand’s message, campaign packages tied to product news, and campaign packages tailored to key moments in a store’s life cycle: grand openings, promotions, clearance sales, events, and more. Each of these packages can include visuals and text pre-designed by headquarters to make the franchisees’ work easier. Ads must also be configured to meet different objectives: brand awareness, in-store traffic, traffic to the store’s Facebook or Google Maps page, or phone calls. Consequently, it’s necessary to be able to run campaigns across different platforms: Google Ads, which allows “hot” or “intent-driven” prospects to appear directly in search results—whether on Google or Google Maps; Facebook, Instagram, and Snapchat, which, through their advertising algorithms, display ads to audiences most likely to click. These social media platforms are essential for expanding visibility among as many potential customers as possible. Publisher websites and apps—particularly news outlets and local publications—as well as sites like Leboncoin. These platforms can display banners in various formats, as well as audio or video interstitials. Waze—the #1 app for navigation—offers highly effective exposure to drivers. Learn more about DeepReach. However, these modules must also take into account the specific characteristics of each store. First, not every local market is on equal footing with the GAFA companies. For the same retailer, Facebook may perform better in one area, while Snapchat may generate more clicks in another. It is therefore essential to be able to adapt the media mix by region. Second challenge: the catchment area. To avoid wasting your advertising budget, you must ensure that only potential customers located near the store are exposed to the ads—and this applies to every advertising network. You must therefore be able to define an ad display zone, with priority and secondary zones if possible. Third challenge: personalizing messages, particularly by including the store’s name, tailoring the text, and specifying the correct address. Cerca can now help its clients launch these local campaigns. By integrating all these advertising networks via DeepReach technology—used by the largest communications agencies— Cerca can offer retailers a comprehensive platform to: design a catalog of campaign packages for all digital media, define the geographic areas for each store to enable geotargeting, allow franchisees to view this campaign catalog and order campaigns directly, and track all campaign performance KPIs (impressions, clicks) by area and by media type. And all this without any expertise in digital advertising or additional staff. Click here to learn more about this feature. You may also be interested in these articles:

The digital world is constantly evolving, but some trends are here to stay. Discover the 8 trends for 2022 you won’t want to miss to effectively prepare your 2023 local marketing strategy. Boost the online visibility of your retail locations and drive more traffic—both online and offline! 🚀 Consumers are looking for inspiration online Shopping is local Shopping is increasingly omnichannel Consumers are looking for added value Social commerce is here to stay Short videos are all the rage Micro-influencers: a marketing strategy worth investing in Position Zero, the holy grail of local SEO 4 Consumer Trends for 2022 1. Consumers seek inspiration online According to a recent Google study, more than 48 % of consumers worldwide say they look for inspiration online for their purchases. This trend is confirmed when they actually make a purchase: 91 % of consumers conduct an online search before visiting a store (Ifop, 2020). Our advice: Boost your stores’ online visibility by creating local pages on key platforms (Google, Facebook/Instagram, store locator, etc.). Develop a local content strategy tailored to the latest news from your various retail locations to attract customers to your stores. 2. Shopping Is Local Searches for terms like “open now nearby” have surged by more than +400 % year-over-year worldwide. These figures reflect an increasingly pronounced trend of checking online before heading out, and indicate that when searching for businesses, consumers are increasingly looking for immediate solutions. For example, in the early evening, people are more likely to search Google (Maps) for restaurants open nearby. Our advice: Invest in optimizing the organic search visibility of your retail locations on various mapping platforms (Google Maps, Apple Maps, Bing Maps, Waze, etc.). 3. Shopping Is Becoming Increasingly Omnichannel Who uses just a single information channel these days? Today, beyond traditional channels (TV, radio, print media, etc.), brands connect with consumers through multiple digital channels: Websites Social media (Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Pinterest, etc.) Search engines (Google, Bing, etc.) E-commerce platforms (Amazon, Bol, etc.) Apps Newsletters and email campaigns … Marketing strategies (both online and offline) should be designed as a seamless experience across these different channels—and, above all, tailored to them: Each platform and medium has its own conventions; communication styles vary depending on the audience’s age and the supported formats. Our advice: Take the time to develop omnichannel communication strategies while ensuring your brand image remains consistent at the local level. 4. Consumers Are Looking for Added Value In a climate of economic uncertainty marked by post-COVID inflation, consumers are seeking added value—both in terms of corporate values (positioning, inclusivity, environmental commitment, etc.) and, above all, in terms of direct added value for themselves: deals and promotions. According to a study on French consumer trends, 52 % of them see their non-food budget stagnating, and 22 % plan to reduce their non-food spending. (source: Into the Minds, 2022) Our advice: amplify your retail locations’ campaigns and promotions through various channels (Facebook, Google, newsletters, etc.). Social media and Google 5. Social selling is here to stay First of all, what is social selling? Social commerce involves promoting and selling products and services through social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, or Pinterest. According to an eMarketer study on the number of consumers who have made online