Do you use publicity in your marketing efforts? Do you expect to see leads from public releations? If you do, you are likely setting yourself up for disappointment.
Our guest today is Nick Powills, and he shares with us how publicity should be viewed as lead awareness and not lead generation.
TODAY’S WIN-WIN:
Be patient with your results in growing a franchise system.
LINKS FROM THE EPISODE:
ABOUT OUR GUEST:
Nick Powills is CEO of Mainland (www.hellomainland.com), a content marketing technology company that includes No Limit Agency (www.nolimitagency.com); 1851 Franchise (www.1851franchise.com); and ESTATENVY (www.estatenvy.com). Mainland was established as the next step of our business for a few reasons. First, because we wanted to clearly define our why and our vision – to lead the reinvention of content marketing. Second, NLA is in the middle of the word Mainland, which shows our path from No Limit Agency. Third, Mainland is where we research, create insights and develop your brand strategy; No Limit Agency is where we create the design, digital development and content; and the platforms are the active newsroom for your brand, where we tie everything together. Nick is also the author of Sticks & Stones (www.stickstonesoar.com), an Inc. Magazine published book. He frequently keynotes conferences with a speech focused on leveraging your past pains to fuel a productive and choice driven future. 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. Prior to jumping into PR, Nick worked as a writer at the Northwest Herald, a daily newspaper in Chicago; started Lumino, an online music magazine; and had internships at Rolling Stone and Details 2 of 2 Magazine. He holds a Bachelor of Journalism from Drake University in Iowa.
ABOUT BIG SKY FRANCHISE TEAM:
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TRANSCRIPTION:
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (00:01):
Welcome to the Multiply Your Success podcast, where each week, we help growth-minded entrepreneurs and franchise leaders take the next step in their expansion journey. I’m your host, Tom DuFore, CEO of Big Sky Franchise Team. And as we open today, I’m wondering if you use publicity or PR in your marketing efforts. And if you do, do you expect to see leads from those public relations or PR efforts? And if you do expect to see those results or those leads come through, you’re likely setting yourself up for disappointment. And our guest today is Nick Powills and he shares with us how publicity should be viewed as lead awareness and not lead generation.
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (00:46):
I’m excited to have Nick on the show. I’ve known of Nick and been around Nick for many years in franchising. He’s the CEO of Mainland, which is HelloMainland.com, which is a content marketing technology company that includes No Limit Agency, 1851 Franchise, and Estate Envy. Nick is also the author of Sticks and Stones, an Inc. Magazine published book. He frequently keynotes conferences with a speech focused on leveraging your past pains to fuel a productive and choice-driven future.
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (01:18):
Nick is an expert on PR, publicity, marketing, and franchising. You’re going to love this interview. And I’m excited to have him on because we found out right before recording that we have common roots in McHenry County, Illinois, which is where I grew up and Nick started his career. So, let’s go ahead and jump right into my interview with Nick Powills.
Nick Powills, Mainland (01:39):
Nick Powills, CEO of Mainland, Publisher of 1851franchise.com.
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (01:46):
Wonderful. Well, Nick, I’m so glad to have you on the show. I can’t believe it’s been a couple of hundred episodes in before we’ve had you on, but here we are. I’m glad you’re here. And when I interview folks on franchising, I always like to ask how you ended up in franchising. It’s always a great question to ask franchise folks.
Nick Powills, Mainland (02:04):
Well, [inaudible 00:02:06] a year in my connection goes back to Crystal Lake. But I was working at the Northwest Herald Daily in the Chicago suburbs, and at the same time, I started a music magazine in Chicago. It was online only, that was supposed to be the equivalent of Rolling Stone Magazine, but centralized to Chicago. So news, politics, sports, and music covering the Chicago market.
Nick Powills, Mainland (02:29):
I hit this point, I’ve always been entrepreneurial, that I was like, “Okay, I love this magazine that I created. I need to learn more about business.” So, there were two opportunities that I had. I could go do sales, computer technology sales at CDW. They hired tons of people there. Or I applied at a PR agency that happened to be in franchising in the Chicago suburbs.
