5 Tips for Marketing Your Graphic Design Franchise

You’ve put together the perfect business plan, found the perfect premises, bought your equipment, and identified your key demographics. But, at the moment you need them the most, you have no customers. After everything, you might have forgotten to get your marketing plan right. In this article, we’re going to cover the bases of what a good marketing strategy looks like, and how to market your graphic design franchise better.

When it comes to launching your graphic design franchise in the right way, you need to make sure your marketing is up-to-scratch. After all, going through all the motions of getting an exciting new business means nothing if none of your customers know when your opening or where to find you. 

5 Key Marketing tips

1. Invest in the right software 

Marketing is a far cry from the ‘gut feeling’ approach of a few years ago. No longer does ‘wait and see’ count as a marketing strategy; today, your marketing needs to be far more advanced.

Data-driven marketing is the approach of optimising brand communications based on customer information. Data-driven marketers use customer data to predict their needs, desires, and future behaviours. Such insight helps develop personalised marketing strategies for the highest possible return on investment (ROI).
- Adverity

Before you start putting together your calendar of adverts and events, you need to get hold of the right people or software. Investing in data facilities will allow you to gather huge sums of data that will give you detailed insights into how your customers are behaving. This should be ground zero for every new franchisee: without the right data, you can’t guarantee you will reach your future customers at all.

2. Work out your demographics 

So, you’ve got the right data software. What next? You now need to work out who you need to be targeting. Figuring out the answers to some of the below questions is a good place to start:

• Who is clicking on your website? 
• Who is staying on your website? 
• Who isn’t? 
• What pages are visitors most interested in? 
• Are visitors to your web page checking out with certain products and services?

You’ll need to figure out how best to reach the customers most likely to buy from you. The graphic design industry is competitive, so if your marketing isn’t reaching the people it’s supposed to, you aren’t going to be able to challenge your competitors.

3. Update your online identity

A whopping 88% of online website visitors are less likely to return to a website after a poor experience [Gomez]. Now more than ever, you need to be selling your graphic design skills online, so your websites and social media channels need to be up-to-date and impressive.

Marketing online can be perilous for many smaller businesses. Although there are far more opportunities for finding new customers, there are also many new ways that customers can be turned away from your business. Thankfully, this is an area where franchising can prove to be very useful. 

As a franchisee, you’ll have plenty of additional training and support to help you get your business going. You’ll also benefit from many of the pre-arranged marketing strategies that your franchisor has already developed. You aren’t the first new franchisee, and you won’t be the last, so make sure you speak to your franchisor about the different ways they can help you.

4. Be unique

Most franchises won’t require you to have had previous experience within the industry before joining. That means that while you may come from different professions and experiences, you can still bring these experiences to bear as a franchisee.

You should make sure to embrace this uniqueness in your marketing. Few customers want to shop at a big business, with little attention to detail, and little individuality. Embrace uniqueness, different ways of working and be sure to make sure that the personality of you, your business, and your employees shines through. 

5. Take on feedback

Marketing is changing all the time, and as a franchise business owner, you can’t be expected to keep on top of all of the new and evolving trends. That’s why you need to be willing and able to both listen to and respond to feedback.

Customers know what they want, and if your website or social media isn’t right, you need to find out from them why that is the case. Include reliable ways for customers to contact you and give you feedback. 

This extends to your franchisor as well. Pursue continuous opportunities for development and education. If your franchisor changes the way they market the business, or comes up with new marketing strategies, keep yourself up-to-date with everything. 

Low-quality feedback is not useful, positive feedback is undervalued, and negative feedback delivered unskillfully can actually cause physical pain… When delivered thoughtfully, however, feedback can provide leaders with the actionable data they need to become more effective.
- Jennifer Porter, Managing Partner of The Boda Group

Improve your marketing and take your graphic design business to the next level

Marketing is everything in the modern economy. Without the right marketing, you could struggle to draw the right customers in. But get it right, and the rewards will be all yours. These have been just a few tips on things you should do, but there are also certain things that you shouldn’t do, so if you want to know how to avoid making some big marketing mistakes, you should consult some other resources on Point Franchise.

If franchising sounds like the right opportunity for you, but maybe the graphic design industry isn’t, there are still many other franchising opportunities out there. On the UK franchise directory, you can select and filter through many of the different sectors and opportunities available to you, so you’re sure to find a franchise that fits your needs.