Use Social Media to Build Brand Awareness

Social Media offers emerging franchisors a wonderful tool to build their brands globally.  People invest in franchises partly because they want to benefit from the brand awareness that future customers already have. However, for the majority of small businesses that decide to franchise brand awareness is confined to their local markets; and, building it throughout the country has been traditionally quite costly. Things have changed; today social media makes building brand awareness easier and less costly than in the past.

So, how do you do it? Get active. Tell the world about your company and about your franchise opportunity. Provide valuable information to people and you will build your brand outside of your local boundaries.

How to use Social Media to build your brand

• Twitter —

  • Chose a background for your Twitter page that is reflective of your brand. Don’t use the standard one.
  • In addition to contact information and a brief description of your company, make sure your page mentions that you offer franchise opportunities. A simple phrase such as “franchises available” suffices. Add an asterisk to the phrase to point to the disclaimer on your website.
  • Use your company’s name as your Twitter Handle (Twitter Handle=your Twitter user name or Id). 
  • Use your logo as your picture to create more brand awareness.
  • Search for words related to your business and/or industry and start following people who Tweet about these topics.
  • Ask your customers/clients to follow you. Check those they are following and those who are following them. Add them to your followers.
  • Use Local Chirps to find who uses Twitter in your community. Do a search for your city, you can specify the radius of the search. Follow people who fit your customer’s profile, and follow local media. Tweet coupons and discounts.
  • Add a “follow me” icon to your website.
  • Add your Twitter handle link to your email signature, newsletters and to any printed materials.
  • When following others observe the following rules of Twitter etiquette:
    • Follow those who follow you (unless they are sending spam or offensive Tweets).
    • Don’t use an automatic ‘thank you’ Direct Message (DM) response to followers. They want to connect with a person. Show them you care.
    • Don’t add more than 10 to 15 followers a day this allows time for people to follow you back.
    • Thank people who resend your messages (Re-tweet or RT). They are helping you reach their followers and build your brand.
  • Make sure you tweet information that is relevant and useful. Don’t just sell, provide value.
  • Tweet often.

•   Facebook —

  • Create a business page NOT an individual profile. Profiles are for people while Pages are for businesses. Pages are public and will help with your ranking in searches.
  • Make sure you brand your page. Make it engaging. Use YouTube videos.
  • Tell all your customers about your page and ask them to become fans.
  • Add your Facebook page info to your email signature, newsletters and to any printed materials.
  • To increase your fans, start contests or try give aways or discounts to those who become fans.
  • Consider using Facebook’s ads to increase your visibility.

•  YouTube

  • Depending on your business, YouTube can create a loyal following and brand awareness.
  • Create an account and start loading professional, useful and fun videos. People want to watch fun things! Remember, professional does not mean boring!
  • Post the videos on your Facebook Fan Page as well as on your website.

• LinkedIn

LinkedIn is a networking social medium for professionals; and, for certain businesses, LinkedIn doesn’t produce results commensurate with the required effort. However, if your franchise is mostly B2B, LinkedIn may be a good resource. It’s also a great vehicle for getting franchise candidates for most companies since most franchisees were employed professionals prior to investing in a franchise and as a professional were probably already using LinkedIn.

•  
  • Create a profile for the Founder/CEO and make sure it is 100% completed. Other senior managers can also create profiles and get active promoting the business.
  • Use the description effectively to describe what your company does.
  • Look for groups to join and become an expert participant.
  • Consider creating your own group.
  • Answer people’s questions.
  • Start with the people you know and connect with them; also connect with people in your groups.