As an established franchise offering a developing support package to assist your franchisees is a large part of maintaining your business excellence. As digital markets continue to grow, so do the requirements of your support package to empower your franchisees’ continued success. This is particularly true in the sphere of B2B, where long-term client relationships offer a great return, but they also involve a significant investment of time and multiple touch points to secure. Here, Leila Him, Senior Business Development Executive at cost management specialists ERA, shares how implementing one of their latest initiatives – the Power Assist Programme – is now showing results for their global franchise network.
LinkedIn has become a major factor in our outreach strategy over the past two years. The world of B2B is evolving to become more and more digital, and the conventional strategies of obtaining clients although still effective, need strengthening with new online initiatives. The pandemic has led to many people not being in offices anymore and therefore, outreach for decision makers has now changed. The Power Assist Programme aims to start business conversations with the 61 million decision makers on LinkedIn, with 40% of them using the platform daily.
For 75% of B2B companies, it takes an average of at least four months to win a new customer1. Therefore, discovering new strategies that will generate more leads for our network is vital. The Power Assist Programme is a bespoke sales and marketing service that supports this enterprise. The main aim is to increase the visibility of our brand and, as a result, gain interactions with key decision makers. The programme acts as a mechanism to support traditional client relationship management (CRM) methods as it gives our target audience a clearer visibility of our business. We then utilise weekly catchup calls so we can cater to individual franchisee’s needs, before setting future targets.
We launched the programme in June 2020 and, as a result of its outreach, we have achieved over 16,000 connections with decision makers, over 800 conversations and over 220 first meetings with potential clients. Industry data shows that nine out of 10 B2B buyers say online content has a moderate to a significant effect on their purchasing decisions2. Consequently, having a digital brand presence is vital in modern B2B selling. In the UK region, we’re piloting the system with a group of six established franchise partners. As a result of the programme, franchise partners who did not consider social selling as an option have secured clients that they would not have reached through traditional CRM methods. The power of the system is that it enables franchise partners who are very busy with client work to carry on pursuing new clients. Our mission is to help keep the marketing funnel full for the franchise partners in our network.
Chris Foster has recently joined ERA, and the range of initiatives including the Power Assist Programme was one of his main factors for choosing the global cost management specialists, “A developing support package was one of the key areas I looked into when evaluating prospective franchises. One of the main benefits of joining an established franchise is the network you unite with to assist you with your business ambitions. My discussions with Leila about the range of support available gave me great confidence in the credibility of the ERA offering. This combined with the broad marketing collateral, which is built around customer testimonials giving credible social proof, provides the foundation for the programme. The world of B2B is always evolving and as digital communication becomes more prevalent, it’s really important to have the right framework in place so you can start conversations and access the right decision makers.”
The costs associated with building a digital brand when starting a B2B-focused business are incredibly high. Therefore, the benefits of joining a reputable B2B franchise instead will allow you to focus on your service, whilst also getting support in lead generation from an established network. The B2B marketplace has changed. So, the way that you access decision makers needs revaluating. The reach of a franchise, who have expertise in your sector is an invaluable support mechanism as you grow your business. Due to this, offering a developing support package as a B2B franchisor has never been more important as it highlights the significant worth of your network for prospective franchisees evaluating your business offering.
1 Hubspot, 2020, B2B Sales Length
2 CMO, 2021, B2B Report
