INDUSTRY MARKETING PLAYBOOK
Franchisors
1
Contents
Why franchisors?
3
Why a playbook?
4
Why marketing?
4
Play 1: Know your target market
5
What’s unique about their needs?
5
How can you add value?
5
Play 2: Match the product with their needs
7
What are the benefits of Xero for franchises?
7
How can you help their transition to Xero?
7
Play 3: Perfect your elevator pitch
8
Play 4: Go to them; don’t wait for them to come to you 9
Play 5: Make yourself heard
10
Mail10
Social Media
10
Blog12
Search engine marketing (SEM)
12
Search engine optimization (SEO)
12
Digital display ads
13
Website landing page
13
Sponsorship13
Brochure14
Play 6: Add value
15
Wrap up
16
Appendix – Xero Branding
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2
Why franchisors?
Franchising is about replicating and selling a proven
business model. Franchisors are successful business
owners with an established business model that works
for a particular product or service. They’d like to expand
their business and have chosen to invest their money, time
and other resources into doing it in a replicable, scalable
franchise model.
Franchising is a significant and growing part of the economy
worldwide. For example, the Gross Domestic Product (GDP)
of the franchise sector in the United States is predicted to
grow by 5.6% to $522 billion in 2016. Employement and
spend in this industry is also set to increase, as captured
by the International Franchise Association Educational
Association.
Numerous high-profile businesses and brand names are
franchises – but smaller local and regional brands are often
franchises too. All of these businesses need quality advice
and insight.
Even with just one franchisor as a client, you have the
opportunity to grow your practice by becoming an advisor
to both the franchisor and the franchisees. The more
experience you have working with franchises, the more
valuable you become to other franchise networks because
you understand their unique needs.
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Why this playbook?
Xero wants to help you grow your practice, so we have
developed a marketing tool that takes you through the steps
to successfully market your practice to franchisors. You may
want to follow each of the ‘plays’ outlined here to connect
and engage with the franchise industry, selling your services
along with the benefits of Xero.
In a crowded marketplace, your marketing efforts are
critical. We hope our suggestions make the difference.
Why marketing?
Marketing is all about communication – your success is
dependent on your ability to communicate the benefits
of your services to your clients. Industry marketing is
effective because it’s so efficient. By marketing to a group of
organizations with similar needs, you achieve economies of
scale in your marketing efforts.
4
Play 1
KNOW YOUR TARGET MARKET
Franchises can be any type of business from fast-food
restaurants and convenience stores, to real estate
and tax services. Well-known worldwide franchises
include McDonalds, Subway, Hertz and Hilton Hotels.
However most franchise networks are small, with
perhaps 10 to 100 franchisees.
What’s unique about their needs?
Franchisors put the reputation of their brand on the
line every time they license a franchise, so they put
huge value into standardization, consistency and
uniformity of their product and customer experience.
This means being in control of business functions
that are critical to the ongoing success of the
franchise network as a whole – financial performance
is a key factor.
Franchisees generally pay an initial fee to the
franchisors; this gives them ownership of the
business for a set period of time – typically three to
five years. Franchisors may then receive monthly
fees from the franchisees as payment for support
and marketing.
It is in the best interests of franchisors to ensure their
revenue stream isn’t compromised by franchisee
trading performance, for example, if one of their
franchises fails. More importantly, their franchise
brand can be tarnished if solid financial management
systems are not in place.
Just as with many other small businesses,
franchisees tend to focus on operations, while the
administration and finance side (the often painful
parts of running a business) can be neglected.
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Including accounting processes as part of the
franchise package adds value to the franchise offer.
Although franchisees technically own their business,
franchisors need to have visibility across all aspects
of the business in order to support the franchisees.
A supported accounting system and chart of
accounts improves this visibility. Having a standard
chart of accounts across the entire franchise
network, the franchisor can accurately compare all
the different franchises.
Having comprehensive reporting tools allows
franchisors to proactively monitor their different
franchises and provide support and advice where
needed, before potential issues become large
and unmanageable. The advice and support of an
accountant can make all the difference.
