What every franchise owner should know about email marketing

When it comes to email marketing for franchise owners, things can get a little complicated. Franchise businesses have a very unique set of challenges, not only because there is the primary brand to focus on, but because each franchise location needs to function separately as well.

This can put franchise owners in a tricky spot. Sure, they have to think of the brand as a whole—but they also have to keep in mind that different franchisees have different things that they need to focus on in their unique locations; different challenges, different trends, different client base, etc.

While it may seem like a big ask to add email marketing to the list of everything else a franchise owner has to do, it’s absolutely necessary.

The numbers simply don’t lie—91% of US adults would rather receive promotional emails from companies that they do business with, making email marketing the number one way to reach consumers.

You want more reasons why franchise owners should invest in email marketing?

Build brand credibility across the franchise.

Probably the most critical reason why email marketing for franchise owners is so vital is that it helps to build brand credibility across the entire franchise, no matter how many locations there are.

The use of brand consistency creates brand credibility. Think about, if McDonald's didn’t have the same red and gold color scheme across all their marketing platforms, would you really consider stopping at that roadside stop instead of a notable chain restaurant?

Probably not.

Source: Really Good Emails

Brand credibility must include that consistency amongst all marketing aspects, including:

• Logos

• Imagery

• Color Schemes

• Fonts

• Language/Tone of Voice

Be consist with your email marketing efforts and watch the trust grow across all locations.

Helps to generate leads.

Word of mouth is the best method of spreading brand awareness, but if more franchise owners invested in email marketing, they could significantly increase their overall lead generation.

Sure, having a “sign up for our newsletter” option is excellent on a franchise website, and even on social media pages. However, when a consumer gets an exclusive email from a favorite brand to help spread awareness, they’re more likely to forward it to a friend, especially if it has an enticing incentive attached.

Just take this example from Tictail:

Source: Really Good Emails

Not only is it clear that they would like you to get your friends to join in, but the users get an additional 10% off their next purchase for referring a friend or loved one. Even better, the referred friend also receives an extra 10% off their first order.

That’s what we call a win-win-win, friends.

Not only does the subscriber get the incentive, but so does the new potential subscriber, all while the brand is getting a new name and email to add to their mailing list.

Improved communication with your audience.

Remember how we said that 91% of US adults would rather receive promotional emails from companies that they do business with? Well, the stats don’t end there:

• Email is almost 40x’s more effective than Facebook and Twitter combined in acquiring new customers.

• The chances of getting a click-through to your website are 6x’s more likely from an email campaign than from a tweet.

• An email is 5x’s more likely to be seen than a message via Facebook.

Moreover, that’s only the tip of the iceberg. We aren’t saying that franchises shouldn’t have social media accounts and engage with their fans there. In fact, social media pages are essential for franchises, especially for franchisees in different locations.

Those pages, however, should encourage fans to contact them through their email campaigns. This helps build a level of trust amongst fans and the franchise. Your email and social strategy should be closely integrated, complementing each other when and where it makes the most sense.

Increase website traffic.

Email marketing is an excellent way to help increase website traffic for franchise owners, especially if the franchise has unique content to share with their readers.

By including relevant content, such as what a local franchisee may be doing in their community, the franchise owner can help drive subscribers to the website to learn more. This is also an excellent way for a franchise to share curated content to help establish themselves as an authority on a topic that their niche covers.

Take this example from Vice Sports—they include a variety of information that their readers may find interesting. What they don’t do is give it all away, enticing the reader to click the links to learn more.

Source: Campaign Monitor

Gain valuable insight into your audience.

Email marketing is a great way for franchise owners to gather more valuable insight into their audience members than simply segmenting them into groups such as gender and age. Sure, these are useful bits of information; however, allowing your subscribers to fill out profiles and preferences are excellent ways to gain even more detailed information for you to help further serve them.

Source: Really Good Emails

The example from Remote.com is an excellent example of how to ask for more information in order to better the user experience.

Allow users to fill in information such as:

• Likes/interests

• Values

• Location

• Gender

• Age

• Social status

• Education status

• Subscription preferences

• Brand preferences

• Shopping preferences

Remember, keep it relevant to your franchise. So, for example, if your brand focuses on selling jewelry, you don’t have to ask them their political preferences. Make it about them, don’t merely farm for information—that only makes a franchise look like a scam.

Structuring an email marketing campaign for franchises.

Email marketing for franchises can be as complicated or as easy as the owner makes it. With the right tools and guidelines, this process can make marketing much easier for both the franchise owners and franchisees—and this is how.

Know your brand’s targeted audience.

We already talked about how email marketing can help increase communication between you and your subscribers, however, if you’re just beginning the process or entirely revamping your email marketing strategy, the first thing you’ll want to do is really define your targeted audience.

Source: Campaign Monitor

Depending on the brand, you’ll want to narrow down who the intended audience is. No brand can suit everyone’s needs—hence why trying to market to everyone will only lead to failure.

Franchise owners need to sit down and visualize the individual that would benefit the most from their product or services. Know their age, gender, values—as much information as it takes to literally visualize a person when you begin talking about your audience. The more you know, the easier it will be to market to them.

Build a brand consistent template.

Building a brand consistent template is another advantage to email marketing for franchise owners. This allows them to create a basic template that each franchisee can use and alter to their specific needs. Keep in mind all the aspects we mentioned earlier that need to stay the same across all locations.

Source: Emma HQ

Set up an approval process for all franchisees to follow.

Depending on the tools your franchise has in its marketing arsenal, you should be able to set up an approval process to have the final say on the campaigns that your franchisees send out. Doing this will help avoid any big mistakes and confusion.

Tools such as Emma HQ allow franchise owners to carefully monitor all the campaigns that are going out while still allowing each franchisee the freedom to create campaigns that will suit their given locations.

Source: Emma HQ

Keep an eye on the data.

Email marketing for franchise owners means nothing if they’re not carefully monitoring the results of their email campaigns.

The data matters so much. It’s why monitoring key performance indicators (KPIs) is essential. These are the numbers that will tell you if your campaigns are working or not.

Things such as your email open rate and click-through rate will tell you if your audience is opening the email and if they are clicking through to your website. If the numbers are too low, then you’ll know that your campaigns need some tweaking.

Other figures you’ll want to consider include:

• Conversion rate

• Email bounce rate

• User unsubscribe rate

• Spam rate

Source: Emma

Email marketing for franchise owners made simple.

Email marketing is a vital piece to any brand’s marketing strategy in the age of technology. Despite the unique challenges that franchise owners face, email marketing can be incredibly effective.

Email marketing can help:

• Increasing website traffic

• Increase lead generation

• Increase quality subscribers

• Improve communication with your audience

• Build trust

The Emma HQ platform was built with franchises in mind. It allows a franchise owner to have complete control over email marketing campaigns, all while letting each franchisee do their thing. Ready to implement email marketing for franchises into your action plan? Contact Emma today.