4 Ways to Capitalize on Your Franchise Brand Marketing Success and Keep Business Booming

Growth is one of the ultimate goals for a franchise business. But, even when business is booming, franchise brand marketers need to be strategic and proactive in order to ensure a well-running machine continues to thrive and evolve well into the future. 

There are a few essential things that successful franchise brands must focus on to keep the momentum going. 

1- Prioritize customer experience and service.

Just because your customers are happy now, it doesn't mean they will continue to reward you with their business if their experience goes south. Your customers should be at the core of all product, experience, marketing, and operational decisions. The more you invest in customer experience and service, the more happy customers you will have. 

Customer experience is also critical to customer retention. A study by Harvard Business School cited that boosting your customer retention rate by even 5% can increase profits anywhere from 25% to 95%. 

Customer relationships can’t become mere transactions. While customers can find similar menu items or services across many franchise brands, they stay loyal to the brands that make them feel appreciated.  

Rewarding customers with unique loyalty programs, continuing to deliver personal experiences, and listening to customer feedback will help ensure that you stay above the competition.

2. Focus on staff recruitment and retention.

Just as it’s critical to attract and retain loyal customers, it’s even more important to recruit and keep dedicated staff.  As many franchise brands have experienced in recent years, across a variety of categories from QSR to retail, being understaffed or having under-trained staff has a major impact on your business. 

With the competition for top local candidates at an all-time high, franchises must take an innovative approach to hire. Understanding your local community and candidate attributes allows you to launch custom recruiting campaigns for every role from financial and operations to front-line staff. 

In addition to competitive pay, benefits, and work-life balance, communication is also key to retaining employees.  According to Gallup’s State of the American Workplace report, higher employee engagement equates 24% greater retention and 21% higher profitability. Even at lower-than-ideal pay, 69% of employees would be less likely to quit if their company was more effective at communicating.

3. Differentiate from the competition. 

There are several franchise categories that have absolutely exploded in the past few years.  One of those is pizza.  Previously there were a handful of household name players with massive ad budgets and thousands of locations that dominated the pizza franchise industry. 

Today, there are dozens of pizza brands, that can be found from coast to coast, that are taking a big slice out of the competition. (pun intended)  Brands like Mountain Mike’s, &Pizza, and Blaze Pizza are firing up the industry through innovative crusts, top quality and locally sourced ingredients, artisanal touches, unique customer experiences, and unmatched employee benefits. 

It’s critical to be true to your own special sauce and focus on what makes your customer base come back for more. 

4. Evaluate your tech stack to improve efficiency. 

Digital innovation is critical to franchise brands today. Brands that focus on continually improving their digital infrastructure when it comes to ordering, customer experience, mobile touchpoints, operations, and marketing will accelerate in a crowded marketplace.

Technology has evolved at an unprecedented pace. Breaking out of what “has worked before” and staying on top of technologies that will help improve your business has never been more important.  From POS to apps, inventory management, and multi-location marketing platforms, there’s likely a technology that can even better optimize your business to take it to the next level. 

So, even when your brand has had a record-breaking year, it takes proactive measures to evaluate all of the ways that you can maintain and surpass that success. 

If you want to dig in more on the topic, read our guide to Transforming Multi-Location Digital Advertising - just click the button to open!