Nick Powills, Mainland (02:53):
And I showed up at that interview with leather jacket, hoop earrings because I thought I was still a rockstar, red Mustang. And somehow they said yes, and they hired me. And what I found very early on, I didn’t know how I’d feel about talking to franchisees, but I loved them. I loved the stories immediately, because I was fascinated that someone was willing to invest their life savings into a business they had little to no control over. But they had these fantastic backstories of what was the trigger that forced them to do it. And then how did they actually build up the funds? Whether they begged, borrowed, and stole, or they raised funds by building their career up to being a disgruntled VP who got overlooked, the backstories were phenomenal.
Nick Powills, Mainland (03:40):
And I realized that what I loved about being a rockstar journalist wasn’t the rockstar, it was the story. And franchisees have the exact same stories to get that to that point. So it was very on accident that I fell into franchising, but I’m very glad that I did. 20 years ago next year.
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (03:58):
Crazy how quickly that time goes by two decades, right?
Nick Powills, Mainland (04:02):
[Inaudible 00:04:03].
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (04:02):
Two decades.
Nick Powills, Mainland (04:03):
And I’m still 22 years old. That’s what’s weird.
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (04:08):
Well, with your main business and with what you’ve been doing and spending most of your franchise career in publicity and in that whole vein, I always think it’s important. Because I think publicity for someone that’s not familiar with it or maybe only casually reads headlines, but they’re not using it, or someone who might be skeptical of it. I think it’s important maybe for you to share why publicity and PR is important or an important part of a marketing strategy.
Nick Powills, Mainland (04:37):
I’m going to answer that in a few different ways. I like to take a transparent approach, so let me be very clear. I’ve always said that PR is not lead generation. A lot of agencies sell it as lead generation, I call it lead awareness. Because if you look at the candidate journey, right now they spend 6.4 months for investments under a half a million dollars in the funnel. So, I educate you today that franchising exists. Now you go around the web and you try to understand what it is, what’s an FTD, what’s Item 19 5 and 7. And so, I’m stuck figuring this out after that impression. Let’s say today’s show hit right now, I might learn about a business, but I’m not going to act on it for quite some time. That’s statement one.
Nick Powills, Mainland (05:22):
Statement two is, the drum beats ends up creating the most noise for a franchisor to have a shot to get in front of the right candidates. And so, PR ends up being part of that drum beat. You’re getting third party credibility from a reporter interviewing or writing about your business and validating the fact that you are legitimate. And so, this drum beat adds up.
Nick Powills, Mainland (05:45):
We did a study with checkers and rallies years ago because of the volume of leads that they got as a business. And we lined weeks, we got press with weeks we didn’t. And it’s not novel, it was just weeks we got pressed, leads went up, weeks we didn’t, they went down. There were still tailwinds ’cause those were getting pushed through the funnel, but it had an impact.
Nick Powills, Mainland (06:04):
The last thing I’ll say on the PR side, it’s the entry point into storytelling. Right before we got on this segment, Tom, to did you see that segment on Fox Business about franchising?
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (06:14):
I have not seen it yet. No.
Nick Powills, Mainland (06:15):
I’m just kidding. I don’t know if there was one. But the point is, news moves so fast today that 10 years ago, PR definitely impact the leads faster. But because if something is important and that hits news right now with you and I talking, we’re not going to see it. The only way it finds us is if a friend forwards it to us or it’s marketed to us. And that’s where the digital component attached back to the PR that you earn ends up being essential, if you’re going to use it as a lead generation tool and not just a credibility builder.
Nick Powills, Mainland (06:45):
So, it’s complex. It’s very important because the end of the day, PR is much more cost-effective than buying the ads and the equivalent. So a lot of franchisors take that swing and say, “Well, look, maybe I get lucky.” But it’s still a crap shoot. And if you don’t commit to it long-term, the odds of you being disappointed will greatly increase.
