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It is no secret that most industries depend on social media to expand their customer base and maximize productivity. Due to social media’s various opportunities to personally interact with potential customers, local and franchise businesses should particularly invest in an adapted approach to enjoy the benefits from these digital platforms.
Especially Instagram has proven to be one of the best platforms for local businesses since they offer a low operation cost while serving multiple functions. Nonetheless, roadblocks can be faced when using this platform for local digital marketing purposes. Franchise businesses that are part of a retail network might for example face concerns in terms of time, budget, a lack of knowledge on how to attract the right audience or which content to post when and responsibilities to be taken between HQ vs. Local.
Nonetheless, social media platforms favor a combination between national and local content. And when responsibilities are shared, the pros outweigh the cons.
But why should you start to integrate Instagram for the local digital marketing today of your retail network? Read all about it in this article and discover why the usage of Instagram for your franchise locations can mean a true boost to your online visibility.
Instagram for local businesses
With more than a billion active accounts and 500 million daily users, Instagram isn’t a platform you want to ignore. Furthermore, according to Hootsuite, 90% of Instagram users follow brands and businesses. Additionally 81% of its users rely on this platform to research a product or service.
Instagram is especially suitable for your local digital marketing, since it offers multiple possibilities to boost your sales online and offline. You can reach and target new customers, it allows you to stay connected and interact with your existing clients and it enables you to sell directly from the app.
These are just a few of the many reasons why it makes the ideal platform to market your local franchise locations. Find out 6 more reasons why it is worth to integrate local Instagram pages for each point of sales in your franchise network below.
6 reasons to start using Instagram for your franchise network
1. Build your Brand
First of all, due to its visually oriented design, Instagram is a great social media platform to construct your brand image. Furthermore, it is a cost-effective tool to create brand recognition for existing and prospective customers. Additionally, by interacting with your target audience and by sharing helpful and relevant content you can increase the know, like, and trust factor of your brand.
2. Online reputation management
Instagram can also be applied for the online reputation management of your franchise business. When (potential) clients search for your business online, what shows up has a direct impact on your reputation. With Instagram, you can curate a well crafted visual image which is more engaging than textual content.
Färm Leuven, Instagram, 2022
Want to know more about how to organize a performing online review management?
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3. Community Building
As social media is a great tool for networking, Instagram enables local businesses to connect with like-minded people that share similar interests. Creating connections with a niche audience can help local businesses to reach more consumers, especially in their target market. Furthermore, it provides a great environment to interact and collaborate with other brands and influencers.
You can engage and partner with influencers in your local area to improve your franchise business. They can lead prospects to your website and might impact your in-store traffic.
4. Share authentic stories
Instagram allows you to share local and authentic content. This is particularly interesting for franchise businesses since it enables them to share interesting facts that can contribute to customer engagement. For example you can give your customers a peek inside the daily life of your business. Furthermore, you can also use Instagram Stories to inform on discounts and special offers. In sum, sharing engaging content on Instagram has become a common approach which helps local enterprises to attract more customers leading to increased productivity.
Delhaize Flagey, Instagram, 2022
5. Boost your Sales
Linked to the previous point, Instagram is a great tool that allows you to boost your sales. You either sell your products directly from the platform. Or, especially for local businesses, it can also be a useful channel to share local in-store promotions or events with customers.
PizzaHut Overrijse, Instagram, 2022
For more info on how to use local ads to boost the visibility of your retail network
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6. Generate local traffic to your store
To enable clients to easily find your store online, local businesses of franchise networks can utilize hashtags and location tags. One of Instagram’s key benefits is how easy it is for users to find new accounts to follow. This social media platform suggests posts to your (potential) customer which they like as well in the “Explore” feed.
Furthermore, you can create branded hashtags and monitor its usage. When users follow your hashtag, they see your content whenever you post. This is a fundamental reason that can improve your customer base and convert users to potential customers.
By adding geotags to your posts, you make your content visible to users who search for that location. Geotag your store’s address so that when anyone is searching for your location they will see your content.
Manhattn’s Burgers Brussels, Instagram, 2022
Conclusion
Social media is a great tool to personally interact with (potential) clients. Furthermore, with more than a billion active accounts, 90% of users that follow brands and businesses and 81% of those that rely on the platform to research a purchase, Instagram offers the ideal environment to promote your local business as part of a franchise network.
A little recap of the main reasons on “why to start using Instagram for your franchise network” today:
- Its’ visual orientation offers a great tool for local brand building.
- It is a useful medium for online reputation management.
- It enables you to create a community and connect with like-minded people to reach your target market.
- It is possible to share local and authentic content which is interesting for franchise businesses in terms of customer engagement
- It can boost your sales online and offline due to sharing local in-store promotions or events.
- It facilitates the customer journey for clients to easily find your store by adding hashtags and location tags to your content.
In sum, it is clear that Instagram is an interesting tool to consider for franchise networks. Nonetheless, it is essential to organize the cooperation between HQ and local level. On the one hand, HQ has the knowledge in terms of marketing. On the other hand, local points of sales know the tendencies. In sum, both perspectives are necessary to construct an optimal and performing local digital marketing.
Curious about how to organize a collaboration where the forces of the national and the local level are joined in the most optimal way online leading to more in-store traffic? Let us be your guide!
Contact us to find out how we can help you to boost your visibility online!
