Know-How Exchange : Branding

Having owned a franchise, and worked for a franchisor, we thought our first hand experience might be of some value. First, you will probably hear from franchisees in various regions that "corporate" doesn't have the right message or advertising for their geographic location. Or, perhaps at a higher level, they feel the corporation does not have a clear vision for the brand.

If you have no clear vision, you need to take time to identify what core values (attributes) you want the brand to stand for in the market. Then engage your team in identifying how those values can be delivered every day to their customers.

Communicate those values throughout your organization at the corp level and the franchisee level. (as a side note - future franchisees should be screened so that you only accept those that believe in and will live the brand values.)

Have brand "cascading" session with your franchisees to ensure they understand the brand vision. Ask them to identify ways in which they can deliver on the brand promise every day. If they tell you how they can do this, it will become much more actionable than if you tell them how they must live the brand.

Create a council of key franchisees from various regions. Just a small group of people who have a positive outlook and are looking for solutions. Ask them to assist you in being an evangelist for the brand. this group can also be a catalist for identifying how your brand is different from competitors and how best to position your brand so it's different as well as credible.


If you have an ad agency, share these values/attributes with them so that all advertising communicates in a way that is consistent with these values. If you handle this internally, you can distill these values to the team and ask them to use this as a filter for all marcom. You should develop a brand style guide that includes not only how the brand is communicated in terms of look and feel, but also provides details on the messaging architecture as well.

At the tactical level - as you develop advertising for the regions - first develop a calendar of events so they know what ads will be placed, where and when, as well as the offer. The calendar is helpful so they can plan their adjunct advertising to support what you are doing at the corp level. If you are running TV spots, then they can plan other supporting ads/media to increase overall awareness and sales.

Develop templates of ads and post them on your website for franchisees so that they can use the ads that are most applicable to their needs. And allow for a multitude of formats for various publications. A helpful resource for us was the website with all the ads that we could send to our local media for publication. This saved considerable time and money! Plus, we also had radio spots we could pull and send to the local radio stations. Everything was readily available to us and it made our lives so much easier.

Bottom line is corporate needs to take the lead on defining the brand then creates marcom that is on-strategy with the brand. All ads should follow the brand standards and guidelines corp. has established. Please, don't expect that your franchisees to be marketing savvy. Help them understand there is a process to marketing just as their is a process to running their business.

We'd also recommend - if you have mulitple franchisees in a city - that they form their own marcom council. They can make this quite formal (with bylaws, officers, dues, etc.) or just keep it informal and just meet to share ideas. (Our council was formal and the dues were used for county wide advertising and events so that we could gain greater purchasing power and awarenss in the region.)

Have a way to track results and share them. Admit when a campaign was not as effective as you would have liked, and change when needed.

As you grow the number of franchisees - be sure you grow your operational support area so that the franchisees don't feel you are not there to help them. This is typically the biggest mistake a franchisor makes. They love to grow quickly, but fail to put the infrastructure in place to support the growth long term.

Hope this helps!

Steve and Elaine