Do Business Well

Draw up the franchisee profile. Franchisee selection is perhaps the most difficult aspect of franchising. Given the nature of the franchise‘ relationship, you and your franchisees will be interdependent, in other words, success as a franchisor is likely to elude you unless the vast majority of your franchisees are successful. When selecting franchisees, guard against the danger of seeking carbon-copy images of yourself. This will not work. The character traits of a successful franchisor differ sharply from those of a successful franchisee. Professional testing is available (see the block “Useful services for franchisors” on page 111) but experience has shown that gut feel continues to play an important part in successful franchisee selection.

Prepare promotional material for the franchise. Most franchisors use a variety of items for this purpose.

A low-cost (sometimes called a confetti-type) brochure which can be distributed freely, for example at exhibitions, and posted out in response to casual enquiries.

To respond to qualified prospects, a glossy folder that has a distinctly upmarket feel to it will be needed. It should contain detailed information about the franchise opportunity and a franchisee questionnaire.

Increasingly, web sites are also used for promotional purposes. This opens up a new vista, with some franchisors having their own web presence, while others are listed on public sites (see “Resources” in the Appendix). The most effective will be a combination of both media, in that anyone locating a specific franchisor’s listing in one of the public sites would find a direct link to the franchisor’s own site.

1. Initial support and training. Initial franchisee support is an essential activity, and cannot be undertaken in a haphazard manner. A detailed written outline must be prepared to ensure that everyone involved knows what his responsibilities are, and that everything that is required will in fact be done, timely and in a professional manner. It is also necessary to prepare a formal training plan for franchisees.
2. Preparation of the disclosure document. Should you intend to apply for membership to FASA, the disclosure document will be a requirement, but even if this is not your intention at this stage, you should prepare such a document anyway. If you are serious about the long-term success of your network, you will soon find that informed prospects make better prospects and they also become better franchisees.
3. The franchisee profile. Based on experience garnered in operating the pilot outlets, list the necessary background, experience and characteristics an individual will need to succeed in your type of business.

Establishing the franchisee support infrastructure

In smaller operations, the temptation will be great to utilise existing resources but experience has shown that in general, this does not seem to work too well. The reasons for this are obvious. It is safe to assume that the existing staff have a job to do, and in the past this has not included tasks related to franchisee recruitment, training and support. If these tasks are simply added on, one or the other area of responsibility is bound to suffer, sometimes even both. It is best, therefore, to set up a dedicated franchise team with its own infrastructure.

• Premises. It is important that the head office premises exude professionalism and inspire confidence in prospective franchisees. The prevailing atmosphere should be conducive to uninterrupted interview sessions.
• Personnel. The head office structure for the franchise operation can be compact; initially, especially in smaller firms, the following team should be able to cope adequately.
• Franchise Director. To ensure the unfettered advancement of the franchise project, one senior individual in the company has to drive it. More often than not, this will be the owner himself. Regardless of whoever this person may be, it is essential that he dedicate himself to the task. This means that he should relinquish all other responsibilities and focus exclusively on the building of the franchise network.
• Field Officer. This individual will be responsible for the maintenance of day-to-day contact with prospects, new franchisees and established franchisees.
• Office Support. The job specification for this position would be: “A live-wire individual who has good office skills but is also a people-person and performs well under pressure.”

Possibly related posts: (automatically generated)
Putting the Franchise Package together

• Business format franchise
• Selling the Franchise
• Relationship Franchise Agreement - Operations Manual
• Some Franchise Terminology
• Preparations for franchising
• The parties to the franchise agreement
• Is a franchise the optimal solution? From the prospective franchisor's viewpoint
• The franchise agreement
• Ready to Acquire Franchising small business?
• Is the business franchiseable? Some critical success factors

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