The Secrets to Marketing Your Franchise Opportunity on LinkedIn | Social Joey
Odds are that you’re marketing your franchise on the “traditional” social media networks. You may have an in-depth strategy in place to catch the attention of consumers on social media platforms including Facebook, Twitter, and even Instagram. But are you using social media effectively for franchise development?
While we often think of social media as a lighter, easier way to engage with a consumer audience, the truth is that it can be an effective B2B marketing tool, too. And marketing your franchise opportunity falls under that umbrella!
The trick is to use the right social media platform to help you make the connection. While the networks we mentioned above are great for catching customers’ eyes, LinkedIn is specifically geared toward professionals. That makes it your platform for catching the eyes of potential franchisees.
Whether you’re already using LinkedIn as part of your franchise development efforts or are ready to get started, our Social Joey team has some tips to help you capture attention—and leads. Read on as we share some insight.
How 2020 Impacted the Job Market
Let’s first consider why now is a great time to reassess your franchise development efforts.
A silver-lining to the difficulties of 2020 is that it served as a reset button for many people when it came to their careers, in some facet or another. As the United States grappled with the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic and stay-at-home orders and restrictions, businesses found themselves in the unfortunate position of needing to downsize or even cease operation.
As a result, many professionals found themselves without a job. Beyond those who lost their jobs, many others found themselves reassessing whether they wanted to stay in their current jobs. It became more difficult for parents to handle the constraints of a “normal” 9-to-5 job while also managing a household and potentially supervising children learning virtually.
Those looking for a change in landscape—and potentially the opportunity to be their own bosses—may look to franchising as a way to break into business ownership while still having a viable support system behind them.
Hence, the opportunity for those in franchise development to grab the attention of a brand-new audience of potential franchisees.
Why LinkedIn?
That’s an easy one! As of 2020, LinkedIn has more than 760 million users, including more than 260 million people who are active on the platform at least monthly.
Even more eye-opening? Around 40% of those LinkedIn users visit the site daily.
Beyond the basic numbers, a major benefit of marketing on LinkedIn is that the platform is well-trusted by its users. Professionals networking on the site are less likely to fear being scammed or otherwise hassled while perusing the pages and interacting with others.
It’s also important to consider the impact 2020 and the global pandemic had on social media in general—and LinkedIn more specifically.
As more of us spent more time at home during late spring and at different points throughout the year, social media use hit an all-time high. This includes a significant increase in both users and engagement for LinkedIn, probably as job seekers looked for opportunities.
While the unemployment numbers have improved since hitting record highs in 2020, the number of claims remains high. That means people continue to look for viable job options and new careers, fueling continued engagement on LinkedIn.
Many of those job seekers will likely look for positions related to the job they lost, but many others will look for new careers altogether. And there are also some people choosing to leave an existing career in hopes of finding a better work/life balance and more flexibility.
All of these factors combine to make LinkedIn the ideal place to spread the word about your brand and opportunities to franchise.
Keys to Effective Marketing on LinkedIn
So, you know that you should market your franchise opportunities on LinkedIn, but how can you make it work? We have a few tips on hitting the right notes with your franchise development marketing:
Polish Your Business Page
As is the case on any social media platform, when you’re marketing your business, you want to ensure your page or profile is clean and easy to read.
That means regularly reviewing it for accuracy and ensuring it contains pertinent information and details potential franchisees might be looking for.
You can also help people find your franchise opportunity by researching and placing pertinent keywords within the text on your profile. Putting them in your page headline and the summary can help make your page more “visible.”
Make Sure Your Website Is Up-to-Date
When you’re promoting your franchise opportunity on LinkedIn, you will often be linking to pertinent resources on your website. Those resources need to be in good shape.
Thoughtfully review your franchise dev website and ask yourself questions about the content. Is this information outdated? Are the photographs included inclusive of diversity and your audience? Are you answering questions that potential franchisees may have? Are there steps you can take to improve the user experience?
You also want to ensure that your entire website is mobile-optimized. Not only is this important for basic SEO reasons, but most of us view content online solely from a mobile device these days. If the material on your website becomes unreadable or funky when viewed on an iPad, you’ll repel the people you’re trying to reach.
Publish Good Content Consistently
No matter what social media platform you’re posting on, it’s important to publish content regularly. You want your audience to be able to rely on your brand for information—and that means setting a schedule and sticking to it.
But even more important than consistent frequency, you want to ensure you’re providing your audience with content worth viewing.
You might think that your “company updates,” as business posts on LinkedIn are called, should solely provide company updates. But you may want to rethink that.
In fact, using your page solely to hard-sell your franchise opportunity is the wrong approach in almost all cases, as LinkedIn itself will tell you. Yes, you want to sell your audience on your brand and your franchise opportunity.
But to do that effectively, you need to demonstrate that your brand is a thought-leader and the go-to expert in the industry. How?
Create a good blend of content to share in your company updates. Calls-to-action (CTAs) are one component, but they should be supplemented by posts related to external resources, such as:
- Articles about the pros and cons of franchising
- Timely content about good franchise concepts
- Tips and advice related to franchising and operating a business
- Current articles and research about your particular franchise industry
- Best practices related to becoming a franchisee, including how to obtain financing
When you’re reaching out to potential franchisees, you are targeting a group of people who may have questions and uncertainty about whether they’re making the right move. Providing them with guidance and help around when to franchise, how to franchise, and how to find success will ultimately endear your brand to them—and can turn them from potential leads into your next franchisees.
If marketing your franchise opportunity feels overwhelming, we’ve got what you need! Our team has years of experience catching the attention of potential franchisees for brands across the country. Reach out today to learn how we can help.