Webtreepro Blog

The franchise business model presents some very unique challenges when it comes to building and maintaining an online presence.   The challenge comes from the very assets that make a franchise successful:

·         First is a compelling brand with positive customer equity—it must stand for something good and not be compromised.

·         Second, is having a large footprint—in other words, lots of locations.  Success breeds more success and the brand’s prominence and equity grows.

 

Ironically, it’s those very fundamentals to success that clash when it comes to a franchise system’s web presence:

·         To protect my brand, I can’t deploy a site for every franchisee unless I want to manage them all which isn’t practical.  

·         But by only having one site, I can’t leverage my size in terms of my search footprint, and I can really lose on local search.  And, my content is generic for my entire system, which may not work if we offer regionalized products and services.

 

With the introduction of webtreepro, the two mutually exclusive options get combined into a best of both worlds web presence.  This represents a pretty significant shift in the way franchisors deploy their brand online and it also opens up a lot of possibilities.  Recently, a prospect (now a customer) presented us with an extraordinarily thoughtful set of questions which go to the heart of the matter.

 

Here they are, along with our responses:

 

Franchisor:

Most franchise experts strongly encourage franchisors to have a single site with multiple sub-pages. What are the fundamental arguments in favor of allowing individual sites? What are the biggest risks of allowing individual sites?

 

Webtreepro:

This “monolithic site” perspective is based on risk avoidance around brand standards.  It was a “lesser of two evils” argument.  Historically, the risk of enabling individualized sites over which the franchisor loses control of their brand standards was too great compared to the perceived lack of benefits. 

 

Webtreepro first addresses the risk by ensuring the franchisor controls brand, look, feel and global message standards on all their sites.   The franchisor retains connection to and ultimate control of ALL franchisee sites, even if they have their own domains.

 

But the benefits of local, individualized franchisee websites has grown in importance.  Most people now recognize that offering a site visitor more relevant information is beneficial to both the visitor and the franchisee.  Offering content that varies by region, community or even location augments this experience.    In addition, franchisees may find this provides added value/pride of ownership. This results in better engagement which is always desirable.

 

Finally, and perhaps most compelling is the benefits in online search.  Having a larger footprint of sites can help with organic search for the brand.  Local sites contribute to success in organic Local Search which is a trend of growing importance.  Of course, locally relevant content within the pages also contributes to natural search.

 

Franchisor:

How much flexibility should franchisees typically get with respect to changing content on the individual sites? How does your software regulate the changes?  

 

Webtreepro:

The degree of flexibility you offer is entirely up to you and ranges from “None” whereby you control their local content (service bureau model) to allowing full control, or anything in between.  You’re able to allow them to control a page, a section of pages, or even just an article within a page.

 

You may also mete out different levels depending on your confidence in each franchisee’s ability.  We typically suggest fairly limited initial access (maybe one or two pages) and then expand as your ecosystem’s comfort level grows.

 

Franchisor:

Does it allow for single change (e.g. press release) to impact each site automatically?

 

Webtreepro:

Webtreepro was designed so that a “single change” at HQ is instantly propagated to one, some or all sites, and it’s quite seamless.  This can be the addition of a new page with content (such as a press release) or could be more modest, such as swapping out piece of content within a page or simply editing something pre-existing that’s shared.

 

Franchisor:

URL—If I allow individual sites, who controls the domain addresses? Do you recommend that each URL be an iteration of the main URL (e.g. www.franchisor-name.com) or should each franchisee have the latitude to develop their own URL? 

 

Webtreepro:

We support your choice of full domains or sub-domains for each franchisee’s site.  For example:

If you use sub-domains and the parent site is www.franchisor-name.com, then the sub-domain would be http://franchisee_identity.franchisor-name.com. 

 If full domains are preferred, then you might register www.franchisee_identity.com.

 

In the case of full domains for each franchisee, who registers and owns them is entirely up to you.  We recommend the franchisor manage the domain registration so you can retain ownership.  You simply direct your registrar to point the URL to our IP address.  If you decide to use sub-domains, then only your main URL needs to be registered and you can create new franchisee sites by simply giving each one a unique sub-domain.

 

Franchisor:

What is the dividing line between the search engine strategy managed by corporate vs. the latitude each franchisee has to manage their own SEO strategy?  What visibility does your software provide franchisors to make sure each franchisee isn’t overly aggressive their SEO strategy (e.g. poaching into another franchisees territory?)

 

Webtreepro:

Our permissions schema provides significant and granular control of who may do what. There’s a combination of our permissions and security settings that allows you to lock down the SEO attributes (META, Description, Keywords, Page Name, Menu Name and Page Title)  on a franchisee site’s pages, while still enabling the franchisee to manage content on the page.  This lets you control (or remediate) the page content—both that which is visible as well as the META data such as keywords, page descriptions, page titles, and optimized URLs.

 

Franchisor:

How much control do franchisors have over the presentation of the search results?  I would like for each search result show the office location in the header (e.g. Rapid Refill – Atlanta, GA).

 

Webtreepro:

Each franchisees site is truly “theirs” and can be customized to differentiate them from others which also helps with SEO.  Beyond what a visitor can see as page content, there are attributes such as the Page Title (what you see in the top of a browser, and/or a tab in the browser window) that can also be customized/localized.  Beyond that, we provide a place to enter and maintain a description for every page, which may get displayed Search Engine Results Page (SERP).  This will depend on how consistent your SEO attributes are applied across your sites and individual page.  Webtreepro provides all the tools needed to apply your on-page and on-site SEO strategy, without requiring any technical skill.  This extends to META content as well as page naming, navigational structure, alt-text and more which all contribute to better SEO positioning and SERP summaries.  These tools also make your site visitor’s experience friendlier, because we don’t use any cryptic or argument-filled URLs. Header tags in the browser’s title bar and the browser tabs will reflect the page name you enter, giving you that control.

 

Franchisor:

I have a separate site to capture new franchise inquiries (ww.costcontain.com). What , if any, benefits does your software provide vis a vis generating new franchise inquiries through a separate site?

 

Webtreepro:

Because webtreepro sites are SEO friendly, you may find that you’re able to generate more organic search traffic which not only appeals in terms of cost-savings (vs. PPC or Portal Marketing), but also enables you to quickly update content, create online forms for inquiries, provide downloadable materials such as PDFs, etc.  You can create a separate child site for franchise inquiries, or even just a series of linked pages that are with the headquarters site. . . these can even use a different look and feel if you opt for that.

 

Franchisor:

What design services do you provide?

 

Webtreepro:

This is an area we don’t serve, but there are several options that our customers have used with success.  One extreme is we simply adapt your current website’s look and feel.  At the other extreme is that you engage a designer/firm that works with you from scratch on a fully custom design.  In the middle, some customers have purchased templates from online resources like www.templatemonster.com and we enable them within our platform. 

 

Franchisor:

What is the typical breakdown of the economics? Is there a master license fee paid by franchisor and individual license fees paid by the franchisees?

 

Webtreepro:

Our initial fee (software license, setup, initial training, etc.) is $3,950, and then a monthly ongoing of $25 per site (defined as the parent site and each franchisee) based on a 15 site minimum.   We bill the franchisor only and which allows the franchisor to re-sell the program.  Because you may be adding a lot of value through the program itself and the content that you’ll provide, there’s likely an opportunity to mark up the sell price in order to make the program self-liquidating, and perhaps even a profit center.