Franchises marketing
They know the brand.
They choose a location.
Customers come for the brand and decide on the location. Google ranks each location's profile mainly on relevance, distance and how well known the business is, and each profile carries its own reviews. So the store that wins is usually the one whose profile and page answer the practical questions: is it open, what does it do, what do people say, and does the advertised deal apply here.
Written by Dan Picken, a marketer who checks the sources. Last checked 6 November 2026.Two decisions,
not one.
A customer choosing a franchise makes two calls, often in the same minute. First the brand: do I trust this kind of business? Then the location: is this one open, close, any good, and will it honour what I saw? Head office mostly controls the first. The second is decided on a phone screen, one store at a time.
Take someone in Charlestown whose car is overdue for a service. They search 'car service near me'. Google shows a handful of businesses on the map, ranked mainly on relevance, distance and how well known each one is. If your brand's Charlestown workshop is among them, the brand gets a look. Then the stars, the hours and the reviews from people nearby decide who gets the call.
That's why national awareness and local results are different jobs. A big brand campaign can lift searches for your name. It can't fix a location whose profile says it's open on Sunday when the roller door is down.
What the brand
does for you.
A known brand lowers the risk for a first-time customer. They have a rough idea of the price, the service and the standard before they walk in. That's a big part of what a franchise sells, and it's worth protecting.
It also sets a bar. When one store falls short, the gap feels bigger, because the customer expected the standard they've seen elsewhere. In that suburb, a two-star profile can undo a lot of national advertising.
So the brand gets you considered, and local proof gets you chosen. Plenty of networks pour most of their effort into the first and leave the second to each franchisee, with no process behind it.
What customers check
about one store.
Once the brand passes, people look for practical proof about the one location in front of them. These are the questions behind most of those checks, and where the answer usually lives.
- Is it open? Hours on the Business Profile, including public holidays. Google lists regular and special hours among the details that help a business show in local results.
- Can I reach this store? A local number that rings the location. Google's bulk upload guidance asks for a local phone number rather than a call centre number where possible.
- Is this one any good? Recent reviews of this location, and how the local team replies to them.
- Does it do what I need? The services this store offers, which may not be the whole national menu.
- Does the deal apply? Whether the current national offer runs at this store, stated plainly.
- Who will I deal with? The owner or manager's name, and real photos of the store and team.
Reviews are
per location.
Every Business Profile collects its own reviews. A network can be strong in Newcastle and weak in Penrith, and customers in Penrith only see Penrith's. Reviews feed ranking too: Google says more reviews and positive ratings can help a business's local ranking.
Networks are tempted to fix this centrally with a review push. Be careful how. Google's policy bans incentives for reviews, selectively asking happy customers, and asking staff to collect a set number. The ACCC says fake reviews, and suppressing or editing negative ones, can mislead. A prize for the franchisee with the most new reviews breaks the first rule on day one.
What works is dull and steady. Ask every customer, the same way, at the same point in the job. Reply to every review with something specific to that visit. Head office can supply the process and the reply guidelines. The local team has to do the asking.
The national offer
has to work locally.
National promotions are where brand and location collide. A $99 service or a two-for-one deal in a TV or Meta ad sends people to the nearest store. If that store isn't taking part, the customer feels tricked by the brand, not by one franchisee.
The legal side is plain enough. The ACCC says fine print can't conflict with the overall message of an ad, and a 'storewide' claim with exclusions tucked underneath may still mislead. NSW Fair Trading also lists bait advertising as an offence: advertising something you won't be able to supply for a reasonable time.
The fix is practical. Put a line on every location page saying whether the current offer runs there. Give franchisees the details early enough to plan stock and staff. And if a third of the stores opt out, it isn't a national offer. Run it as a regional one.
Check one
location.
Pick one location, ideally your weakest. Tick what a customer could find out about it today without ringing. The result shows which part of the decision it's losing: being found, being trusted or being chosen.
Location proof check
What can a customer find
about this store?
Pick one location. Tick what a customer could find out about it today, from its Business Profile and page, without ringing. The three stages are a framework for this page, not measured data. Nothing is sent anywhere.
Found
Trusted
Chosen
This location shows
0 / 9
Fix first
Run it for your best and your weakest location. The difference is usually the to-do list for the whole network.
Head office's job,
and the store's.
Who does what depends on your franchise agreement, so treat this split as a starting point. The test is simple: for every fact a customer checks, one named person keeps it right. The same facts feed AI answers too, which the page on getting each location named by AI covers.
| Part of the decision | Usually head office | Usually the location |
|---|---|---|
| Knowing the brand | National ads, brand standards | Signage, local sponsorships |
| Being found | Profile ownership, location pages, bulk hours updates | Telling head office when anything changes |
| Being trusted | Review process and reply guidelines | Asking every customer, replying with specifics |
| Being chosen | Offer timing, booking system, store finder | Answering the phone, honouring the offer |
What I see most often
What I'd check first
on a location's local proof.
- 1
Holiday hours missed
Profiles showing normal hours on public holidays, because nobody owns the network-wide update.
- 2
One template reply for every review
Every review answered with the same head office wording, which reads as if nobody at the store saw it.
- 3
Offer pages with no store status
National offer pages that never say which locations are taking part.
The honest bit. None of this fixes a store that does poor work. If the reviews are bad because the service is bad, better marketing just sends more people to find out. Fix the store first, then market it.
Questions
people ask.
Why does one franchise location rank on Google Maps and another doesn't?
Distance to the searcher is a big part of it, along with how well the profile matches the search and how well known the business is. Google says complete and accurate information, hours, reviews and replies can help. It also says you can't pay for a better local ranking.
Can head office reply to reviews for every location?
It can, but identical replies read as if nobody at the store was involved. A common set-up is reply guidelines from head office and replies from the local team. Either way, don't offer anything for reviews: Google bans review incentives.
Does a national offer have to run at every franchise location?
No, but the ad has to be accurate. The ACCC says fine print can't conflict with the overall message, so if only some stores take part, say so clearly and make it easy to check which ones.
Should each franchise location have its own phone number?
Usually, yes. Google's guidance for bulk uploads asks for a local phone number rather than a call centre number where possible. A local number also shows which location each call went to.
Should each location have its own Google Business Profile?
Yes, one for each real location that serves customers in person. Google's guidelines say don't create more than one page for each location, and every location in the country uses the same name.
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