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If your goal is to promote successful franchising and sell more franchises, focus on creating a marketing machine for your franchisees. That will set you apart from most of the franchise companies that are trying to sell franchises today. Marketing is one of the components that differentiates the successful franchise companies from those that are struggling. Successful marketing separates the prosperous franchisees from those that are failing.

It’s easy to overlook the importance of marketing in franchising because there are so many other components that compete for a franchisor’s time. Selling franchises, for example. Training and support. Site construction. Managing the corporate team. Funding the business. Dealing with vendors. When franchisors forget (or just don’t know) that marketing propels franchising — that nothing is more important than marketing, especially to a franchisee — they fail to live up to their responsibilities as franchisors.

Worse: they disappoint their franchisees, which usually brings franchise development to a standstill.

Too few franchisors invest in marketing

Franchising is in a mess right now (for many brands) because too few franchisors are marketers, and too few franchise companies are providing marketing machines for their franchisees. Things aren’t going to get better until franchisors begin to invest again in marketing.

Early in my career, when I was fortunate to consult with the late franchisor Don Dwyer, I learned about the significance of marketing in franchising. (I’ve blogged previously about Dwyer. Search for “Dwyer” at FranchiseMastermind.com for the articles I’ve written about him). He was the first to demonstrate to me that franchising is all about marketing.

Solve the marketing equation for franchisees and you’ve got a successful franchise — or at least you’ve mastered one of the the critical components of a successful franchise. Granted, you’ve got to have something to sell — something that people want to buy. Selling, however, is always much easier for franchisees to learn and master than is marketing. And that’s not because marketing is so complex, or because franchisees can’t master marketing — it’s because selling is a skill that can be taught and transferred, while marketing, also a skill, involves multiple other components including a branded message and (especially) the money to brand and promote that message. How many franchisees could afford to develop ads like those of the major franchise companies and then have the funds to air them on radio or television?

Dwyer’s marketing machine

Dwyer launched his conglomeration of franchised businesses with a carpet cleaning company — nothing too sexy about that — and part of his promise to franchisees was lead generation. He figured out how to generate customers for franchisees, and that promise attracted people who wanted to buy his franchises. Of course, people with carpets needed cleaning services, but they had many choices — all they had to do was open the Yellow Pages (you remember them, don’t you?). Dwyer developed a telemarketing campaign that consistently produced customers for his franchisees, who were skilled at selling, and skilled at cleaning carpets, but not so good at finding customers on their own. The challenge for franchisees is almost always finding the customers! A Rainbow International franchise, sold by Dwyer, solved that problem!

As Dwyer went on to create or buy another half dozen franchise concepts, in each instance he made certain the concept included a marketing machine. Consequently, he sold franchises at a rate that dazzled his competitors and other franchisors (watch for my upcoming blog article: Who’s Selling Franchises — you’ll be surprised by The Dwyer Group’s success. Or, maybe not. We’ve come to expect it of them!)

Franchise marketing geniuses

Through the years, many of my clients proved their value as marketers — Jim Cavanaugh, founder of Jani-King, single-handedly created the marketing machine in commercial cleaning while he was a college student; AAMCO created the buzz for transmission repair. But perhaps the most successful of all (at least in terms of getting the greatest brand recognition for the least money invested) was the late Ken D’Angelo who concepualized We Buy Ugly Houses®. Now there was a franchise marketing genius!

I met D’Angelo in 2001 (and succeeded him for more than four years as President of HomeVestors beginning in 2004) and was dazzled by his marketing prowess. While his start-up franchise consisted of the basic components (he had 80 franchisees when I met him and we built the business to 265), all of the components needed to be tweaked, except for his marketing machine! For many years, that was HomeVestors’ differentiating advantage. When D’Angelo conceptualized We Buy Ugly Houses® and branded it using billboards, the phones started ringing in his franchised offices and his franchisees loved him for it.

The franchisor’s primary job

D’Angelo knew that his principle job as a franchisor was generating business for his franchisees, who bought houses at a discount, typically 60% of the after-repair value of a property. Finding properties to buy was a challenge for franchisees — at least it was back in the seller’s market when D’Angelo created his slogan. (Today, those houses are easy to find — just call the bank!) When D’Angelo coupled lead generation with interim money — in its heyday, HomeVestors loaned money to franchisees to acquire properties — he created a flow of prospects that lined up to buy his franchises. Of course, it also helped that at the time, everyone (or so it seemed) wanted to invest in real estate! Not so much today — but then again, leads are plentiful and the economic crisis forced HomeVestors out of the money-lending business. But with $20-million in advertising dollars behind it, HomeVestors’ marketing machine was once among the most effective in franchising!

The concern about marketing

I frequently speak to franchisees who represent many different businesses, and the overriding concern today among those who are failing, or struggling, is marketing.

Where are the leads?
Where are the customers?
How do I get more customers?
How do I keep my customers?
How do I get customers to spend more money in my business?

Those are the questions and issues facing far too many franchisees today, which is why marketing is the most important component for franchisors to address these days.

Unfortunately, many franchisors either don’t know the importance of producing a marketing machine or they can’t afford to. Sometimes, in fact, the franchisor hasn’t figured out a marketing scheme, and in those cases the franchisees are in the worst situation. The saving grace may be that all these franchisors aren’t selling many franchises these days! Not all bad when you consider that they’re likely only to produce more unhappy franchisees.

Marketing machines produce happy franchisees

Want happy franchisees? As Dwyer, Cavanaugh, D’Angelo and so many other savvy franchisors have demonstrated, create marketing machines that generate quality leads and attract customers and your franchisees will prosper.

Even better, they’ll sell franchises for you! Unfortunately, too many franchisors are most concerned now about their ability to sell franchises and they are not investing in what really matters — producing marketing programs that get results for franchisees.

Just Released: FranchiseMastermind Interview Series

Curious to know how they did it? What did Don Dwyer know that other franchisors need to know? And William Rosenberg, founder of Dunkin’ Donuts? What can you learn from franchisors Jim Amos, Jim Bugg, JoAnne Shaw and others? You can immediately download their interviews with Dr. John Hayes. Click here

In September 2010 Dr. John Hayes joins the faculty of Gulf University for Science & Technology in Kuwait.