1851

Development sites are often the first and last stops a candidate will make in their pre-application discovery process, and the importance of making a good impression and driving applications cannot be overstated. 

Most franchisors have already discovered the power and necessity of a functional and compelling franchise development site. The problem is that too few know how to fully optimize their sites, and according to Michael Palm, Senior Project Manager, Digital at franchise marketing and PR agency No Limit Agency* [No Limit Agency is a sister company to 1851 Franchise], most omissions are completely invisible.

&ldquo;You see a lot of development sites that aren&rsquo;t doing all they could be to attract users and drive conversion, but the franchisor has no idea because there are no red flags pointing out the failures,&rdquo; Palm said.

An eye for design can go a long way to ensuring a development site is visually compelling and streamlined for conversion, but it takes a more technical understanding of web development to maximize a site&rsquo;s impact.

We asked Palm for the five most important factors that impact the performance of a franchise development site. Here&rsquo;s what he had to say.

1. Mobile optimization

Palm: Traditionally, most websites have been designed for desktop first then retrofitted for mobile. That was true even just last year, and a lot of franchisors still have development sites that were designed for desktop experiences. That&rsquo;s a mistake. 60 to 70 percent of traffic is coming from mobile, so that&rsquo;s got to be the priority. All of the essential components of the site &mdash; the call to action, the contact form and any other vital information &mdash; has to be optimized for mobile. Otherwise, you are losing the majority of your audience.

2. Strategy integration

Palm: A strong website is essential, but it can&rsquo;t exist on its own, separate from the overall marketing plan. Your development site has to be fully integrated into a larger digital plan, ideally one that includes PR and pay-per-click advertising. If you are not driving traffic to the site, it doesn&rsquo;t matter how good it is. You&rsquo;ve got to have eyeballs on it, and that requires a comprehensive strategy outside of the site itself.

3. SSL certification

Palm: This is a simple one, but its important. I see a lot of franchise development sites that don&rsquo;t have SSL certificates, and that&rsquo;s a problem. Some people think the certificate is just meant to assure users that the site is protected, and providing that assurance is not their top priority, but it&rsquo;s actually even more important than that. Google&rsquo;s algorithm has started punishing sites that do not have SSL certificates, so if your site doesn&rsquo;t have one, you&rsquo;re making it harder for candidates to find your site.

4. Content balance

Palm: Too many franchisors try to do too much with their development sites. It&rsquo;s important to remember that the development site is not and should not be the entire discovery process. You need to have just information to entice the user into taking the next step, and you need to make sure that all of the content is placed and worded in order to optimize the page&rsquo;s SEO.

5. Video

Palm: If you can incorporate video in your development page, I always recommend that. Not only is it stylistically compelling, it provides a huge uptick for SEO and it&rsquo;s a great way of including some of that info that you may have cut in order to streamline the rest of the site.

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