purchases via social media, there has been a 10% annual increase. Why? Social commerce enables a “frictionless” shopping experience: on a social media platform, a consumer sees a product that interests them, clicks on it, is redirected to an e-commerce site, and, if they wish, completes the purchase and receives their order (if everything goes smoothly and there are no glitches!). Examples of social commerce: Instagram Shopping: allows you to add product tags to images in posts, videos/Reels, and Stories. Facebook Shops: a new interface that lets users discover brands and buy their products within the Facebook app. 6. Short videos are all the rage Do you know what the average person’s attention span is? According to recent studies, it’s gradually shrinking and has recently reached an average of 8 seconds. This, among other factors, explains the success of platforms offering short-form video content, such as TikTok and Instagram. Instagram has nearly 1.4 billion users worldwide, followed by TikTok with 1.02 billion. This makes them extremely popular platforms centered around short videos (or Reels on Instagram). TikTok offers formats ranging from 3 to 60 seconds (via the app) and has also recently introduced “long” formats lasting 3 to 10 minutes. Instagram offers Reels with a maximum length of 90 seconds, as well as videos ranging from 3 seconds to 10 minutes. Why use these formats? These formats (on both TikTok and Instagram) allow for organic reach that can grow exponentially, depending on user interactions (number of views, clicks, likes, comments, shares, etc.). Furthermore, these platforms automatically display content similar to what the user likes in their feed. This means that videos are shown to an audience that is already qualified by its interest in similar topics and is more likely to engage with them. Videos under 15 seconds already account for 45 % of the videos posted in the feed. Guillaume Thévenin, Head of Content Creator Partnerships at Instagram for Southern Europe, via France Inter. 7. Micro-influencers: A Marketing Strategy Worth Investing In Micro-influencers (this includes[…]

Marketing automation helps optimize many aspects of the franchisee recruitment process. Implementing it can be time-consuming and requires a variety of skills. However, in the long run, it saves time. Creating optimized campaigns helps you attract new candidates. Below, you’ll find all the relevant information about marketing automation for your franchise. What is marketing automation? As the name suggests, marketing automation generally refers to the automation of marketing campaigns based on a set of predefined conditions and user behavior. Among the marketing actions you can automate are: sending emails and text messages, and contact segmentation. On a more technical level, you can also automate:  lead scoring, which involves calculating and assigning a score to each prospect to indicate their conversion potential and the strength of their interest in your brand; and lead nurturing, or maintaining and strengthening a marketing relationship with prospects who aren’t yet ready to take action (submitting a franchise application) with your brand. Unlike more traditional email marketing—which involves sending the same email to a list of contacts (one-to-many)—marketing automation sends targeted, customizable automated emails triggered by specific actions taken by prospects. To streamline franchisee recruitment, it’s essential to use every tool available to help you accelerate the growth of your network. Marketing automation is one of these essential tools for saving valuable time and significantly increasing both the number of applications you receive and your candidates’ conversion rate. How can you use marketing automation to save time when processing franchise applications? Analyze franchise applicants’ actions To set up effective marketing tracking, it’s important to carefully analyze each applicant’s actions to understand where they are in the application process. You can track their actions based on the time they spend on each page of the website and how much time they’ve dedicated to each page. With a thorough analysis, you’ll be able to take specific actions at the ideal time. Segment your candidates Marketing automation allows you to effectively segment your candidates. This way, you can send targeted messages and announcements via email, depending on where the candidate is in your process. For example, if a candidate has started reviewing all the franchise information, you can send them an email with more detailed information and invite them to an initial conversation. Nurturing Leads and Moving Them Through the Application Process Marketing automation tools help move candidates through the decision-making cycle. In particular, you can use lead nurturing techniques to strengthen your marketing relationship with candidates. Lead nurturing is most useful for long conversion cycles, such as those involved in recruiting a franchisee. By offering high-quality, targeted, and informative content, you’ll help candidates progress in their decision-making process by providing genuine value. Send targeted emails Once you’ve effectively segmented your candidates, you can create automated and personalized email campaigns using workflows. Workflows are automated, targeted sequences of multiple emails designed to encourage a prospect to take a specific action. In the case of a franchise candidate, this might involve reaching out to you to open a franchise. The workflow will be triggered by a subscription to your newsletter, the download of your informational brochure, an action on a landing page, or participation in an online information session. Create automated social media posts Your social media strategy is also a key way to attract new franchise prospects. Along with publishing content on your website, you can schedule posts to be automatically published on your social media channels. By using marketing automation tools, you can produce high-quality content and measure the impact of its distribution—whether in terms of website visitors or converting visitors into leads. In short, marketing automation enables you to publish relevant, high-quality content at the right time across all your social media channels. Using Marketing Automation in the CRM The ultimate goal of marketing automation is to