Franchise Advisory Board | Expert Franchising Advice for Franchise Leaders

When you get the drummer of the Wild Boyz on the digital stage, Kurt Hurley is not likely to disappoint :) Join us for this week's episode to explore how the franchise development landscape has changed and how to pivot around the new opportunities arising from it. We dig deep into virtual discovery days, why they work, and how to leverage them. Kurt shares some insights into why franchisors and franchise brokers should be focusing their efforts on multi-unit franchise buyers. Then, we discuss how to leverage primary research to fuel effective marketing funnels and content marketing strategies that work to drive higher-quality franchise candidates that will be more successful. If you're involved in FranDev at all, you'll want to listen to this.

As a long-time skeptic of social media marketing and lead gen efforts, I was shocked to become a true believer in the value of Facebook and Instagram marketing for B2C and B2B sales models. Join expert Peter Lewis of 7X Direct to learn the best practices he and his team use to generate more than $1M of new revenue for a client in 7 months using just Facebook ads. He shares:- How to create a compelling offer & why that is important- How to narrow your audience properly using effective targeting- What's the best way to approach testing- The value of lead forms and how to use them- The power of thank you pages and how to use them to advance the lead experience- What to look for in an outsourced Social Media Lead Gen partner and how to pick one

Franchise PR and marketing is changing quickly, and the data trends are helping to reshape strategies to get better results - at least, that's what we discuss in this episode with Graham Chapman from 919 Marketing.Graham shared some solid insights into:- How to use marketing analytics to drive marketing decisions- What is changing in FranDev and Franchise marketing- How content around franchise innovation and leadership is shortening franchise sales processes and creating better leads (Red - we discussed something similar & Graham mentioned how Moran Family of Brands recently did a great job of this)- How to consolidate data across marketing and PR functions to get deeper insights to drive strategy- The new way to leverage PR and own media channels to get multi-piece content strategies to work (Stratus Building Solutions example was great)- Creating ideal client profiles based on real data for FranDev and franchise marketing and make sure marketing strategy and lead acquisition approach align with themEnjoy!

How do we end racism, bigotry and bias in our personal lives and in the workplace? May Snowden of Snowden and Associates, Inc., a leading expert in creating cultures of diversity and inclusion shares some deep insights into how to do it. Here are some of the insights we discussed. What is Prejudice? (Pre-judge) It is a preconceived opinion that is not based on reason or actual experience about a particular group. It is formed without adequate prior knowledge, thought, or reason. A prejudice can be positive or negative. Bias has a similar meaning: an inflexible predisposition to see certain things, events or category of people in a certain way (positive or negative based on their appearance, group kinships, or differences from you). Prejudice often relies on stereotypes, which are a set of oversimplified images, statements, and generalizations applied to a whole group of people, without regard for the individual. Stereotypes are often unconscious beliefs about a group of people. Then the stereotype is often applied to individual members. A belief that ALL members of the group match the stereotype. Prejudice, Bias, and Stereotypes are an internal belief. They are mental prejudgment, positive or negative, made about an individual. It’s not until you act it out in speech and behavior that others receive the impact. SIMPLIFIED, FIXED BELIEFS OR JUDGMENTS ABOUT A GROUP OF PEOPLEWho has it? Everyone – We all have an “affinity bias”. A definite preference for doing things the way we like to do them. And a tendency to warm up to or be comfortable with people like ourselves. No one is immune from bias.Where did it come from? They are Taught. No one is born prejudiced or biased. Family, Friends, Culture of Origin, Churches, Teachers, People of Influence in our lives, Media, Magazines, Movies, Past Experiences, Books, etc.What is Racism and How does it inform our Prejudice? Racism comes from the belief that race is equated with particular traits and capabilities. A belief that some races are superior to others. A belief that inherent differences among the various human races determine cultural or individual achievement, usually involving the idea that one’s own race is superior and has the right to rule others. Scientists and anthropologists have noted that race is a social construct, not a biological one.What are the benefits and detriments/disadvantages of being prejudice? What is Discrimination? Discrimination means Action. Treating a group of people unfairly because of a prejudice against them.How can we overcome Prejudice? Assess your own Biases, keep yourself accountable for the following 4Es:•Exposure•Experience•Education•Empathy

Join Franchise sales and marketing maven, Erica Tarnowski from 919 Marketing, as we explore some of the trends and shifts in buying and selling behavior in franchise development. Some of the key insights you'll want to hear are:- The evolution of the customer consideration process over the past few years- How franchisors and franchise marketing firms should to adapt to these trends to drive more sales- What FranDev teams are doing to improve their lead conversion rates and sales- How and why franchise marketers need to diversify their marketing channels and messaging to accommodate the changes in franchise buyer behavior- The importance of structuring, streamlining, and automating the FranDev lead response processEnjoy!