How can you add value?
Franchisors tend to operate larger businesses
(the ‘head office’) and would look to you to provide:
• Standard accounting system advice, training
and support
• Strategic tools and guidance to help them improve
and grow
• Systems advice around benchmarking, cashflow,
and key performance indicators (KPIs)
• Business advice on how to maximize performance
of their franchise network
• Clear and consistent reporting across their
franchise network.
Your relationship with franchisors is really important. They
need to trust you with not only the books, but with advising
them on how varying their business model or taking up new
growth opportunities can affect their network, especially
with emerging (newer) franchises. That trust comes from
showing them that you truly understand not only their
challenges in running a franchise network, but the different
challenges their franchisees face.
Don’t be afraid to challenge franchisors. They may know
their business inside and out, but being that close may
cause them to lose some objectivity. You can provide that
by helping them see ‘the forest through the trees’, e.g. an
impending issue or a new opportunity, or take away key
learnings from great successes and minor failures.
You want to help franchisors succeed and grow, and share
in that growth by having them include your services in their
franchise package. You can offer a ‘review’ or ‘start-up’
package for their new franchisees to discuss their particular
needs and how your knowledge of the franchise network can
help them grow a successful franchise.
Some franchisors will provide business coaching and
work with their franchisees to set their own KPIs, such
as turnover. These are benchmarked against successful
franchises in their network. Having visibility across all
franchises in real-time ensures the KPIs are being met.
However, other franchisors may not have the experience or
capacity to provide business coaching or to develop KPIs
with their franchises, so this is where you can offer real
added value to both the franchise owner and franchisee.
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Play 2
MATCH THE PRODUCT WITH THEIR NEEDS
When developing Xero, we wanted to create
accounting software that was easy to use and
provided real-time financials for businesses so they
would always have the most up-to-date information
to make business decisions. Because of this,
franchisors will love how they have financial visibility
over their entire franchise network.
What are the benefits of Xero for franchisors?
Xero can be used anytime, anywhere - Franchisors
can easily review their franchisees’ numbers in a
standardized format and in real-time, without waiting
for them to be sent through.
Xero connects with KPI and benchmarking apps Franchisors love the deeper insight and increased
visibility they get into their franchise network’s
financials by using add-ons like Spotlight Multi
or Fathom Reporting. This means making betterinformed decisions to grow your business.
How can you help their transition to Xero?
Xero really ticks all the boxes for franchises, but
change is not always easy and you can really help
ease the transition. A project management approach
and sufficient timing for a smooth ‘onboarding’
are key.
Xero connects to banks - Xero imports all live
transaction data from franchisors’ banks, so they
always have an up-to-date and accurate
picture of their finances.
Some suggestions are:
Xero has reporting templates - Franchisors love that
they are comparing apples with apples across their
entire franchise network using a standard chart
of accounts, helping them identify real business
problems, not ones caused by inconsistent reporting.
• Work with the franchisor to set up their Xero
accounts, including bank feeds
Xero adds value – Franchisors love that they can add
value to franchisees with better tools and systems,
which includes adding Xero as part of their franchise
package.
Xero adds control – By adding Xero to their franchise
package, franchisors have better control of financial
performance across their network.
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• Decide the best timing to switch to Xero; a new
financial year is generally best
• Convert their financial data from their previous
system
• Set up ‘head office’ consolidated reporting,
KPIs and benchmarking with a Xero add-on like
Spotlight Multi.
And don’t forget, although Xero is easy to use, they
won’t know Xero the way you do, so make sure you
provide all the training and support they need as
they make the switch. And provide training for their
current and new franchisees to ensure consistency.
Play 3
PERFECT YOUR ELEVATOR PITCH
You know your market and how Xero will meet their needs;
now you need to wrap it up into a proposition that will speak
to franchisors.
