Coffee and Analytics: The Turn of the Year. Another Chance. Welcome to 2023.

Over the last few months, we have talked a lot about the predictability in the funnel.

Based on the researched candidate journey (which we studied extensively in 2022), it will take ~six months for a candidate seedling to bloom into a candidate flower (lead). For those profiled in December 2022, the fastest was “a few months” while the slowest was three years. Still, averaging out at ~six months.

Thus, your New Year’s Resolution should really be your July Resolution :)

I see January to March of 2023 as an opportunity to reestablish the foundation:

Make some updates to your franchise website.
Do a content refresh.
Profile your franchisees.
Softly spend on FranDev efforts.

Why?

With the turbulence in the economy, I believe the strongest spending months should be in Q2 and Q3. I was curious about spending behaviors in 2022.

The top six months based on spending were (in order of highest to lowest):

December
January
September
June
March
October

Reordered (chronologically):

January
March
July
September
October
December

The lowest spend months were August and February.

Now, if this were to align with the six month run, this would mean the lowest lead activity months were February and August (interestingly six months apart). This would also mean the best months would be June and July. How does that align with your data?

For those profiled in December, I also looked at their due diligence process — as I believe the opportunity to reestablish your foundational elements should happen in January and February this year.

Here are the aggregated responses:

Spoke with Franchisees
Online Research
Visited Locations

That’s it.

So, how can you elevate foundational elements for each of those categories?

Spoke with Franchisees:

Do you have franchisee stories on your Website? Are you sending out Meet the Zee to your leads through email? Do you have a Q1 Webinar set-up (video asset and understanding of activity of your dead lead database)?

Online Research:

Content, PR, End of Year Press Release.

Visited Locations:

What’s your owner story within your units? Perhaps not just “Franchise Information”, rather, meet the zee.

Nick Powills, CFE, founded No Limit Agency in 2008 and serves as Chief Brand Strategist for the Chicago-based firm. No Limit is a full-service communications agency that establishes and elevates brands by bridging Public Relations, Social Media, Marketing, Advertising, Digital, and a lot of creativity, to best strategize well-rounded and successful campaigns for 50+ global franchise brands. By presenting visionary ideas and building real relationships, No Limit is able to create effective media branding strategies to help companies grow. Nick currently leads a staff of writers, media strategists, designers, social media experts and digital producers in an office think-tank where brands are humanized for strong, compelling media stories. Prior to starting No Limit at the age of 27, Nick spent four years working at a franchise PR agency where he mastered the art of building rapport with media outlets and creating newsworthy pitches for earned media placements. He holds a Bachelor of Journalism from Drake University in Iowa.

Coffee and Analytics: The Turn of the Year. Another Chance. Welcome to 2023.

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