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (07:08):
Very fair and appreciate that. Well, our audience largely tends to be folks that are either thinking about franchising their business or they’re emerging and franchisors. So very often, especially with emerging franchisors, they have a limited marketing budget, as they start exploring different avenues and ways to generate leads. And so, I like how you described PR as this lead awareness to help support some of the lead generation activities. Maybe talk a little bit about how a franchisor can mix in to their marketing budget, a PR press type strategy with some of the work that maybe you’ve done with clients of yours.
Nick Powills, Mainland (07:50):
The first piece of advice that I have to a brand is, look at your deal value to get a sense of how much you should budget. So, the number that I usually use is three times royalty for a year. And so you look at what that number is, whether it’s $15,000 or it’s $45,000, it’s a million dollars. And you say, “Okay, how much would I be willing to get a check for that amount of money?” And so, it gives you a sense of how much money do you want to budget to put against the marketing of your business. There are other brands that say they take the franchise fee and the fee is turned into the cost of acquisition. And so, I start there because now before we figure out what the drumbeat is going to be, we need to have a sense of how much we want to spend to go get those deals done.
Nick Powills, Mainland (08:36):
When I’m looking at the menu mix, like in today’s world, we have our website, which ends up being the most essential piece, ’cause where most candidates are going to inquire. And so you look at that, and most websites are stagnant, so there’s no content, there’s nothing moving on there. Yet, if you take the most important piece of news, which is your signings, your openings, your milestones, and you put that drumbeat onto your website, every eyeball that’s coming on there is actually seen it, which in my opinion is the definition of PR.
Nick Powills, Mainland (09:04):
So when I look at… After I figure out the budget I start building on what is the drumbeat, we have website, we have content, we have digital, we have PR, and we have traditional marketing. And under the market umbrella, we could say franchise expose or things that would fall under there. But each of those, it’s almost like a soundboard, like one might move down, one might move up, that you’re really layering it back to back of the napkin $25,000 per deal.
Nick Powills, Mainland (09:30):
And so when you’re thinking about how can I spend $25,000 per deal, you don’t want to spend it all on PR. You want to create as many different areas as possible that’s talking about your business, so that you have the best shot at getting in front of someone and saying, “Hey, first think about franchising. And then secondly, think about franchising with my business.”
Nick Powills, Mainland (09:46):
So when I’m looking at PR as a component, signings, openings, milestones, consumer to show the position from the consumer brand, a significant piece on a quarterly basis creates a good model for what an emerging brand should be looking at for, how do I actually leverage? Or what should I be expecting out of PR to get it so that I’m having the drum beat that will drive candidates through my funnel?
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (10:11):
That’s very good. I appreciate you providing some ideas. And you addressed this a little bit, but one thing I was thinking about, just some best practices for PR. I’ve seen various forms of, I guess press releases and news coming out. And some of it seems very self-centered, I guess, is the best way to describe it. And some of it is more oriented around maybe their system or as you had mentioned, new franchisees opening. So, I’m just curious maybe some best practices or a general direction you work through.
Nick Powills, Mainland (10:46):
So the example that I use is Sony had this guy, Nobutoshi, created the Walkman, digital, camera and camcorder. So, arguably the three reasons we’re able to talk like this today. Apple had Steve Jobs, Apple put people front and center, Sony did not. And so when you’ve looked back at the history of those two stories, of those two visionaries, everyone knows Steve Jobs, nobody knows Nobutoshi. They both died in 2011. One left the world forgotten, one left the world remarkable. We could say Steve Jobs to every single human being that we bump into, and they’re going to know exactly who it is.
Nick Powills, Mainland (11:19):
That’s the miss that most franchisors have both within their web footprint, their website, and in their PR. They say, “Buy my brand or look at my building.” And they don’t say, “Look at the people.” Brands don’t sell brands, people do. So best practice number one is, lift up the humans. And you’re going to have a founder story, most likely, and then you’re going to have your franchisees who are willing to invest their life savings into this business. So, you have two forms of humans on that.
