Why "Custom TV Channels" are a Great Fit for Franchises

/

In a previous post I put forth the premise that digital signage in many businesses is not thought of as a "TV Channel", but a variation of a presentation or web page.

My experience shows this can be especially relevant for franchise environments.

It is generally agreed one of the major business innovations that drove the growth of the US economy has been the franchise model. 

It has allowed for franchisors to expand faster by sharing the bulk of scaling with franchisees, while providing for local ownership and keeping more $'s in the community.

The most recognized franchises are in fast food and retail (McDonald's, Ace Hardware), but their successful processes have been tweaked and implemented in other business arrangements:

  • Auto Groups and their dealerships

  • Dental Support Organizations (DSOs) and their dentist customers

  • Rental Community Management and their lessor companies

  • ...even Broadcast TV and local affiliates

Of course, no franchise setup has been perfect. 

The best franchises adapt to changes in customer preferences, business conditions, and technology so the franchisee continues to see value.

One of these change areas is the franchisor addressing the need for consistent brand messaging to franchisee visitors through digital signage.

I found the majority of the time the digital signage decision is made by the franchisor corporate marketing and IT to make sure this requirement is front and center.

This does meet the branding needs but overlooks a key potential benefit to include relative franchisee localization content. 

Why?

  • It is a "below the line" cost/benefit for franchisor marketing and IT to support:

    • Marketing supplies menus, prices and beautiful media of the food to sell the product

    • IT keeps the displays working and programmed

    • No one at the franchisor is in place to support franchisee involvement

  •  It is a "below the line" cost/benefit for the franchisee to develop their own content and learn the digital signage system

    • Menus, prices and beautiful media of the food do sell product, but this content does NOT sell the franchisee

    • The franchisee is not a marketer or tech expert, that is why they bought a franchise :-)

    • Even if they wanted to, no support from franchisor is available

What if the system was redesigned to include the capability of franchisor localization in a way that makes a positive cost/benefit for everyone?

The franchises where we see this successfully deployed adopt the concept of "Custom TV Channels".

Consider the major broadcast networks (ie, NBC):

  • They supply the programming and ads to local affiliates to be played in designated slots

  • They provide the affiliates available slots for their programming and local ads to take on these slots

  • The affiliate slots is optional, depending on their cost/benefit

Unified Brand saw how this has worked very well as a "franchise environment", so why not in others?

For every rollout we studied, the franchisee is often in a "take it or leave it":

  • Franchisor provides the entire solution with little/no variation

  • The system is sometimes optional, sometimes required, usually with incentives to make implementing more attractive

  • But it doesn't change the bottom line that it was franchisor driven and managed.

What if all parties relooked at this and had a single support organization to make this successful for all:

  • Marketing produces its great content and hands it over for programming across all the franchisee channels

    • Jointly determine optimal content scheduling including day/time parting and localization for regional variations

  • IT releases day-to-day operational responsibilities:

    • Working with a tech savvy partner who monitors and troubleshoots the network on its backbone so IT is only needed for Tier-3 support

    • Minimizes the occurrence of the "TV black screen graveyard"

    • Manages the relationship with the digital signage software and/or 3rd-party AV integrator

  • Franchisee has a full support organization for content localization:

    • 1-stop-shop for all technical issues and content changes

    • Easy-to-use processes for uploading content

    • Manage their content scheduling to complement the franchisor programming

    • Content production, consultation and recommendations, including what other franchisees are doing

If you find yourself in this situation, whether a franchisor, franchisee or AV integrator, give me a call and let's see where our processes to support "Custom TV Channels" can make your in-store communication more successful.