In this week's podcast, learn from a guru in the franchise development space, Red Boswell of International Franchise Professionals Group - IFPG. He shares FranDev best practices from a broker and a a Franchisor perspective, and we hone in on a few key points franchisors and brokers alike will want to pay attention to, including:- How franchise development teams have to approach their prospecting differently - Why franchise system leadership teams need to engage and create strong value to their franchisees to improve the validation process- Why in-house Franchise Development teams need to develop strong relationships with their broker network and vice versa- Why Franchise Brokers need to sell with a win-win-win in mind, or they won't last long

Lane is a fantastic professional with great experience in leading teams and running companies- from franchises to IBM to sales organizations generating $250M per year. In this episode, he shares insights into mindset management, we joke about and then seriously discuss how coaches can help elevate performance, and then we dive deep into how to identify the opportunity to pivot and how to overcome the fear of doing so. Our last point of discussion is around how Franchisors and Franchisees can strengthen their relationships and create a highly successful, collaborative partnership. If you work in the world of franchising, you have probably felt the strain of the franchisee relationship and wondered how to improve it. Listen in for some great advice.

Franchises and businesses looking for some expert advice on how to create a powerful branding strategy will want to check out this episode with Jed MorleyIn this episode of The Advisory Board Podcast, Jed shares decades of experience regarding:- how to extract your brand story from your clients and personnel - how to live your brand story and the consequences of not doing so- how to codify brand behaviors to enforce brand as part of your culture- how to create alignment across franchise systems or other multi-location businesses- how to nail your brand promise and use it as your guiding beacon for all messaging strategy. Enjoy!

What are the most pressing legal issues for franchise systems today? How are you changing your Items 19 and 20 to accommodate for the recent economic turmoil that's impacted your franchise system? How should you?How do you handle deviations from your FDD and franchise legal agreements to accommodate changes needed to weather the current economic storm? Listen to Christian Thompson from The Franchise & Business Law Group in this week's episode from The Advisory Board Podcast as he shares some insights and actionable advice that all franchise systems should be paying attention to... after all, his team has been in Franchise law for more than 40 years.Key topics we cover are:- How to encourage and not create legal issues by Zor and Zee innovation- Negotiating lease agreement issues during closures- Legal issues we you should be monitoring during this time of reopening- Do's and Don'ts of Zee termination and resale