Nick Powills, Mainland (11:48):
And then again, to build the drum beat, signings and openings end up being so because you want to create a fear of missing out. You want another candidate in a marketplace to feel like the deterioration of the market availability is increasing. Therefore, if I don’t make this decision now, I’m going to overlook this brand.
Nick Powills, Mainland (12:07):
There was an article in QSR Magazine, it was the founder of Panda Express. And he had just bought and this is years ago. He bought Tide Cleaners when that brand came out. And I’ll never forget this quote, they said, “Why did you buy Tide?” He said, “Because I don’t want to miss the next McDonald’s.” A quote like that coming from a person that’s a pioneer into your brand [inaudible 00:12:28] giving you such lift. Because now fear of missing out and the look like, lookalike, the like me, those two angles or those two components end up making the PR work. So press releases are, they’re not authentic, they don’t tell a story. And most franchisors don’t paint the picture of what a day in the life of a franchisee looks like in some capacity, and leverage it as a part of telling the why you, why now behind that business.
Nick Powills, Mainland (12:53):
So brands don’t sell brands, people do, is the most important best practice for someone to get in their head. Even if you use another PR firm, use that as your avatar for the kind of content you want your PR agency to go get out there on your brand.
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (13:07):
Very, very, very good advice. And speaking of PR firms and how to get ahold of you, you said use another one. Well, how can people find out if they say, “Well, Nick, I like what you’re saying. How can I get in touch with you or find out more about what you’re doing?”
Nick Powills, Mainland (13:20):
Positively or negatively, I am the only Nick, Powills, P-O-W-I-L-L-S in the entire world. So if you Google me, you’re going to find me. But 1851franchise.com is our trade magazine, and you’ll find a ton of content on there. And then HelloMainland.com is our agency. So, reach out to me on those or find me on LinkedIn. Happy to give advice, even if it’s free. That’s how I roll.
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (13:45):
I always like to ask folks in franchising that have been in franchising for a while and now fast approaching two decades for you, just what advice might you give someone that’s either looking to franchise their business, or they’re launching now into franchising. Maybe they’re trying to get those first 10 or 20 sold. What advice might you give to someone?
Nick Powills, Mainland (14:02):
There’s a story that I tell often. And full transparency, they’re a client of ours. But I was with Slim Chickens very early on in their business, and I said, “What is winning?” Which is a question that I’d like to ask, because if I understand what the brand expects, then I can tell them whether those expectations are real. And the founder said, “Winning for us is 25 franchisees who each have five locations.” And I said, “By the end of the year?” And they go, “It doesn’t matter how long it takes.”
Nick Powills, Mainland (14:33):
I think oftentimes the biggest miss for a new franchisor is, you put these fake timelines and it’s usually December 31st, on what needs to happen. And when you let your brand grow organically and find the right people who are going to be able to be developed as franchisees, then you go from one person who owns one, to one person who owns five. And that advice has always stuck with me because now they’re a billion-dollar business.
Nick Powills, Mainland (15:01):
So when you think about, how do you get to the starting line? You don’t force the hand. You don’t sell franchises, you develop franchisees. And if you drive unit level economics back for that franchisee, you invest as much time, energy, and money back into driving that profitability, franchisees sell franchises better than anything else. And so, I can say this advice until I’m blue in the face. But brands that just go at the pace that the world dictates they go at based on obviously your financial resources, plus your brand story, plus your unit level economics, plus the point of differentiation in the marketplace. Being patient with this is the biggest virtue, when it comes to growing responsibly and hopefully accomplishing the growth that you expect.
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (15:50):
This a great time we make a transition, Nick. We ask every guest the same four questions before they go. And the first question we ask is, have you had a miss or two on your journey, and something you learned from it?
