Franchise Update Magazine Issue II, 2014 | Page 52

Grow Market Lead
50

Sales
smarts
BY MARC KIEKENAPP

Any Portal in a Storm
Re-evaluating portals as lead generators

T

he Internet portals continue
to be one of the most successful inquiry generators for
franchise sales. Like all of our
businesses, the portals have gone through
a transformation and are making many
positive changes so they can continue to
provide us with good inquiries.
Like a ship on the sea, your brand
needs to find the right port (or portals!)
to dock. And, just as ships are not all the
same size or docking at the same ports,
all brands are not created equal. Bigger
ships are more expensive and need deeper
ports, while smaller ships have many ports
to choose from. Think of your brand as a
ship and find the ports that fit you best.
The key to finding the right portal for
your brand is not just a matter of calling
up a provider, but knowing what you
are looking for, who you are looking for,
and where you are looking for franchise
candidates. In addition, talk with other
brands similar to your investment level
and category and find out what the costs
and results have been for them.
Important reminder: Lead costs mean nothing! What matters is the cost per sale—and
how competent and experienced your franchise
development team is in making the first conversion from an inquiry to an interested lead.
For your brand to have a favorable experience with Internet portals, take a team
or partnership approach to work toward
the best site conversion rates. Most reputable franchise portals have a marketing
and creative department that will assist
you in developing your landing pages
on their site. It should be a team effort
as you develop the content and provide
substantial input and educate the portal
marketing department on understanding
your brand and who you are looking to
recruit. For optimal results, you should
have a CRM system in place to provide
Franchiseupdate ISS U E II, 2 0 1 4

feedback to the portals and make adjustments and tweaks to the site. Also franchise
portals are more than willing to give you
credit for “bad” inquiries that didn’t give
real contact information, another way to
extend your budget.
Don’t let your relationship with the
portals turn into a finger-pointing episode
when the lead flow or response rate isn’t
what you expected. Work with the account

Think of your
brand as a ship
and find the
ports that
fit you best.

representative for a solution. Dropping
a portal after a month is not the answer,
nor a good business decision. You should
spend at least 3 to 6 months to properly
evaluate the site. Again, you must have a
good CRM system to gather this information and ensure that the problem is
not on your end with poor follow-up, too
many emails, and no phone calls within
the first 4 hours. Every year Kiekenapp
& Associates conducts the Mystery Shopping research for Franchise Update, and
50 percent of the franchisors don’t follow
up. Your team does what you inspected
more than what’s expecte