Here are the top 10 reasons a franchisor should move
to Xero:
• Dashboard gives a clear financial overview - instant clarity
• Visibility across your whole network - anytime, anywhere
for peace of mind
• Compare apples with apples across your network with
standard chart of accounts
• Reporting add-ons consolidate data for a clearer picture
and useful insights
• Adds value to your franchise offering
• Safe and secure - user permissions and encrypted data
• Automated daily bank feeds - automatic data import
saves time and effort
• Fast, simple and customized invoicing - including online
invoicing
• No installation and automatic free updates - no more
disks or out-of-sync systems
• Available anytime, anywhere you’re online - great for
businesses on the move.
Xero has done some of the work for you on our landing page
– www.xero.com/franchises – so use this a reference to
support your pitch.
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Play 4
DON’T WAIT FOR THEM TO COME TO YOU
Look through your list of current clients. Do you have
any franchises on your books? Have they already
been converted to Xero? If not, why not? Do they
know about Xero? Reach out to them. Also make
contact with other franchises they know that are not
current clients.
Finally, organize your own event such as an open
house or a seminar, on how you can help franchisors
in their business. Topics could include:
Reach out to franchises in your area. You will already
know many of them, but doing research on Google
will help you find others you may not know about.
Franchise networks are moving into new markets
regularly so keep an eye on new franchises opening in
your area and beyond. Many franchise websites have
information about areas where they are looking to
open franchises.
• Moving your franchise network to Xero
Most countries have a franchise association or
franchise council. Get in contact with them to see
how you can reach their members. Some may require
you to become a corporate member before having
access to their members. Others may allow you to
advertise on their website or in their newsletter.
Others may have events you could sponsor. Even if
you don’t want to sponsor an event, make sure you
have a presence at your regional and even national
association events. Franchisors use these events to
meet, network and compare notes.
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• Doing business in the cloud
• The benefits of moving to Xero
Reach out to Xero and the add-ons to help with
events and collateral.
Regional franchise associations:
International Franchise Association (USA)
www.franchise.org
[email protected]
Franchise Council of Australia
www.franchise.org.au
[email protected]
Franchise Association of New Zealand
www.franchiseassociation.org.nz
[email protected]
British Franchise Association
www.thebfa.org
[email protected]
Play 5
MAKE YOURSELF HEARD
So, you’re ready to market your services to
franchises. How are you going to make yourself
heard? At Xero, we use a wide variety of marketing
tools to reach potential customers. We don’t suggest
every one is appropriate for you. Get familiar with
the different tools and determine which one or
combination would work best for your practice and
provide you the greatest return on investment.
Contact details
Your database of current clients should have all the
contact details for clients you want to contact via
email or personalized letter. And any sponsorship
of industry events or conferences should give you
contact details for heaps of potential clients in the
franchise industry. You will want to send a different
email or letter to each of these groups, as some are
already clients and others you’ve just met.
Email
Easy to set up, low cost and immediately measurable
email is one of the simplest means of online
communication.
Group emails are best managed via specialized email
software that enables you to manage your database,
build templates for your emails, measure email
campaigns and keep an accurate record of your email
activity. This software does not replace your normal
email programs (such as Outlook, Apple Mail etc.)
used for individual email communication. We use
Marketo, but there are free options as well, such as
Mail Chimp.
Direct mail
A bit more old school than an email, there is
something about receiving a personalized letter in
the mail that people still like. And they are less likely
to throw it out before reading. It is a more expensive
option than email (printing, postage), but can be
highly effective.
Content
So what do you say in your email or letter? If you’re
writing to current clients, talk about the features
and benefits of Xero, how you can work with them to
make the switch and additional services you can offer
once they make the switch.
For potential clients, introduce yourself and your
practice, talk about how Xero can save them time
and money and how they can benefit from working
with you and Xero.
Sample email or letter:
Our firm, <Practice name>, helps franchise businesses
like yours thrive. That’s because we understand the
challenges you face and have solutions to help.
We use Xero online accounting software, which is
collaborative and easy-to-use. With Xero, you have
access to your data anytime, anywhere, on any
device. And since we’re managing your books, we can
also provide financial advice when you need it.
Give us a call if you want to talk about what we can
do for your company.
