Imagine for a moment you have completed the process to franchise your business and are now offering your business as a franchise nationwide. When you get to this point, it is time to start marketing, advertising and begin talking with interested applicants. It is exhilarating when you have been talking with an interested applicant and they sign on as a franchisee. It gets even more exciting when that person comes to training and you are in the position of shaping his/her habits to effectively run and operate your business. The icing on the cake is when a few weeks after training you go to a franchisee’s location to help, assist and provide guidance as they open their business. Then it hits you, “Wow, this is exactly my business in a city I could not have imagined being in just a short time ago!” The feeling of pride never gets old. It comes full circle when you witness customers or clients being serviced by your franchisees.
But that’s not where it stops! As a franchisor you are going to be tasked with providing ongoing value to your franchisees. Some of our most successful clients (you can see for yourself a list of clients we have franchised from start-to-finish) take this responsibility very seriously and view it as an ongoing challenge. A challenge that they are hell-bent to conquer. As part of our proprietary franchise development process with you (if you become a client) we will walk you through how you can provide ongoing value to franchisees and actually teach you how to be a franchisor (learn more about how to franchise in eight easy steps and our proprietary franchise development process). So what are some examples of providing ongoing value to your future franchisees? Well, here are just a few.
Marketing and Advertising Initiatives
One such example is your ongoing creation and development of new advertising and marketing pieces that you regularly give to your franchisees. Think about it, a franchisee who is running their day-to-day business is pleasantly surprised when they open their email and boom, a new promotional or marketing piece or advertising strategy is suddenly dropped in their laps. Another example may be relationships you create with vendors who can provide services such as pay-per-click advertising for your franchisees (take a look at our article “What is My Role as a Franchisor?”). Remember your franchisees are going to be busy running around like a chicken with their head cut off operating their business, so the more you can do for them the better. Part of your job as a franchisor will be to keep developing different marketing initiative and keep those creative juices flowing!
Technology Advancements
Technology is constantly changing. For example coming up in the near future will be “visual search”. Yep that’s right, visual search. Being on top of technology, staying one step ahead or at least being aware of what is coming in the future and taking the steps to be ready to go with such new technologies is a HUGE value to your future franchisees. Again the theme here is what can you drop in their lap as a benefit of being a franchisee in your system. Some examples may be to re-invest your system advertising dollars (for more on system advertising see our article on “What are Franchisor Responsibilities: Is a Franchisor Required to Advertise for Franchisees?”) in creating a mobile app or text messaging services that can be given to your future franchisees. Remember, if you choose to franchise your business and as a client of The Franchise Maker you will have access to all our resources including people who can create mobile apps, customized software programs and much more.
Research and Development
“Don’t fear criticism; fear stagnation” is a quote by Dr. Debasish Mridha (an American philosopher) and is SUPER relevant to franchising. In general the best franchise brands are never stagnant and are constantly developing new streams of revenue, new products, new services, etc. that their franchisees can offer. Ask yourself what you can add to your business after you have franchised that maybe you haven’t been able to do previously that would ultimately benefit your future franchisees and your branding efforts. Once you have franchised you will have additional funds to play with that you didn’t have prior to franchising.
The ongoing support that you provide to your future franchisees is an expectation and not something that is considered to provide ongoing value. So as a future franchisor why not step it up a notch? One more example is to have somebody on your team reach out to your future franchisees once a month. Have a one-on-one phone conference with them (like a coaching session). This type of support takes things to the next level. It shows you really ARE dedicated to the success of your future franchisees. It takes thought, effort and work but in the spirit of providing ongoing value to your future franchisees this by far carries the most weight and yields quicker results.
Pioneer in the Industry
Franchising your business means you will constantly be creating, innovating and developing new ways to bring ongoing value to your future franchisees (see a definition of what it really means to franchise my business on the home page of our website). Think of it as being a pioneer in your industry, constantly working on improving the segment of our business. As mentioned above this could be in the form of new advertising, marketing and promotional materials and/or strategies; staying on top of advances in technology; researching and developing new products and/or services to expand your brand, etc. The Franchise Maker will not only put together an attractive and affordable franchise opportunity for you but will also mentor and teach you how to be a franchisor and provide ongoing value to your future franchisees. If you are looking to grow your business and if the idea of guiding others to success while creating different initiatives to continue to grow your brand sounds attractive, franchising may be the right path for you. Let’s talk. Contact us through our main website or call us directly at 1-877-615-5177.
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