Grow From Here

Online Coupons Bringing In New Customers

CBC had an interesting interview recently related to the recent increases in online coupon usage.  They’re in huge demand these days and websites like Red Hot Deals are doing a booming business.  Online coupons can be a great way to attract customers and bring new people in to your location.   People are looking for ways to save money these days, and many are open to trying new suppliers/companies if they can get lower prices.  Coupons can be a great way to entice new customers, and the cost can be extremely low (close to non-existant) if you use online coupons.

Using the internet to distribute online coupons for some retailers has led to a reduction in catalouge production/distribution, saving both the consumer & the supplier money, not to mention lowering environmental impact by reducing paper waste.

Statistics on Online Coupon Usage:

Many retail franchises have traditionally used coupons to bring in new clients, and according to a site called Prospectiv, “Tough times are seeing more people using coupons – 72% of consumers are using more coupons than they did six months ago and three quarters say the state of the economy is the reason for doing so”.  This is strong evidence that using online coupons to promote your product(s) or service(s) is a sound marketing strategy.  When times change and new trends on consumer spending practices surface, they often become the norm for the long term rather just surfacing as a “fad”.

Prospectiv also quotes the following survey stats from polling 1,386 consumers, (August 2008): 

• 80% said they would be very likely or likely to increase their use of coupons if they could be tailored to their interests and delivered online.

• 87% of shoppers said they would be more likely to shop at a retailer that offered coupons.

• And the good news for newspapers: 47% found print and online coupons equally convenient, while just 9% reported online coupons were most convenient.

An article on how to market your coupons can be found at TamingTheBeast.net, where ideas such as; raising standard prices; offering a coupon sign up registry on your site; submitting your coupons to online coupon sites & setting up an affiliate program are discussed.

Creating Your Own Online & Print Coupons:

Other options are to create your own coupon(s) using websites such as MerchantCircle.com (for a fee, their service is to assist you with online advertising), or CouponsReady.com  (design your own coupon for your business website, or print distribution).  Each charges a fee for their service, but make the process of online coupon creation a relatively simple process.  Even better, you can set coupons up for free using Google Coupons.

Get set up with Coupons in 10 minutes or Less With Google:

If you’re not already set up on Google Maps, do that first (5 minutes).  Then go to www.google.com/local/add to create an online coupon for your company.

Best Practices, Business Growth, Communication, Franchise, Technology, Tips advertising, clients, consumers, creating, Design, distribute, economy, franchises, Google Coupons, Google Maps, ideas, marketing, new, offiliate, online coupons, polling, prices, print, product, promote, retailers, service, statistics, strategy, submitting, trends, usage

There are lots of blogs out there about franchising & particularly about how to buy or select a franchise.  When I started looking for blogs for franchisors, I had a very hard time finding good blogs with valuable information specifically for franchisors.  I tried Google searches, etc and kept coming up with blogs for franchisees.

Thanks to Twitter, I have come across a number of blogs providing high value information specifically for franchisors.

Top Five Blogs for Franchisors

Note: these are listed alphabetically not in order of preference – they’re all worth following!

1.  “CrappyToGood” by Christian Faulconer.

Christian Faulconer is the CEO of Franchise Foundry which focuses on helping new concepts with high growth potential.  Christian provides business advice and talks about how to achieve growth through franchising.  Nice short posts, thought-provoking…

Sample posts:

• Trust is the New Competitive Advantage
• Failure Is Not An Option, It’s a Requirement

 

2.  “Expert Franchise Guide” by Shelley Pearson. 

Shelley Pearson is working to solve one of small business owners’ biggest operational obstacles: access to decisive, experienced and cost effective franchise business guidance.   Shelley is also the developer of the Expert Franchise Guide. She aims to develop a progressive network of ethical franchisors who work together to improve the industry’s best business practices.

Sample posts:

• Economy Slowing… Franchising Hotting Up
• Where Government can help small business

 

3.  “Franchise Essentials” by Paul Segreto.

Paul Segreto is the Founder and President of FranchisEssentials.  He is a franchising veteran – for over twenty years he has exclusively served the franchise industry as a consultant and coach, senior-level corporate executive, activist, multi-unit franchisee and area developer.  Paul has a great collection of resources and sources of information on his blog, as well as his useful and informed posts that cover a variety of viewpoints with dexterity.

Sample posts:

• Franchise Growth – Are Concessions and Discounts Necessary
• Franchise Success & Web 2.0 

 

4.  “Franchise King” by Joel Libava

Joel Libava is a franchise consultant, so you might think his blog would fall under the category I first mentioned – blogs for franchisees.  It does.  But his blog made this list because it also offers a wide variety of information that can be useful to franchisors.  Look especially for information on social media marketing and check out his business advice links.  Follow trends in franchising and keep a finger on the pulse of a wide variety of information.

Sample posts:

• Using Franchise Brokers and Consultants
  Do You Know Anybody That is Financially Stressed?  Here’s A Way To Help Them 

 

5.  GrowFromHere by Katryn Harris

No modesty here; this list is not complete without this blog itself!  Depending what you are looking for, you can find technology tips, business strategy posts, book reviews, and even some fun stuff…  Suggest new topics you would like to see anytime, and post a comment if you know other good blogs for franchisors.  Let’s grow the list!

