Franchising in Australia is a $144 billion dollar industry, with many of our franchises operating internationally and nation-wide. Australian franchises can be traced back to the 1970s with the expansion of US fast-food chains, which started to penetrate the Australian market. Initially franchising was a specialised marketing strategy, however, the industry has grown rapidly and now the competition is extremely fierce. In order to stay ahead of the game, franchisees need to implement effective digital marketing strategies and tactics. According to a US Digital Marketing Agency, the top three lead generating channels include the following:
a) referrals, accounting for 63% of leads;
b) social media, accounting for 55% of leads;
c) and SEO, accounting for 39% of leads.
It is interesting to note, that upon first glance intuitively you might think of referrals as being predominantly word of mouth (WOM), however, with the advent of social media a significant amount of referrals and WOM take place online now. Therefore, a strategic social campaign in order to generate customer driven referrals both online and off, should be at the top of the priority list in terms of digital strategies for your Franchise. Furthermore, an effective social media presence is able to not only generate more leads, but also add to Brand equity and Brand resonance.
Lastly the importance of a good SEO strategy is essential for increasing leads and in turn sales growth. However, due to the localised nature of Franchise outlets, a local SEO strategy as opposed to a traditional one is important because:
1) 89% of consumers search for local businesses on their smart phones in any given week;
2) 86% of consumers look for the location of a business on Google maps;
3) 76% of successful searches will result in a phone call;
4) 71% of consumers will look up a local business before visiting it for the first time.
Therefore, ensuring your SEO is localised and is geared towards consumer behaviour, will in turn increase the sales revenue and growth of your franchise, ensuring you stay ahead of an ever increasingly competitive industry.
Thank you for reading,
Warm Regards,
Eddie
featured image: http://www.snopes.com
Very interesting post 🙂 ! This really sum up well the digital strategies franchises can follow to grow and get ahead of the game. I personally use a lot the localisation tool on Instagram for example to see what food look like in a restaurant or what is the vibe of a club. I think these franchises need to take advantage of all the opportunities social media offer them to improve their SEO strategy.
Absolutely, localisation is critical for small outlets and leveraging digital and SEO is in my opinion a must in today’s society.
Interesting statistics Eddie! I didn’t realise how important setting up a good SEO strategy for franchises is. I initially thought the company itself does the majority of the SEO and these franchises just wait for foot traffic. I guess implementing their own strategies definitely serves as an added bonus. Local marketing can be extremely important as well and possibly using traditional marketing strategies could help as well (handing out flyers/discounts).
Yeah I’m not sure how it works internally, but I guess SEO for a flagship website globally isn’t going to drive leads or sales for Starbucks in Chadstone, therefore local SEO for franchises and SMEs alike is a critical strategy in my opinion.
Hey there, nice post! I think localising SEO is an important strategy for franchises, especially since each different location may present a different feel or products. While social media campaigns initially attract customers, it’s the localised SEO that will convert those leads. Looking up a business and being confused with trading hours or location could drive those potential customers away before the franchise even had a chance to present themselves. Focusing on SEO is an easy and cheap strategy that companies should definitely be taking advantage of 🙂
Totally agree, and with a long tail keyword approach you are ensuring that consumers who are already intent of a purchase are gaining access to your business and specific products or services.
Interesting analysis~ Great suggestions of strategies for franchise~ Can you give a few suggestions on how to generate customer driven referrals online?
Thanks for commenting, customer referrals online could be generated by giving out referral discounts if they refer a customer through facebook, other than that maintaining a good content marketing strategy is likely to generate indirect referrals.