If you are trying to cut through the noise of the marketplace and reach a targeted audience quickly, direct mail can be a powerful tool to do it. In this episode of The Advisory Board Podcast, listen to direct marketing expert, Angie Bynum, who shares insights into B2B and B2C direct mail marketing strategies that actually work. We cover:How to build an effective direct mail strategy?B2B vs B2C direct mail - what works best?What are the best types of items to send?How to balance budget and impact with direct mail?How can you send your items to make them stand out?What are some good/bad examples of direct mail campaigns?Want the transcript? Here it is!Dave Hansen (00:02):Hey Angie, thanks everybody for joining this episode of the advisory board podcast. I am joined today by the lovely Angie Bynum who is the founder and CEO of Villager Magazine and an expert in direct marketing. Angie, I don't want to elaborate too much on it. Why don't you add a little bit of color to that? What else should everyone know as they listen to this about you?Angie Bynum (00:24):Just a quick introduction of where we started out about 11 years ago. We had another business and our biggest challenge was figuring out how to market our business in an affordable way, targeted way. It really was our biggest challenge in our company and so we ended up creating our own direct mail piece. And fast forward 11 years, it started out as just a really small community magazine and now we mail to about 200,000 homes and we've franchised and done some fun things with that. But then in addition to that, we've just added to our marketing toolkit, I guess. And, and we sent out all sorts of funds, direct mail pieces now and, and we just love marketing and everything to do with advertising but mainly direct mail. So. Right.Dave Hansen (01:18):Well I'm glad we've got you on the call and I think let's start off with something a little bit lighter and fun. Maybe a couple of examples, but tell me, tell me a little bit about maybe some of the coolest or most effective or even the funniest direct mail pieces that you've seen people use before that have been effective.Angie Bynum (01:35):So we'll, we've done, I mean it's been 11 year honestly. I mean sometimes we're pushing companies to be, you know, kind of fun and whimsical and do different things that stand out. One is funny and this is actually an interesting thing. We had a company do a split test, actually a local plastic surgeon office that offer a hair restoration treatment that is really unique. I think they're the only ones in Utah that offer it. And we did a funny split test ad campaign and they sent half of their ads without was very attractive young man with a super thick full and apparently other one was just this funny old guy that, you know, had the comb-over in the hole, you know, you know what some people are trying to avoid these days and did a split test and it was funny. The interesting thing is the young guy with the hopeful head of hair one, so the funny guy with the comb-over but, but yeah, we did that and we then were creative I think funny. It's hard to get companies to step out and do something funny and whimsical even though they're super effective campaign. You actually were telling me about a campaign you recently did that I think is super superb, so maybe you should tell that.Dave Hansen (03:00):Oh no. Well I in my bag, I've got a good buddy that I was an early friend of mine professionally who did direct mail. So I've always loved this concept. And I'll, I'll maybe I'll share a story too, cause I'll share one of his stories even though it's not yours. It's funny. But so we were going to a recent event. You're talking about the floppy disks, right? Okay. So we're going to an event now, you know, client ever. We're CRM with sales automation on online reputation, blah, blah blah, right? A technology platform designed for franchise. And so we're going to a franchising conference. So we, we hand picked about, about I think about 250 people that we wanted to send a direct mail piece to. And we got a floppiness like the three and a three and a half floppies and we put a label on them and then we put them in, you know, padded envelopes, handwritten addresses, and sent them out. And and the label, I can't remember what it said exactly, but something to the effect of, Hey, is your, is your franchise? You know, CRM software a little bit out of date. You know,Angie Bynum (04:00):When you told me that, I just thought that is brilliant. And first of all, like can you even find floppy disks anymore? So I don't know where you came up with 250 sloppy disks, but I think that's super fun secrets you can find anything on eBay. So the thing I loved about that, like it was whimsical and fun, but anything in direct mail and really any type of marketing, but especially if you're going to have the extensive postage and sending something off, you want to have something that really engages the recipient. And then the other thing that I think was so great about that campaign you spent sent out is a package like that is going to make it up to the decision maker. You know, even if it's just a funny little piece you know, it was going to make it to the hands that you want to get to, you know, it's not going to be, you know intercepted by a gatekeeper. So I thought that was a really fun idea.Dave Hansen (04:58):Yeah. I mean even during the recent days I would still have opened up any handwritten envelope sent to me cause I'm like, Oh, what's this? This is cool. Like no people are, and maybe, maybe I can share a funny, like a really interesting story. So a friend of mine, Chris Salway and I'll tell, I'll tag them when I post this cause he's, he worked for a direct marketing guru for years, but they did like really weird stuff. And he told me about his campaign. He actually sent me one in the mail while he was working for this guy who was a canoe paddle. So you know like like five feet long on the blade of the Knute paddle. They use that real estate to put like vinyl lettering that said something like I can't like are you, is your, is your sales automation technology for Creek?Dave Hansen (05:39):I can't remember what it was exactly, but to get to the CEOs of fortune 500 companies and so to these guys, I mean the cost to get involved with these guys, for this tech company they were working for was astronomical and just unlikely. And so they did this campaign and he, the funniest part about it was, you know, the ROI was like 12000% ROI. It was like a crazy high ROI. He said, but we would get phone calls about the campaign and people would be, so they would think it was so creative. They'd call him up and say, I had three people follow the package from the mail room to sit in my office while I opened your canoe paddle. That was G they'd have an entourage. Cause what was the last time you saw somebody ship a canoe paddle into a corporate American office?Angie Bynum (06:24):Right, right. Well it's really fun. There's a piece that I came out of an ad agency in Canada and I think a couple of agencies since then has duplicated it. And I did like anybody listening to this Google cardboard record player ad campaign. And they actually took a piece of cardboard that folded. You opened it and there was an actual 45 record inside and the cardboard could fold and you know, they had a pin and everything and you actually stuck in a pencil and rotated the record and it would place the messaging. And it was, I mean it actually wasn't a crazy expensive campaign. You know, probably the paddle was much, much more expensive, but it just, you know, it took off like wildfire and it's actually one of the most well known direct mail campaigns ever just because it was so unique. And then it also engaged the recipient. And so, you know, a piece like that probably was passed around the whole office shown to their colleagues, you know, just, you know, really made the rounds and that's, you know, that's the ultimate goal of every marketing campaign is to get as many eyeballs as possible. So, so fun. Yeah. Fun piece like that.Dave Hansen (07:41):Totally agree. You know, and I think we could almost spend the whole show just sharing creative and funny ideas of the whole episode. But it brings me to, to wonder, like, I've also seen really terrible direct marketing pieces where people say like they're trying to do it, but literally send me like a foam Chachi in the mail. I'm like, why? Why I should, I had somebody wants, they met and they sent me a, a poop emoji, a phone poop emoji in the mail. And I was like, I don't know yet. It had their name on it. And I was like, let me get this straight. You just sent me, there was some sales technology company at the time, I was VP of sales at a translation company and they're like, eh, but they're trying to get me to use their service. I'm like, you just sent me a foam poop emoji with your logo on it because you want me to use your cell service. Like there was no connection, no emotional connection. I was like, well that was a pretty crappy campaign, pun intended. And they wasted so much shipping cause it was in walks, you know?Angie Bynum (08:36):Yeah. Whatever I can say is that would probably a really, really expensive campaign. And I do think that sometimes in marketing we get, you know, we might fall in love with our own ideas and really, you know, thinks that we, you know, this is going to be so funny or this is going to be so, you know, get so much attention. And it might get, but you've got to know your audience and you also have to have the ability to kind of step outside yourself and say, okay, if I received this from a random company I've never heard of, is that something I want to get? And I'm like, well, I'm actually working with a couple of companies right now that we're sending a nice little care package that we'll have a little bottle of hand sanitizer that'