Nick Powills, Mainland (16:01):
Plenty of misses, and I learned from each of them. I’m going to go back to being a journalist ’cause I love this story. I hate this story.
Nick Powills, Mainland (16:11):
I was a writer for the Des Moines Register, and they had these local newspapers in Iowa. And there was one called the Urbandale Press Citizen. And there was a lady, Betsy Funk, basketball player. As a writer, sometimes I write fast and I didn’t read what I put. And instead of F-U-N-K, I may have put a C. And so, that ran in the newspaper.
Nick Powills, Mainland (16:35):
And now what’s interesting about that lesson learned, is it shows the value in the details. It also shows what happens when you are what gets tossed under a bus. Because my editor took no responsibility and blamed me and I got fired. But that’s really the only time I’ve been fired from a job and it was for a giant mistake. And so sometimes, again, in some of those details, we tend to go fast or we have fast expectations. Slowing down a little bit, smelling the roses, not putting a C instead of an N can make a big difference in where your career goes.
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (17:08):
Thanks for sharing that story. Well, let’s talk about a make or a win. You’ve got a decorated career here, especially in franchising. I’d love for you to share a few highlights.
Nick Powills, Mainland (17:18):
I think the first one ends up being very important, which was I pitched my former employer a business plan on social media. This is back in 2007. And it was how the agency world would be transformed by this new form of communication. I will never forget being told that social media is a fad. That will be in my brain forever.
Nick Powills, Mainland (17:44):
But I took that moment to make the decision to quit my job, break up with a girlfriend, and move to Atlanta, Georgia to start this business. And sometimes you need to find that silver lining in a moment where you might feel like the turn went the wrong direction, but you build it as momentum or motivation to go do something incredible. And that was March 3rd, 2008, is the day I quit, I said I quit, and I think a lot of franchisees say I quit. A lot of franchisors said that they quit. And just note that everybody that’s been there had to get to those important words of, “I quit.” And so that was a big moment for me to say, “I believe in myself, I’m going to take a swing at this. I’m going to create a business.” And now again, many, many, many years later, here we are. And we’ve scaled it into a pretty cool company.
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (18:36):
Excellent. Well, let’s talk about a multiplier, Nick. The name of the show is Multiply Your Success. If you can share a multiplier or two that you’ve used to grow yourself personally or professionally.
Nick Powills, Mainland (18:46):
I think about personal wealth, and there’s tons of financial wealth managers out there. I’ve always struggled with the concept of hiring one because I’m like, “All right. So, let’s say best case scenario is between five and 10% back on the money. Like, boy, what could I do with that same money if I put it to work?” So the multiplier with us, we start off as really no limit agency, evolve that into Mainland. In the middle of Mainland’s spelling is NLA, so no limit agency remains. And part of the reason we did that, because we were going to build and multiply our business into other areas, which is now 1851franchise.com and Growth Club, which is our franchise brokerage that we’ve built out to be a disruptor.
Nick Powills, Mainland (19:31):
And so, I keep on investing in myself. And my multiplier is taking those funds and saying, “I’m going to invest in myself and I’m going to invest in my people. I’m going to invest in my technology.” And so, I’ve explored many times becoming a franchisor ’cause I know how to do it. Or becoming a franchisee, but it would be really hard to give up a percentage of my dollar. ‘Cause I know how to do these things, that would be a bad franchisee in many sense. But I continue to multiply.
Nick Powills, Mainland (19:57):
But I’ll say it’s a deep thought that I have. At some point, the financial side isn’t what’s motivating. It’s almost like the financial side’s a scorecard. And it’s a very complex thing on the brain, because you know need to make more money or you’ve being told that. But it’s really ends up just being a scorecard. And then you decide, at what point am I too fearful to continue to invest? Thankfully, I haven’t got to that point. And I continue to invest in owning as much of a life cycle as I can for the franchisee or the franchisor.
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (20:32):
The final question we ask every guest is, what does success mean to you?
