Marketing Your Franchise Based System

Until you have sold your first franchise you won’t know the cause and effect of your marketing efforts. As soon as the first franchise is sold and all the paperwork has been signed and the check is in your hand, business starts to make its mark and rear its capitalist head. Funny statement, but nonetheless true.
Think of the process by which you made that first franchise sale. You began with some advertising either by print, media or word of mouth. Still the message you had something for sale made its way to the right person. Often the first buyer is an employee of your newly franchised business. Now the fun begins. With the sale come the after-effects of making sure it is flowing in the proper direction – towards profit.
With franchising, most franchisors won’t see a return until they have sold a number of franchises and this takes some advertising. When it comes to advertising nothing is more effective than doing so in a large enough group. With 10 or more franchises comes a lower ROI when it comes to advertising dollars. If all 10 franchises were putting in a fair portion of advertising costs it then lowers the cost for all members yet increases the market share.

All franchises should have some form of Advertising Agreement and are typically the rules by which to follow when forming an advertising coalition or small media group between franchisees. You as the franchisor grant the right to the franchisees to form an advertising group and use their advertising dollars as they see fit. All of this and more should be in that contract and will often determine final say on verbiage and design. Check your marketing contract contained within your FDD, it speaks volumes on how a franchisor operates and control paperwork.