Best regards <Practice name>
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Social media
Social networking sites such as Facebook, Twitter
and LinkedIn let you create an online presence and
publish your ideas, photos and videos. This is a
great way to grab the attention of franchises who
are already following you. They can then share your
messages with their networks earning you fantastic
(and free!) exposure.
The more compelling and interesting your content
is, the more likely your followers will like, comment,
and share. When they do this, they’re engaging with
your brand, and their networks (friends, family,
colleagues) are seeing that engagement and may be
prompted to check you out for their own accounting
needs.
The most challenging part of social media is
resourcing. Each account that you create online
needs to have a person on the other end to provide
updates and respond to customer conversations.
Don’t set up an account if you don’t think you’ll be
able to keep it up-to-date.
Twitter
Twitter was originally marketed as a means to let
people share what they are doing in real life, in real
time “in between emails and blogs.” Twitter is now
widely used by businesses to stay in touch with their
customers and their competition. Use Twitter not just
as a sales tool, but also as a way to communicate,
share interesting news and information, provide
customer service and just get to know your
customers. Look at tweeting one to three times a day,
but obviously only if you have something interesting
to say or share (sharing can include retweeting
relevant tweets from other sources). Don’t just tweet
for the sake of it.
Sample tweets
• News impacting the franchise industry
• Link to articles on economic trends for franchisors
• Top opportunities for franchisees
Facebook
Facebook pages are for businesses and brands to
share their stories and connect with people. People
like your page and you keep them engaged with
interesting and compelling posts. Let your followers
know what you’re up to, show the human side of your
practice, share interesting articles, ask questions
and take polls. Show an interest in your followers and
what is important to them. And always try to include
an image with your post – it helps grab attention.
Post on Facebook at least a couple of times a week,
but never more than once a day. Your followers are
busy people and you don’t want to overwhelm them
with posts.
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Sample posts
• Weekly top tip for running your franchise
more efficiently
• Link to a great article on how a successful franchise
weathers the economic downturn, with your take
on what it means for your clients
• International trends in the franchise industry.
LinkedIn
LinkedIn is a social networking site designed
specifically for the business community. The
goal of the site is to allow registered members to
establish and document networks of people they
know and trust professionally. Both franchisors
and franchisees are active users of LinkedIn and
participate frequently in discussions on one or more
of the hundreds of groups set up for this sector. Find
groups in your region and make sure you join the
discussions. Become a thought leader in franchise
and cloud accounting.
Blog
What is a blog? Simply put, it is a section of a website
that is used for regular updates of information and
articles regarding topics important to your practice
and your clients.
Search engine marketing (SEM)
Search engine marketing is the practice of advertising
your website within the paid areas of search engine
result pages (SERP). Advertising appears above the
search results.
A blog is a great forum to talk directly to your clients
and potential clients and start conversations. They’re
also easy to share across social media platforms.
Most templates have the ability to add links to
Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Google+ allowing
you to encourage readers to post a link to your blog
from these platforms. It’s simple – just add “Like
this? Share ...”
SEM has become very popular because of its costeffectiveness – advertisers can get a lot of value from
even tiny budgets. With SEM you have the ability to
target your ads at precisely the market you’re hoping
to reach with little wastage of spend on people
outside the target market. For example, if you only
want to reach franchises based in the UK, you can
set your ad to only appear in front of people who
are in the UK and searching specifically for franchise
accounting.
Most blog post are 200 - 400 words long and it is
better to publish short, regular little paragraphs that
are well written and relevant. Simply adding a photo,
chart, illustration or any type of image can increase
interest and readership. Just ensure you attribute
any images that are not your own to the owner.
Blogs take care and attention. Set yourself a goal to
write two or three blogs a month. If you don’t think
you have the resource to do that, then blogging may
not be for you.
Sample blog topics
• Top 10 tips to make your franchise stand out in
the network
• What it takes to start a franchise
• How latest regulations/tax changes/industry
developments affect your clients
• Events you are holding or attending
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SEM is also cost-effective because you’re charged
on a ‘cost-per-click’ basis. This means you only pay
when someone clicks on your ad. You also set your
own price – you specify how much you are willing to
pay for a click through to your website. You can also
put a cap on your spend, so there is no need to worry
about a huge bill at the end of the month if your ad is
too successful.