Nick Powills, Mainland (20:37):
I have it tattooed on my arm. I’ll show you. It says, “Equals happiness.” Ultimately, I think that’s what we all chase. It’s like, what is that equation? And so, success isn’t exiting a business. It’s not building up generational wealth for my children, even though that’s a nice afterthought or addition into what I’m chasing. But success to me equals happiness. And I don’t think if you look at the big picture of happiness, it’s not like something that you achieve. It’s in these small moments. And so success, this is success to me, having a nice conversation with you. Whether it’s just my mom that listens to this later on or not, that’s happiness. It’s an enjoyable break from the craziness of being a business owner. So, my definition of success is what equals happiness. And finding that as frequently as possible within the construct of a day that I can.
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (21:39):
Well, as we bring this to a close, is there anything you were hoping to share or get across that you haven’t had a chance to yet?
Nick Powills, Mainland (21:45):
Not really. I’ll say this to anybody that will listen, there’s a lot of snakes in franchising. Trust your head, your heart, and your gut, and that’s going to get you to the finish line that you expect. Those are the three most important tools to finding good people to work with, like obviously you, Tom, and what we’ve tried to build. Trust your head, your heart, and your gut. That’s your secret weapons to winning in franchising.
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (22:09):
Nick, thank you so much for a fantastic interview. As always, it’s great to connect with someone that has roots in your hometown and is just a great person in franchising, and someone I consider now to be a franchise friend.
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (22:23):
So, let’s go ahead and jump into today’s three key takeaways. Takeaway number one is when Nick talked about PR and marketing strategy, and how he specifically said that PR and publicity is not a lead generation strategy. Owners and leaders and organizations that go in with that mindset are probably setting themselves up for disappointment. Rather, PR should be viewed as lead awareness. And it’s contributing to that drumbeat of awareness and helping folks become aware of your brand in their purchasing decision. Thought that was a great takeaway.
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (23:00):
Takeaway number two, brands do not sell brands, people do. Brands do not sell brands, people do. I just, very well said by him. Takeaway number three was right at the end of the episode. And I thought this was great ’cause this is something I’ve run into over the years in franchising. And he said, “There are a lot of snakes in franchising.” And to help avoid that, he said, “Trust your head, your heart, and your gut as a secret weapon.” All three combined.
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (23:30):
And it’s definitely something I’ve seen over the years as well, where I’ve had people tell me that end up not hiring our organization or working with me. And they end up hiring other maybe cut rate consultants or someone who promised a whole lot of things that seemed a little too good to be true. And maybe months or a year or so later, come back to me and say, “You know, Tom, you were right.” Or, “My gut was right. It was too good to be true.” So I think that’s just a great takeaway, and it’s something I’ve seen in franchising. I’ve been in franchising about as long as Nick has. And it’s something just to be mindful and aware of, just like there is in any industry. But just be mindful.
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (24:14):
And now it’s time for today’s win-win. So, today’s win-win comes from when Nick talked about patience, and patience being the primary virtue in franchising. It’s something that I completely agree with. You have to be patient to be successful in franchising. That’s as the franchisor and emerging brand, which is where many of our clients start. As an emerging brand, you have to be patient for those first few sales or maybe first many sales. It takes patience.
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (24:48):
And I love the example he gave of a client that he worked with, and started working with early on. And he asked them what success means to them. And the client said, “Selling 25 franchises.” And Nick responded by saying, “Well, by when? When do you want to achieve that?” And the client essentially responded with, “Whenever it happens.” And I thought that was just a beautiful takeaway and as a reminder to be patient, and as Nick said, allow for your brand to grow at the pace it’s naturally going to end up flowing into.
Dr. Tom DuFore, Big Sky Franchise Team (25:22):
And so, that’s the episode today, folks. Please make sure you subscribe to the podcast and give us a review. And remember, if you or anyone might be ready to franchise their business or take their company to the next level, please connect with us at bigskyfranchiseteam.com. Thanks for tuning in and we look forward to having you back next week.