Generating more leads for your franchise or multi-location business has become one of the most anticipated benefits of search engine optimization (SEO). These are not random franchise leads either, but rather qualified and ready to convert.
But such results do not happen by accident. Whether you are a franchisor or a franchisee, you need to properly incorporate franchise SEO practices into your franchise marketing. Specifically, you should employ local SEO, which optimizes each of your locations and provides correct information to Google to improve your online presence.
For the most part, people searching for your products or services have purchase intentions, some intense and urgent. Ranking higher in their location-specific search results increases your chances of capturing them as leads. In this case, opportunities open up for both roles within the framework of the franchise. Franchisors can attract additional franchisees as part of their expansion. On the other hand, franchisees can convert more customers or clients to make their business successful in their respective areas.
Stay with us as we provide you with franchise marketing and local SEO tips to help you boost your franchise lead generation efforts and achieve coveted results.
Enterprise SEO, Local SEO and You
The franchise strategy tips we are about to share are connected to each other. An experienced franchise marketing agency can track these components for you, but it's also worth learning some of the strategies yourself. Here's a quick introduction to the basics, which you need to master if you want to attract high-value franchise leads:
What is franchise marketing?
Any form of marketing for franchises falls into this category. Broadcasting, print and radio are considered the traditional form of franchise advertising. So are coupons, direct mail, brochures, and other types of word-of-mouth marketing.
While traditional approaches still exist, the rise of mobile devices and faster internet speeds have led to changes in consumer behavior. For example, according to Google, 63 percent of purchases begin online, whether the purchase ends online or in a physical store. This has changed the focus on digital marketing, including franchise SEO.
What is enterprise SEO?
Enterprise-level SEO refers to large-scale optimization that involves companies serving a broad market. We're talking about websites with thousands or millions of pages, often with complex requirements in areas like project management, collaboration, and automation ( Search Engine Journal, 2020).
By this definition alone, franchise SEO is addressed at the enterprise level due to 1) the large number of pages a corporate website has (for example, it may have 200 location pages) and 2) the broad market a franchise is seeking. capture.
What is the importance of local SEO for franchises in generating franchise leads?
While brand guidelines can be set at the corporate or franchisor level, an enterprise SEO strategy should take national and local searches into account. What hangs in this balance is not only corporate brand consistency, but also the local search performance of each business location. Also, do franchisees distribute corporate content or create their own content? These are the types of complications that enterprise SEO aims to address through local SEO.
Because of this complex and complicated nature of franchise optimization, businesses can benefit from the insight of a well-versed enterprise SEO agency. Many profiles need to be tracked and accessed, such as your website, Google My Business profile, and Search Console account.
5 Ways to Increase Your Franchise Opportunities
Now is the time to implement local SEO strategies and services to attract potential customers to your franchise locations. Here are six tips to achieve your company's marketing goals:
1. Create pages for each location
Multi-location or franchise SEO requires you to create pages for each location on your site, making it easier for you to reach the right customers. When you apply this franchise strategy, your pages can rank high for relevant search terms, and this level of visibility can attract visitors to your site. Once potential customers are on your site, you can direct them to the nearest store or location.
Sounds doable, right?
A local SEO company with extensive experience would tell you, well, it depends. Whether it is 20 or 200 locations, our enterprise SEO company can take care of up to thousands, this strategy can only be successful if the following steps are completed:
- Keyword research – Identify which keywords to use for each location and how much traffic you can capture if you rank well for them.
- Competitive analysis – Target your local SEO services or campaigns for each location i.e. on-page optimization or off-page optimization (link building)
- Logical URL structure – Determines how you type your location URLs. A uniform resource locator or URL is the unique web address of each of the pages on your website. When it comes to URL structure, pick a writing system and stick with it. This way you can make navigation easier for users and easier indexing for search engines.
For example, a local SEO agency with multiple locations may use one of the following URL structures for all of their location pages:
example.com/locations/ for a list of all locations
example.com/locations/Texas/ for a list of all locations in a particular state
example.com/locations/Texas/Dallas/ for a list of locations in a city
2. Create and optimize your Google My Business listing
When users search for a local business on Google, the search engine displays a map and a list of three options at the top of the page. These are search results for Google Maps and Google Local 3-Pack, two Google properties that give brick-and-mortar and service-area businesses (the latter include plumbers, cleaners, etc.) a prime spot on results pages. of search engines. (SERPs).
With 93 percent of local searches featuring Google 3-Pack results, appearing on this property should increase your brand awareness, relevance, and credibility. If you're promoting franchises, you need to be ranking in one of their coveted spots, and the first step to doing so is to claim your Google My Business (GMB) listing.
Setting up a profile should be easy. But optimizing it may involve hiring a local SEO company. Just consider the complexity of Google's guidelines, which you must fully comply with for your locations to rank in these high-value results. An enterprise SEO services expert should be able to help you nail down tasks like maintaining separate listings for each location, including storefront information that reflects your real-world identity, and writing descriptions that draw users in immediately.
3. Ensure NAP consistency
Local citations for your franchise locations can appear anywhere on the web, from GMB and Yelp to blogs and public databases. Appointments are online mentions of your name, address and telephone number (NAP). And your NAP should match what appears on your website because Google uses citations to accurately rank local businesses on Google Maps .
Franchise marketing agency professionals emphasize that this is no small matter for your company's marketing efforts. Even slight variations, such as writing "St" in one place and "Street" in another, must be corrected to maintain the confidence of Google in your business. In turn, an accurate and consistent NAP across the board strengthens your reach and search rankings.
4. Take advantage of local keywords and geo modifiers
An experienced local SEO agency would suggest strategically placing location-based keywords, such as “fence installation contractors in Dallas, TX.” Here are some ideas on how to position your site in front of high-intent leads using geo modifiers:
- Include them in your title, meta description, and headings.
- Use them in your content naturally, integrating both exact keywords and their variants.
- Maximize long-tail keywords by addressing the problem embedded in them, such as how to find the best enterprise SEO company.
Now, what about keywords without geographic modifiers? We know not to waste non-geographic modifiers when trying to rank locally. But pulling off this trick may require the local SEO agency's sleight of hand: the constant nailing of the execution of the enterprise SEO strategy.
5. Use unified branding
As a franchisee doing franchise advertising, branding or marketing, you automatically benefit from the brand equity your franchisor has built. So, even if you have the freedom to develop your own website and advertising assets, make sure people recognize your logo and associate other visual elements such as fonts, icons, and color palette with your established corporate identity.
On the other hand, franchisors are responsible for an overall franchise strategy that includes the generation of brand guidelines. Experts at the enterprise SEO firm cite Starbucks' brand expression guide as an ideal model for this. The stylebook emphasizes the appearance of the Starbucks logo, which contributes to the customer experience, and professionals at enterprise SEO companies can even argue that it keeps sales growing.
Why work with an enterprise SEO company?
Local SEO for franchises has many components. Since Google's guidelines and best practices also change more frequently, it's valuable to have an experienced enterprise SEO company who can stay on top of things for you.
We align strategies with each individual client's goals, including improved franchise lead generation. Our offers They also range from local SEO services to a wide range of digital marketing solutions. We're not kidding when we say you have access to our team of industry experts. A client of ours with a multi-location property restoration company attested to this:
When you have some concerns or an issue that you need to address, there are several people who can come to the table to address the concerns from their knowledge base versus another agency that would only give you one or two people.
That synergy, by the way, generated around 46,000 qualified calls for this client in 2020.
