When you franchise your business, you put a lot in the hands of your franchisees. This includes their local marketing strategies. Given so much franchise marketing strategy is online, you need to determine if each location should have its own social media pages or not. Here’s what you should consider when making your decision.
Remember, Local Pages Don’t Replace Brand Pages
If you are questioning whether you should go with a brand page or a local page, the answer is either brand page or both. You should never go with local pages only. Across all social media platforms, there will always be a place for the national brand page, and this page should establish the tone that you allow local pages to use as part of your franchise’s management terms.
So, Are Pages for Each Franchise Good to Have?
Generally speaking, yes. Most social media platforms favor local content in searches, connecting people with pages that are physically close to them before they show results at the national level. This is especially true for Facebook, which remains the top social media platform for most industries. This means that these individual pages are core tenants of marketing for franchises.
And it isn’t just the algorithm that favors these pages. Potential customers prefer local pages, engaging with them hundreds of times more than they do national and global pages.
Regional Differences Matter
The United States is a geographically massive country, and while we often talk about American culture and identity, there are a lot of things that vary between regions as well as between rural and urban areas. When you allow each franchise to maintain its own social media, you let them tweak their messaging to appeal to the nuances in the local market. Franchise SEO in Atlanta won’t be the same as franchise SEO in Piedmont.
However, You Need to Worry About Divergent Messaging
In your contract, set the terms for what search engine optimization in Atlanta or other locations can include. Talk about voice, tone, language, branding, and how to keep this consistent across various pages run by different owners. You can even require that they avoid certain terms or topics, or even have them contract with a specific SEO service in Cumming so everything is consistent.
Ultimately, each franchise can and probably should have their own social media. Just ensure best practices are used and consistency is maintained.
