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Create and maintain positive publicity for your franchise brand.

By Heather Ripley
 
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Getting great publicity is one thing. Building positive momentum, and using it to its maximum benefit, is another. 
 
With more competition in the franchise industry, franchisors must explore new ways to keep their brand in front of the public. Good, steady media coverage can help you raise brand awareness, stand out from competitors, and turn inbound calls and web traffic into loyal franchisees and customers. And it can help you weather the storms that will inevitably come.
 
Earned media is vastly preferable to paid media because anyone can buy an ad. Having a journalist tell your company’s story adds value and gets you instant credibility. When you use that coverage cleverly, it gets you traction and positions you as an expert. Now you’re on that journalist’s contact list, which means you may get a call the next time he needs an expert source — and that gets your business more positive mentions and Google hits.
Making great publicity last 
Even the best publicity will quickly become yesterday’s news if it just sits on your CEO’s desk gathering dust. While putting it on your website will help short-term, after several months it gets stale and is forgotten. The idea is to keep that article working for you.
  • Make it pop on your website. When you get prominent coverage, display it front and center. Catch the attention of anyone who found you on Google and came to your website. Consider creating an “As seen on…” section on your home page.
  • Don’t forget about social media. Tweet it. Share it. Make it a post on LinkedIn. Then keep leveraging it by bringing up different aspects of the coverage. This keeps you at the top of the minds of target customers.
  • Make your emails eye-catching. When you go through your email inbox in the mornings, you probably make quick decisions as to what’s worth reading and what isn’t. Grab readers’ attention by mentioning your article in your subject line.

Keep the momentum going

Everyone wants to talk about the most popular person, so it’s important to stay in the spotlight. It’s a lot easier to get the next big story when you already have one under your belt. Keep the momentum going. 
 
Franchises need someone who knows and understands the franchising industry and can help generate regular media interest for your brand, create website content, manage your social media platforms, and drive greater interest in your products and services.
 
You need great stories with interesting angles, and these stories need to be pitched to media contacts who will be interested and will take action. This takes talented, creative writers with the instinct to create news by tying your franchise — and a story surrounding it — to topical trends or hard news events. And they should know how to turn up the heat when a big story comes up.
 
They also should be skilled at making social media work for you by creating content, managing updates, and sharing important information through Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, blogs and other social media platforms. Posts on these platforms can be used to generate leads if done in the right way.
 
Social media and internet presence go hand in hand, but they are not synonymous. Both should be leveraged to your advantage. That means dominating the first Google search page with a variety of information from different sources. Then, potential customers or franchisees don’t have to wade through pages of search criteria before they find you.

Protecting your credibility

It’s important to realize that in the public eye, your franchisees are all linked to their corporate parent. What impacts one, impacts everyone. An incident involving a well-known name is far more likely to be widely reported than the same incident at a local small business. Those headlines would be linked to your entire franchise system, not necessarily the franchisee’s location. And that could have negative effects on your entire franchise brand.
 
First, head off bad news. Watch news feeds. Have Google alerts set up so you’ll know when you or your company gets mentioned online. Watch your reviews, and when a negative one is posted, respond immediately by showcasing the positive aspects of your business. This strategy doesn’t make negative reviews disappear, but it helps outweigh the negative with the positive. 
 
Second, a crisis communications plan should be in place so everyone knows what to do when something bad happens. It could be a bad review, a product malfunction, or an employee scandal. How you handle it is imperative. Some key points:
  • Have a team in place to manage emergencies, with all members available 24/7.
  • Designate spokespeople, and list them by name in the crisis communications plan. They should be high-level people, knowledgeable in their field. 
  • At the same time, realize that the media may not stick to the script. Everyone in the organization should know how to handle it if questioned by the media. Hold media training for everyone who could be interviewed. 
  • Hold drills and exercises to give everyone real-world practice.
  • Have social media posts, statements and press releases pre-written for use in case of emergency. 
The key is to tell the truth, tell it all, and tell it quickly. That strategy has proved itself repeatedly. Having a crisis management plan allows you to respond promptly, accurately and confidently during a crisis and in the hours or days that follow. The credibility of your franchise can be positively or negatively impacted by public perceptions as to how the incident is handled.
 
Third, know how you’re going to recover. One way is to reach out to the third-party media who have already helped you get to this point through their positive press. 
 
Success begins with positive publicity. This makes you a household name in every good way. It keeps your reputation and credibility intact when bad things happen. And it gives your business the best opportunity to stay at the top and dominate its market, year in and year out. 
 
Heather Ripley is the Founder and CEO of Ripley PR. She is a guest contributor to Entrepreneur.com, as well as numerous national and international franchising magazines and trade publications.

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