So much has changed around how franchise brands attract qualified prospects. Like many aspects of advertising, the game has fundamentally shifted. What can you do about it ? To be successful, brands must re-engineer their methods based on the following 9 disciplines: 1. Understand HOW and WHERE to engage qualified prospects; 2. People trust others […]

Information Technology within franchise systems would appear to be a scarcity, judging by the lack of conversation on the topic. In this post, I’ve laid out 5 of the most important aspects that franchisors will require from their technology vendors.

Developing and awarding quality franchises is a challenge. With so much competition quality franchisees are getting harder to find. Ironically, most of the development approaches used today, despite many changes in technology, prospects and available methods, are based on old paradigms of professional selling. There is a real opportunity for those who want to embrace […]

How a franchise manager or executive looks at the key functions of their business must, in many instances, evolve significantly. Rapid changes in how customers, employees and strategic partners interact with the world requires people to rethink methodologies and creates significant implications to all business models, including franchising. A recent report by Gartner, which you […]

Like most companies in most industries, franchisors have plenty of moving parts and pieces in their business. For instance, there are potential franchise candidates to evaluate, real estate to analyze, franchisees to train, and franchisees to support; not to mention all of the franchise contracts, leases, and disclosure requirements to keep tabs on. Many franchisors tout ” proven systems” as a main selling point or advantage to becoming a franchisee, however a quick look under the hood would reveal that many franchisors don’t have their own internal processes sorted out.

Most businesses seeking to franchise a concept do so with the belief that it is a proven way to expand their company successfully. However, its not nearly as easy as many statistics might lead you to believe. A handful of brands comprise the clear majority of successful franchises and thousands of smaller franchise systems experience […]

If you’ve been in the franchise industry for any time you know the scenario. The poor franchise business consultant, working with a franchisee or its managers at a location in the field. The business is having challenges and the new consultant is trying to get down to the who, what, when, where and why. The […]

During a November 13, 2009 presentation to the legal firm Nixon Peabody and their Franchise & Distribution Team, Fran-Data’s CEO Darrell Johnson shared that, “tight credit” was “the single biggest constraint on franchise growth.” According to Mr. Johnson, easy credit over the past several years allowed franchise systems to expand and prosper even though their […]

Having worked in IT and franchising for over 25 years, I only wish the “Cloud” was around a few decades ago like it is today. I remember it well, dealing with IT people, and hardware and software infrastructure that required many resources and delivered little in the way of quality solutions in a reasonable time […]

Franchise systems come in many shapes and sizes. Long term success doesn’t come in the form of just more franchise sales. Insightful management and development of franchise systems is achieved via the adoption of certain philosophies, and many of those are counter to what pundits or experts claims.