Whether it’s a business, franchise, service organization, or some other enterprise, engaging and retaining customers is your most important function. Where do you start? November’s blog posts here at Superior have been all about getting your marketing campaign off the ground and creating customer loyalty.
It’s always a good idea to work on improving your marketing efforts whenever possible, and every business comes at this from a different angle. For franchises, development marketing is often even more complex. As a franchisor you have to market yourself to prospective franchisees and to potential consumers. It might sound like exhausting work, and in many ways it is, but it can be very rewarding.
Getting Off the Ground By Engaging Potential Customers
These are the nitty-gritty everyday marketing best practices that all businesses need to survive in a crowded market. Don’t cut any corners. Design a SEO-optimized website and drive its visibility with content, CTAs, offers, a social media strategy, the list goes on, and we could too, but we want to talk more about two marketing methods that are often overlooked: Print and QR Codes.
Print Marketing – Documents, business cards, whitepapers, you name it – not everything is digital, and it never will be. If you are running a business, print management will remain important.
Print can be a high area of concern for many businesses and franchises trying to keep up with costs and be efficient. The fact is that starting any organization is often a costly affair, and print can actually save you money and begin to allow you to make a profit sooner.
QR Codes – When your customers scan these QR codes with their smart phone cameras, something interactive happens. They are taken to a website. Or they might access a coupon. They could even see a video. Interactivity is where the potential of your marketing campaign increases exponentially. When you get a potential customer to your site once, it’ll be easier to get them back.
Reaching a New Level By Creating Brand Loyalty
That’s how brand advocates are created, and that’s the point at which you know your marketing is paying off and reaching a new level. For many small businesses, the majority of sales come from a small proportion of repeat customers who are loyal to the brand. In order to find these customers in the first place, you have to get the word out there, but once you have interest, it’s time to create a loyalty program.
Many brands begin with special offer emails or loyalty cards, which are not very expensive, but can be effective. These are opportunities to share your brand’s story and offer potential customers incentive to listen and be a part of that story. It’s more about them than you. One of the best mentalities a business can have for a successful loyalty program is to switch from a sales-based focus to an education-based focus.
Contact us or call us at 800.968.1416 to get more information on how we can help get your organization off the ground and into the hearts and minds of your customers. And we sincerely hope you have a restful Thanksgiving!