Best Practices, Communication, Time Savers

So You Want To Franchise Your Business by Harold Kestenbaum and Adina M Genn, 2008

This book  is jam-packed with ideas, suggestions, reminders and information.  It is invaluable for anyone who is thinking about franchising their business.  As a sidenote, I have been interviewing a number of franchisors about their experiences recently, and the most common advice they have for someone thinking about franchising is ‘know what you’re getting in to’ or ‘do your homework about franchising’ or some variant thereon, so this book is a great resource to help you do just that.

So You Want to Franchise Your Business contains four main sections, a useful add-on; guidelines for an operations manual, and lots of good stories – both success stories from franchisors and also warnings from franchisors who got some thing wrong.  The four sections are

1. Why Franchise?
2. Moving Forward (information about advisors, operations and so on)
3. Rolling It Out
4. Keeping it Going

I found Part 1 to be the most valuable.  As I kept reading, I realized I was mentally accumulating a huge to-do list, and it started to feel a bit overwhelming.  This is not a book to try and read in one sitting.  But do read it.

This is clearly written by people who have been through the wars (or, if they haven’t, have spent a lot of time with people who’ve been there!).  I was struck by the phrase ‘you get what you pay for’ – one franchisor I spoke with a couple of days ago was telling me what a disaster one particular attempt to do things with few resources had been for her in her early days.  There is also a good exploration of what makes a succesful operations manual (including a sample table of contents) and a whole chapter on exit strategies.  The exploration of what makes a suitable franchisee is also a nice combination of theory (fit, skills, attitude, funding) and practical (review committee, discovery day, earnings claims, etc).

Technology – Integrated Throughout

I have read a lot of books about franchising, and since I run a company that uses technology to help build businesses, I am always curious whether technology is even mentioned.  Often not.  With So You Want To Franchise Your Business, I was intrigued to find ways to benefit from technology running through the various sections:

• Chapter 6 talked about website and marketing tools, including how to provide branded sites to franchisees
• Chapter 8 talked about training tools and how beneficial automated or online training programs can be
• Chapter 9 was all about the website, including how it can support and strengthen branding, sales, quality assurance and lead generation
• Chapter 10 talked about advertising, building buzz online, internet marketing, public relations and electronic coupons
• Chapter 11 talked about online support; including internet training, the convenience of web access, the advantages of a strong audit trail, the benefits of communications tools and how to advance your branding.

This type of integration of technology into core business strategy can be a huge competitive advantage for franchises that see the value and implement it.  One franchisor said to me that technology had been her source of greatest expense & irritation, but had also provided opportunities for revenue and company growth that she would never have had otherwise.  So thank you to the two authors for including the technology thread in their exploration of how best to franchise your business.  And guess what?  You can find Adina Genn online via twitter at http://twitter.com/AdinaGenn (no real surprise there, right?).

Words of Wisdom/Quotes:

“For starters, not every business is franchisable.” (p. 10)

“Most franchisors agree that moving into the business of selling franchises is a tough transition….  So the more you know about the difficulties, the better equiped you may be at overcoming the challenges ahead.” (p. 21)

“If you have franchisees but do not have the appropriate infrastructure to handle them, it can lead to disaster.” (p. 34)

Past Book Reviews

Outliers by Malcom Gladwell

The Franchise E-Factor by Greg Nathan

What No One Ever Tells You About Franchising by Jan Norman

Book Review, Franchise, Technology

There are lots of online technical tools out there. I’m not a fan of tools that just let me play with technology, but the ones that actually forward business purposes are the gems. One good one (and free) is the Press Release Grader from HubSpot. Improve the quality of Press Releases that you send out & make them more effective by getting direct useful feedback before you release them.

“HubSpot’s Press Release Grader evaluates your press release and provides a marketing effectiveness score. This score is based upon basic factors from public relations experts including the language and content of the release, plus advanced factors from Internet marketing experts such as links and search engine optimization characteristics.” (from the Press release grader website).

To test the press release grader, I submitted a sample press release. The results were returned instantaneously, with a follow up email of the full report. The first screen returns a clear and concise analysis along with suggestions on how to improve the press release.

Some of the suggestions made on how to improve our press release were:

· The anchor text of the link did not seem to match any words in the page title of the target page. For Search Engine Optimization (SEO), use keywords in the anchor text that describe the page being linked to

· Press releases should contain 3 or more links to get the maximum SEO benefit.

· A standard practice when authoring press releases is to include an About section at the bottom of the release. Following this convention makes it easier for those interested in information about the organization mentioned in the release to find it.

· For a press release to have maximum value from a Search Engine Optimization (SEO) perspective, it should contain a hyperlink to the main website of the company.

· It is a standard practice of press releases to include special text at the end of the body of the release. This is usually ### (three pound signs) at the end of the text. This can be either ### or -30-. This special text is used by press release submission software to recognize where the official release ends.

· It is usually a good idea to get a link to your website earlier in the release than I had done in my sample

· (Love this one): This content contains 0 words that are considered gobbledygook (they are overused and lack specific meaning).

The report also offered two additional resources to assist with writing a press release: Which of these rookie mistakes are you making? and a link to join the Pro Marketers Group on LinkedIn

Even though my “grade” came back at a respectable 78/100, it is good to know which tweaks would make it even more effective. After all, the whole point of sending out press releases is to have them be noticed & generating PR for your business.  Five more minutes to know I’m not wasting my time sending it out is definitely a winner.

Past Technical Tips

Keyword Analysis Tool – Write Content that Works for You

Google Keywords Selector – Help the Right Customers Find You

Google Maps – Let Customers Find You

Google Alerts – Keep an eye on the Competition

Technology, Time Savers, Tips