As a multi-location marketer, you know the stakes are high. You’re juggling big-picture strategy with endless day-to-day demands, all while being pulled in ten different directions. Vendors are supposed to make your life easier—but do they? Misalignment or inefficiencies can sometimes add unnecessary complexity. The good news? With the right approach, you can turn these relationships into your greatest assets.
With the right approach, you can build vendor relationships that don’t just deliver results but make your job easier. Here’s how you can reframe and optimize those partnerships to solve your biggest challenges, free up your time, and help you focus on what matters most.
Re-evaluate your contract and service offerings
Is your vendor still providing the exact same line items as 5 years ago? If the only thing that’s changed is the price, it’s time for a serious discussion.
Instead of treating contracts as static documents, see them as living agreements that reflect your current priorities.
Scale up
When your business is growing—whether you’re opening new locations, acquiring competitors, or launching a new product or service—your vendors need to grow with you. But scaling up isn’t just about asking for more, it’s about making sure your vendors have the resources, expertise, and systems to handle your evolving needs.
We have clients who started with just one single service, like local SEO, growing over time to engage with five or more channels from Meta Ads to TikTok videos. This has been a very successful model, helping us “work out the kinks” at a smaller scale and figure out the right partnership dynamic before throwing fuel on the fire with ambitious multi-channel campaigns.
It might also be an expansion of existing services. Say, for example, your company is making a move into the Quebec market. Adding French content and/or translation services to your contract will help serve this new market adequately.
Scale down
Sometimes, scaling down is just as critical as scaling up—whether due to budget adjustments, shifting priorities, or the need to streamline operations. Scaling down doesn’t mean cutting corners; it’s about reallocating resources to where they’ll make the biggest impact.
One of our larger multi-location marketing clients decided to bring social media in-house, and so we readjusted their contract. They were able to focus on social media with a new hire, saving money in the process, and together we redirected a portion of this budget toward web development, primarily landing pages for paid ads. The shift was a win-win for everyone.
For both scaling up and scaling down, consider the seasonality of your business. If you’re involved in retail, for example, you could probably use much more hands-on service in the holiday shopping window, and scale back the budget for early winter when customers are more budget-conscious.
Experiment and pivot
Will Spotify or TikTok Ads be an effective marketing channel for your business? Will a pillar content strategy move the needle? Experimentation is a part of marketing, and there’s always value in testing new things.
By the same token, there may be a service you’re receiving that, for one reason or another, just isn’t generating the results you need or expect. Don’t throw good money after bad, it might be time to try something else with that budget.
I would recommend setting SMART goals in partnership with your vendors; if you’re not seeing the results you need to see, on the timeline you need to see, be honest with each other and pivot.
Tell your vendors what you need
Effective vendor relationships thrive on clarity. Be open and direct about what you need, and how they can best support you.
Here are just a few factors to consider:
- Big picture or granular details? Decide whether you want high-level strategy, in-the-weeds support, or both.
- Control or trust? Are you a hands-on decision-maker or do you prefer to delegate? Define the balance.
- Right-sized approvals: Streamline the approval process to avoid bottlenecks while still maintaining oversight.
- Communication preferences: Weekly meetings or real-time Slack updates? Set expectations for how and when you want to stay in touch.
- Metrics that matter: Focus on the KPIs that align with your goals, and make sure your vendors are clear on what you’re tracking.
- Risk tolerance: Share how comfortable you are with experimentation, so your vendors can push boundaries (or stay conservative) accordingly.
Keep your vendors informed
The best vendor relationships are built on transparency. Help them help you by sharing what’s on your radar. Your vendors can’t truly support your success if they don’t know what’s happening behind the scenes. By sharing the big picture, you empower them to become proactive partners who anticipate needs and align with your goals.
Share your company’s goals
Are you opening new locations, rebranding, or shifting focus? Providing the larger context ensures your vendors align their efforts with your objectives.
If we know that a multi-location client is not focused on acquisition or growth, we will centre our strategy around market share in priority locations, strengthening the position and growing traffic and leads.
If we know that a multi-location client is overseeing expansion into a new territory this year, then we will focus our digital marketing strategy in support of this, whether it’s ensuring an appropriate transition of digital assets (if an acquisition) or setting up the right foundation for new locations (if an expansion).
If we don’t have this information from a client, our strategy might not match the key company priorities and it will waste time & money unnecessarily.
Share your own career goals
As a vendor, we’re here to serve your company, but we’re also here to serve you. What does success look like for you?
If you’re under pressure to achieve ambitious results, we can prioritize quick wins—like ramping up campaigns in high-performing locations or rolling out scalable templates that save time.
If your focus is on thought leadership we can experiment with cutting-edge strategies, like testing emerging ad platforms. In 2022, our ad campaigns helped support an industry award win for a client in the residential property management space.
Simply put, you deserve a vendor who makes you look good.
What’s on the horizon ahead?
Share what’s changing in your business and industry. Vendors who understand your evolving environment can anticipate needs and offer proactive solutions. While we do our best to stay informed, as marketers we cannot be experts in every single client industry. Maintaining a shared dialogue helps us provide answers on the marketing side to the regulatory, compliance, or market shifts that may affect your business.
Consider Canada’s anti-spam legislation (CASL), which came into effect in 2014. This necessitated significant marketing changes, from consent boxes on email forms to a complete restructuring of email lists. Being able to navigate these types of changes with a trusted vendor makes all the difference.
Be open about your concerns
Great partners are there to help alleviate your biggest pain points. Be honest about what’s keeping you up at *****. Is an emerging competitor casting a shadow over your weekly board meetings? Are franchise owners cranking up the pressure? Is leadership pushing for results faster than you can deliver?
The more your vendors understand your challenges, the better they can offer targeted support to help you overcome them.
We worked with a client who regularly presented marketing performance data to his executive team during monthly meetings. However, there was a misalignment between their numbers and ours—partly due to differences in naming conventions and partly because of data inaccuracies. This was causing unnecessary stress and required extra time to prepare. After our client shared his concerns with us, we collaborated closely to align our numbers and ensure they stayed synced moving forward, giving the client confidence and saving them valuable time before each meeting.
Conclusion
As a multi-location marketer, you shouldn’t have to settle for mediocrity in your vendor relationships. You deserve a team that matches your ambition and delivers results that elevate your brand. By fostering transparency, setting high standards, and pushing for deeper collaboration, you can transform vendors into strategic partners who help you reach your next level.
The partnerships you build today will shape the success of your business tomorrow. Hold your vendors to the same high standards you set for yourself, and you’ll create relationships that exceed expectations.
At seoplus+, we **** partnering with multi-location businesses to achieve big things. Get in touch with us to see how we can help you reach the next level.