Getting started is easy and because you can put a
cap on your budget, the risks are small. Both Google
and Bing provide simple self-service platforms that
allow you to get up and running within five minutes.
Google AdWords: adwords.google.com
Bing Ads: bingads.microsoft.com
Search engine optimization (SEO)
Search engine optimization is the practice of
improving your website and its content so that it
ranks higher in “organic” (unpaid) SERPs. Organic
search results are those that appear below the
highlighted, paid advertising at the top of the
results page.
A higher-ranking website is a vote of confidence from
search engines such as Google, Yahoo and Bing. In
other words, if your website is more prominent, it
means the search engines consider your website
relevant to your main category. The result is that
potential customers using the search engine are
more likely to click through to your site (think about
it – how often do you go past the first or second
results page?).
SEO is important because search engines need to be
able to read all of the elements that make up your
website in order to determine how relevant your site
is to a search query. They will look at everything from
text to images to site speed to HTML. Therefore, it
is important that all of these are carefully planned,
informative, and/or descriptively labelled so that
search engines can read your site, understand it and
rank it.
Digital display ads
Display advertising is a type of advertising that
typically contains text (i.e. copy), logos, photographs
or other images and similar items. Digital display ads
are the ads you’ll see on websites as opposed to the
text-only ads used on search engines (SEM).
You can target very specific audiences with digital
display ads depending on where you choose to place
them. Franchisors and franchisees tend to gravitate
towards certain websites, read specific blogs and
follow other franchises in their network and outside
through social media. You can advertise on all
these platforms. Determine where you would like to
advertise and the site will have information on cost,
reach (how many people will see your ad), specs (the
size and format of your ad) and how to book.
If you are going to spend money on digital display
ads, then you should spend time on the design
to ensure that they stand out, in a good way. As
with your website, first impressions are lasting
impressions. Look at getting a designer who
specializes in digital advertising to develop
your ads.
All digital ads should link directly to your website,
and more specifically, your dedicated landing page
(see below). This means that when someone clicks
on the ad, it takes them directly to your site. It’s also
a good idea to have an offer in the ad to entice the
potential client to click to learn more.
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There are two main (popular) ways websites charge
for display ads. At a CPM (cost per thousand
impressions) or CPC (cost per click) rate. With
CPM, for every thousand people who see your ad,
you pay a certain price. Websites will provide their
average impressions per page over a specific period
in their media kits. Based on those averages, you can
determine how long your ad will be displayed. With
CPC, you only pay when someone has clicked on the
ad and comes to your website. The more popular
your ad, the more people will click and the more you
will pay; however, you know you are achieving your
objectives because people are clicking through to
your site. Different websites will have different prices
for CPM and CPC, so determine which websites
would be best to target franchises in your area and
then look at how they charge and how much they
charge.
As with your website, you’ll want to make sure
your landing page is well-designed in order to
draw potential clients in as soon as they hit it. The
designer who created your website would be a great
choice to design your landing page as well.
Landing page
A landing page is a single web page that appears in
response to clicking on a search result or an online
advertisement. The landing page will usually display
information that directly relates to the search result
or ad. The general goal of a landing page is to convert
site visitors to sales leads.
Sponsorship
Sponsoring an industry event or conference is a great
way to get in front of potential franchisors. There are
a number of events tailored specifically to franchises,
so it is worthwhile taking the time to do some
research online. Begin with franchise associations. If
they don’t have information on events or conferences
on their website, ring them and have a chat about the
best places to get in front of them.
We encourage you to create a dedicated landing
page to promote Xero and its benefits on your
website, detailing just what Xero is and how it allows
you to take the advisor-client relationship to the
next level.
Your landing page should have a very clear call to
action (CTA). Your CTA is what you want people to
do when they land on your page. If you want them
to contact you for more information, make sure you
have your contact details in a prominent position
on your page and make it easy to link to your email/
contact form.