convert prospects into franchisees through sales opportunities. By using marketing automation at various stages, you’ll be able to track exactly where a candidate is in the recruitment process. When a prospect reaches a certain score, a lead will be automatically created in your CRM so that a sales representative or franchise development manager can quickly reach out to them. By implementing all these marketing automation actions, your candidate recruitment process will be streamlined, and you’ll be able to identify future franchisees more effectively. What are the advantages and disadvantages of marketing automation? Marketing automation offers many benefits for streamlining franchisee recruitment, but it does come with some limitations. Here is a brief summary of its pros and cons. Pros of marketing automation Significant time savings for the marketing and sales teams, allowing them to focus onother tasks High-impact marketing campaigns on the right channels with the right message Cost savings on marketing and sales campaigns Optimized conversion of leads into new franchisees Reduction in repetitive tasks Optimized digital marketing campaigns through results analysis Improvedeffectiveness of marketing campaigns through better targeting of[…]

Local SEO has become a key factor in improving online visibility; its goal is to drive more traffic to your franchisees. Our partner Mobilosoft, a specialist in local digital marketing, has compiled 7 tips to help your franchise network succeed. 1. Website: Ensure a consistent brand image for a top-notch customer experience. One of the goals of a franchise network is to offer a consistent customer experience across all franchise locations, whether in-store or online. Ensure your brand image is always top-notch by using the same branding across the national website and franchisee pages. Ideally, as a brand, you should include a “store locator” page on the national website and provide local pages associated with each franchisee. This ensures consistency in the brand image (theme, font, logo, etc.) and formats names, hours, and other details according to the same template. 2. Website: Incorporate Franchisees’ Unique Details into Their Local Pages Each franchisee has its own unique characteristics, including, of course, the address, but also hours of operation and the products and services offered. Here are 5 recommendations: Optimize the pages for local search: include the name of the neighborhood, town, or region, depending on the franchisee’s service area. This will help the pages rank for these search terms, provided they are properly structured within the webpage’s structured data schema. Include an interactive map (Google Maps or similar) on each local page. This allows users to easily locate the store. Describe accessibility options (public transportation, driving, etc.). Add images of the store, products, and staff. Include customer reviews specific to each franchisee. Certain platforms, such as Trustpilot and Google, can be automatically integrated into website pages using a plugin. 3. Leverage local pages on Google, Facebook, GPS, and industry directories. Create or claim pages for your franchisees on the platforms that generate the most traffic: Google (Business Profile), Facebook (Places), Bing, GPS navigation apps, and relevant industry directories. Note that each platform has its own specific requirements for organizing and linking national and local pages. Plan ahead on how to structure the accounts and access rights between the corporate headquarters and franchisees. 👉 Having pages on these different platforms allows franchisees to reach a wider audience and gain visibility. 4. Standardize data across different platforms Once the pages have been created or claimed, make sure the information is consistent across all platforms. Imagine if, across the website, Google, and Facebook, the opening hours weren’t up to date—especially for a holiday. Consumers wouldn’t know which information to trust, which would slow down their decision-making and purchasing process. 5. Highlight products and services specific to each franchisee. Although franchisees generally offer similar items, they have their own local specialties depending on the region, season, and other factors. Take advantage of the website’s local pages, as well as Google, Facebook, and other platforms, to promote these offerings. 💡 It’s a good idea to adjust your featured products based on seasons, occasions, events, and promotions.  6. Encourage local content strategies Local pages serve two purposes: to increase visibility through search engine optimization (SEO) and to generate positive engagement (customer reviews, comments, photos, etc.) to convert other website visitors. Depending on the size and brand recognition of the network, as well as its authority in the industry, various communication strategies can be applied to local pages. 🔍 Keep in mind that each platform (Google, Facebook, Instagram, etc.) has its own unique characteristics, of course. For example: On social media platforms like Facebook or Instagram, content specific to the store’s news (promotions, events, staff, etc.) generates on average 9 times more interactions (likes, comments, shares, etc.) than national “branded” content. 💡 Local content for a local audience. 7. Boost franchisees’ visibility with local Google and Facebook ads. The little extra? Boost your Facebook posts and invest in local Google Ads campaigns. These campaigns are specifically designed for local businesses looking to promote their locations easily and within a budget that works for them. This can help franchisees easily gain visibility within a specific radius around their location. Conclusion on Local Digital Marketing for a Franchise Local digital marketing is a powerful tool for a franchise network that organizes itself to take advantage of it. Centralize or decentralize day-to-day management between the corporate headquarters and franchisees, depending on your needs. Collaborate using tools to effortlessly manage a high-performing online presence. Ensure consistent communication that puts the local community at the center to drive more traffic and revenue for franchisees 🎯 Author, Mobilosoft, Article Title, Local Digital Marketing: 7 Tips for Franchise Success, Available on the Mobilosoft blog You might also be interested in these articles: