Companies with a regional or national footprint spend millions of dollars on branding — and for good reason. But most of that branding focuses on macro-branding: big, broad messages meant for wide audiences across many markets.
That strategy creates a challenge.
Each region — and even areas within a state — has its own culture, buying habits, and favorite products. When examining sales data, savvy brands recognize that even statewide campaigns may not be sufficiently targeted. There are significant differences in customer preferences between rural and urban areas, as well as between locations with varying age groups, ethnicities, and other characteristics.
The issue and big opportunity for brands is how to give local market operators tools to adjust campaigns and boost sales.
Let’s explore the benefits and risks of local store marketing. Then, we’ll look at strategies that make local store marketing work. Finally, we’ll talk about the core technology that brings local store marketing to life — print-on-demand (POD).
The Benefits of Customizing Local Store Marketing
In the musical The Music Man, the opening scene shows salespeople on a train singing about the need to “know the territory.” Their melodic message still rings true. National brands must understand local areas right down to the people, culture, habits, interests, and values.
We’ll cover why that can be hard for marketing teams based elsewhere. But first, let’s focus on how local store managers or franchise owners/operators already have that knowledge.
Finding Your Local Marketing Experts
Local owners/operators know their neighborhoods. They know what people buy and what catches their attention. They are the key to unlocking the power of customized messages within local markets. Rely on their perspectives. That doesn’t mean giving them the final word, but you should gather their opinions on messaging and tools.
Local owners/operators provide national brands with valuable insights to connect with customers in their neighborhood.
Even with access to data on demographics and buying behavior, nothing compares to authentic, local knowledge of franchise owners/operators. Yes, data helps, but don’t underestimate the value of first-hand experience.
The Risks of a Brand Localization Strategy
National campaigns are built by teams of experts. These include creative professionals, media planners, and strategists. They collaborate closely to make outstanding promotions.
But who takes care of local market campaigns?
In some cases, an owner/operator may work with a local marketing agency. But often, they rely only on a small internal or field marketing team. In the most limited situations, the owner/operator handles it all.
That last scenario usually means little expertise and less time allotted. When that’s the case, local marketing becomes another task on the to-do list. Therefore, the results can be inaccurate, off-brand, or even harmful to the brand image.
Is the best solution for local marketing to allow the corporate marketing team or even the agency of record to handle local work? Maybe not. They may not be familiar with the local tone, language, or sensitivities. Remember, they are experts, but on a macro marketing level.
Is authentic local marketing that complies fully with brand standards possible? Absolutely.
How Can You Maintain Brand Consistency While Marketing Locally?
Large brands want local retailers to thrive. They also want to give them some measure of autonomy to make local marketing decisions. Paramount is the need to maintain brand compliance.
Here’s how national brands can support local teams — be they owners/operators or local marketing experts — to create local marketing campaigns that comply with brand standards and current promotional priorities.
Rules
Most brands have rules for their marketing — what can be said, how the logo is used, what fonts to use, and more.
But they may lack rules for local input.
National brands already have brand guidelines. They can and should build on these to empower local teams when creating locally-focused advertisements, out-of-home, or point-of-purchase materials. That includes rules for tone of voice, brand personality, image use, and other topics like using regional terms or colloquial language.
Providing those marketing rules respects the local teams as area experts. If Adidas had followed this idea, its email message would have been different.
Tools
Rarely are franchise owners marketing experts. What’s more, they probably don’t have advanced software or production tools.
National brands should provide a cloud-based marketing platform that helps local teams with creative tasks and customer relationship management (CRM). A powerful example of this kind of technology is The Engine from Momentara.
It empowers local retailers to select promotions, coordinate with the national efforts, and seek approvals for their marketing executions.
Integrated marketing platforms like The Engine vary in size and features. The Engine is among the most robust options, while other partners may rely on scaled-down versions. Still, the goal is the same: to help local teams follow national plans while adding local artwork, messaging, information, or other details to the final promotional message.
Templates
Templates are key to keeping national branding consistent across locations.
The central marketing team creates the basic design and loads it into the cloud-based marketing platform. From there, local teams can log in and add or select content tailored to their area. That can include images, headlines, and addresses — all set within defined spaces of the template.
In many cases, the national team still reviews and approves the final version before it’s used. That protocol keeps things on-brand and helps meet co-op marketing rules.
Technology — Print-on-Demand and Variable Data Printing
How do you give local teams the freedom to create marketing without losing control of the brand style? The answer is print-on-demand printing (POD). When print-on-demand options also include the ability to customize text or images, it’s referred to as variable print-on-demand (VPOD). Both are powerful assets within your local marketing toolset.
Ideally, POD should be part of your cloud-based marketing platform just as it is with The Engine. The POD systems start with approved templates that meet brand standards. Using them, local teams are empowered to add their localized content, such as coupons, images, messages, store hours, and addresses. Once the file is localized, the local team orders the equity and sets the shipping location. All items are then printed and shipped automatically. Or if your brand prefers, the localized file is routed at the national level for approval prior to production. Doing so will confirm brand compliance and validate co-op advertising compliance when needed.
Using POD creates campaigns that follow national brand standards while feeling hyperlocal. The best brands build and provide POD libraries filled with approved messages and designs that local teams can use as needed.
Combining Local Store Marketing With Out-of-Home Advertising
A lot of local marketing efforts are delivered in-store. It often becomes an extension of a brand’s point-of-purchase program. However, local marketing efforts should extend into the world at large — or at least, the surrounding area.
Ideally, the cloud-based marketing platform used for in-store should be able to generate out-of-home materials. Disappointingly, that’s not the case. The only platform with that depth of capability is The Engine from Momentara. It’s the one marketing platform and partner that can provide complete in-store and out-of-home promotions.
The out-of-home marketing opportunities are vast, so we’ve identified a list of go-to use cases to get you started.
Top Uses of OOH Advertising for Local Marketing
- Entering a new market area
- Announcing a new store opening
- Boosting awareness of a location
- Increasing local foot traffic
The formats of OOH advertising are nearly as extensive as the use cases. Here again, we’ll get you started with some proven options that deliver a strong return on ad spend. To that end, we recommend local marketers start their OOH efforts with to-the-door advertising.
Popular To-the-Door Advertising Formats
- Door hangers
- Flyers
- Front door sticky notes
Ready to Improve Your Brand Consistency with Local Market Customization?
Creating compelling local marketing that matches national brand standards is only one aspect of in-the-moment marketing — a strategy created by Momentara. We turn in-store, out-of-home, and event promotions into useful touchpoints that sync with the customer’s routines to encourage behaviors. The Momentara approach makes your marketing messages a welcome, impactful, and natural part of the customer’s day.
Whether your marketing needs are focused on local market customization or if you’re intrigued by the omnichannel opportunities offered by Momentara, we invite you to reach out. We bring you the technology, experience, production, scale, resources, and national presence to build certainty and programmatic success.