At Xero, we have created a number of landing pages
targeting specific industries or complimenting a
promotion we are carrying out. We have created our
own landing page to attract franchises – xero.com/
franchises
Sponsorship can seem costly, but if the event is targeted
directly at franchises, in close proximity to your office and
the expected participant numbers are high, then it can
definitely prove value for money. You can’t beat face-to-face
interaction with potential clients.
We sponsor a number of events for franchises including
the franchise expos in both New Zealand and Australia. We
also attend conferences for specific franchise networks, ie
McDonald’s.
Brochure
If you’re sponsoring an event or exhibiting at an event, it’s
a good idea to have something for potential clients to take
away. Something that sells your services and explains how
you can help their business to succeed and grow.
Your takeaway should be eye-catching, easy to read, clearly
explain the benefits of your practice and using Xero, and
have a call to action alongside your contact information.
Our takeaway is ‘Why people love Xero’ (http://www.xero.
com/media/161347/why_people_love_xero.pdf) that lists 10
reasons people love Xero on the front side. If you’d prefer
to use ours instead of creating your own we supply these to
Bronze and above partners for free.
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Play 6
ADD VALUE
As with any business, the financials are important for
franchisors, but there are other elements that feed
into their success. If they’re not already using them,
advise clients on the value of using add-ons from the
Xero ecosystem – add-ons that have been tailored to
integrate with Xero to save time and money.
Talk to us about which add-ons may be best suited to
the franchises you are looking to work with, as there
are a range of industry-specific software tools as
well, including Vend, GeoOp and Unleashed.
Spotlight Reporting is a cloud application that
allows you to easily create useful standard
or customised performance reports quickly.
It also allows you to set and monitor KPIs or
targets, drill into cashflow and forecast the
future for better decision-making.
Receipt Bank makes the gathering, storage
and processing of receipts and invoices as
easy and as cost effective as possible and
converts them directly into Xero data.
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Spotlight Multi is a specialist franchise tool
that consolidates up to 500 Xero orgs for
one head office report. Its Google Analytics
integration allows an outward-looking
marketing focus for franchisors
and franchisees.
Wrap up
The franchises have unique needs from their accounting
software and Xero helps fulfill those needs. By following the
plays outlined in this playbook, you’ll attract franchisors and
grow your accounting practice.
Play 1: Know your target market
What are franchises and what is unique about their needs?
Play 2: Match the product with their needs
How does Xero fulfill the needs of franchisors?
Play 3: Perfect your elevator pitch
Sum up in 10 bullet points what Xero can do for franchisors.
Play 4: Go to them, don’t wait for them to come to you
Where do franchisors hang-out? What they read? Who
influences them?
Play 5: Make yourself heard
There are a large number of marketing tools you can use
to reach out to franchisors. Pick and choose based on your
budget and resources.
Play 6: Add value
What else can you offer alongside Xero that will attract
franchisors?
If you’d like more information on marketing to industries in
general, please contact your Xero Account Manager for tips,
tricks, resources and best practices.
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Appendix
XERO BRANDING
Xero is happy to support co-branding by partners.
In any co-branding initiative it’s important to strike
the right balance between the use of your brand and
the Xero brand.
Please remember that Xero must always approve
co-branding.
Rules
• Use of the name Xero in your company name,
product name, service offering or URL is not
permitted.
• Use of the Xero logo, tagline and web address must
conform to the brand guidelines.
• Apart from the use of the Xero logo, use of the Xero
brand blue is not permitted.
• Copying or obvious adaptation of the Xero design
interface from either the marketing site www.xero.
com or the Xero application is not permitted.
• Use of copy, images, screenshots, photos and any
other content produced by Xero is permitted only
with approval.
• When promoting or offering your products or
services, your brand must be the dominant brand.
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• When promoting or offering Xero products or
services, you must use materials provided by Xero.
You can only alter the materials and apply your
own brand and content in ways pre-approved
by Xero.
• Any implied endorsement by Xero or implied
affiliation with Xero must be approved.
Xero is a fast-moving company that is dependent on
close partnerships - we will ensure you get a speedy
and flexible response to all co-branding requests.
Beautiful accounting software
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