Though a franchise benefits from the reputation and customer base of its parent company, there is a lot of trust and loyalty that has to be built from the ground up. These are tricky things to accomplish, especially if you don’t have much experience running a business. Thankfully, there are guidelines you can follow, such as communicating with your customers and hosting business events.
In this article, we’ll go through what some of these guidelines are, and how you can use them in your own business. Keep reading to learn how to build customer trust and loyalty as a franchise.
Receive Relevant Certifications
In order to build trust among your customers, it helps to be certified. As a business, you can receive accreditations like ISO 9001 for quality management and ISO 45001 for occupational health and safety. These certificates prove to both business partners and the paying public that your business adheres to certain standards of quality.
Accreditation also forces you to raise your standards as a business. For instance, in order to receive ISO 9001 certification, your company needs to demonstrate that it has certain quality control measures in place. Creating products of a high standard inspires confidence in customers and encourages future purchases.
Master SEO
If you don’t already know, search engine optimisation helps your website rank higher on search engines like Google. So, if you want your site to appear first when someone searches ‘nearby restaurants’ or ‘automotive suppliers in my area’, you’ll need to put some time into your SEO.
One way to do this is by hosting a blog. By building up your website with content related to your business, interested people will have more opportunities to find your website, and both your views and Google ranking will benefit from that. Posting on a blog also gives you a chance to link to other parts of your website, which increases your site’s authority on Google. Another way to boost SEO is to advertise on or collaborate with other sites in your sector.
Different companies can approach SEO in different ways, so experiment to find what works best for you.
Leverage Social Media
Social media is all the rage in 2024. Platforms like Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn are all ways to give your business exposure and connect with customers. Besides just using social media to promote a product or service, you can use it to build relationships and a community with your customers and the locals. You can do this by sharing content that your audience finds interesting.
Once you’ve got your social media accounts up and running and built up a following, you can interact with customers in more complex ways and branch out into activities like influencer marketing. You can also use social media to run polls and surveys in order to understand your customers better.
Social media is very much an extension of your local community. As a franchise, it’s vital to take advantage of it.
Improve Customer Service
Customer service might be the most basic way to improve customer loyalty, but it’s also among the most essential. If you want customers to come back to you, it’s paramount that you treat them well.
Your customer-facing employees in particular need to be trained to provide top-class customer service, as they act as the face of your company. Good customer service on the part of your staff might mean attentive table service, comfortable chairs or simply switching on the aircon on a hot day.
Look after your customers, and they’ll reward you for it.
Develop a Loyalty Program
Loyalty programs are a big hit among today’s consumers, and it’s easy to see why. People love to save money, and loyalty rewards are a way to do just that. Encouraging repeat purchases by providing financial incentives is a great way to strengthen your ties with your customers and get them coming back.
There are many ways to run a loyalty program, including handing out physical cards. A loyalty card is a physical reminder to return to your franchise. After all, knowing that you’re a few stamps away from a free coffee is often enough to choose your store over your competitor’s.
Be sure to design your loyalty program based on your customers’ habits and tastes. If you run a program that offers an anchovy pizza after ten purchases in a place where everyone hates anchovies, few would take you up on the offer. Figure out what customers buy most, and design your program around that product.
Host Meaningful Events
Events are a fantastic way to build a stronger tie with your community. There are many types of events you can host, but a product launch is often the easiest to plan for. You have a built-in theme and can give your customers the chance to use the newly-released product.
However, there are far more events that your business can run to get its name out into your community. Some examples include charity fundraisers, workshops and even holiday-themed events.
Events are a great way to give people a reason to visit your stores, and should definitely be part of your business strategy.
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Customer trust and loyalty take time and initiative to build, but the dividends you receive are worth it. You’ll create a steadier consumer base and secure your franchise’s long-term financial health by encouraging customers to keep coming back.
In this article, we’ve gone through some key ways to build customer trust and loyalty. Implement these into your own business today to boost your chances of success.