When your business grows into a franchise, you have a lot more responsibility since you have more stores, employees, products, and customers. Even though managing them can seem challenging and overwhelming, you can grow your franchise to greater heights by following the appropriate management strategies. Franchise Business Management strategies can help you in the long run.
Franchise management success relies on factors such as professionalism, communication, technology, creativity, and partnerships. It would also help if you had appropriate planning, skills, and technique.
Hence, the most important question is: How can franchise business management be improved? Here are some effective methods.
10 tips for effective franchise business management
We have compiled ten tips to help you become a great franchise business and have good relationships with your franchisees.
1. Engage ineffective communication
Franchisees must be effectively communicated with if you want them to emulate your success.
Make sure you speak with them on a regular basis. For each aspect of the business, dedicate the appropriate amount of time to it (marketing, human resources and legal). Lastly, make sure you document everything you discuss. If you work with franchisees across a wide area, have a similar discussion with your regional managers.
You’ll gain the trust of your franchisees by holding these discussions. They’ll feel assured that you have their backs and they’ll share all of their concerns with you.
2. Conduct training
You have a vision for the business. What about your franchisees? Do they share your vision?
It is one of the best ways to ensure that your entire business network has a central set of values and goals. Whether you’re in customer service, marketing, or operations, training will improve efficiency and make teams more effective.
With the internet, training no longer needs to be drawn out. Team members can learn by watching videos or participating in virtual classes. If on-site training is required, spend at least a week helping the team grasp key concepts. Franchisors should train their employees for a few days every year. Small business owners who become franchisees can definitely benefit from such programs.
3. Provide support
Getting started in a franchise may not be easy for every prospective franchisee.
New business owners may need assistance to secure real estate, submit franchise disclosure documents (FDDs), or create business plans. Furthermore, there are a number of state and federal laws that may be overwhelming.
Having franchisees across multiple time zones requires a 24-hour helpdesk so that they can get help in real-time. Assign relationship managers and make sure their contact information is shared across the network.
Further, create a system for dealing with calamities such as natural disasters or financial troubles. It might be necessary to release emergency funds to keep them afloat in such cases.
4. Perform trials
Franchisees allow you to experiment with new products in a variety of markets, which is the biggest advantage to having a large franchise network.
Performing beta tests in a few stores before launching new products will let you know if your products need changes or if they need different variants. The same can be done for new brand policies, software, and operating procedures.
5. Audit franchises
It is possible that your franchise strategy is terrific, but it will only be effective when it is applied properly. Audits can help you determine whether this is being done.
Audits are often viewed as a threat by franchise owners, so it becomes important to explain how they can benefit their business. Develop an audit approach and share it with franchise owners. Choose which locations to visit based on objective criteria such as revenue, growth, or footfall.
If you find any irregularities, you can create a management plan to resolve them if necessary. You don’t have to visit every franchisee to conduct a franchise audit. Check if the franchise has seamless operations by requesting balance sheets, surveying employees, and asking for employee feedback.
Franchise problems ultimately affect your company’s reputation. If there are any issues with a franchise, they ultimately become your problem.
6. Make sure your goals are clear
Every step you take needs to be explicitly outlined in a way that gets all franchise owners on the same page.
Franchisees should be aware of new products that hit the market. When you launch a new marketing campaign, explain why it is important to you. If a change is made to the pricing structure, explain how the change is expected to influence sales.
This business model is based on synergy. As long as everyone on your network is kept in the loop about the latest developments, you can become the leader in your field.
7. Identify and reward your Franchisees.
Keeping your franchise owners motivated is simple – give them incentives for good performance.
Make sure you keep an eye on the bottom-line figures of all franchisees and compensate the franchisees who perform well. The compensation does not have to involve money. If you want to thank the franchise team, you can give them a free trip, a club membership, or gift baskets.
Keeping this as a regular feature will promote healthy competition between them. Host an annual convention in honour of the best franchisees.
8. Feedback is important
Don’t ignore your franchise owners, especially if they are showering you with bouquets or bricks. Make yourself accessible and address their queries. It’s likely that they have some good suggestions since they deal with customers all the time.
The best way to handle feedback and ideas is to have a robust system in place. That way, everyone can offer suggestions, and you can implement the best ones.
Having a feedback system will also allow you to better understand business issues. For instance, if many franchise owners in a region complain of their products going bad, perhaps there is a problem with the supply chain.
9. Make use of technology
Your presence is not required everywhere or you need not deal with administrative work manually.
In addition, many franchise management software solutions are available in the market that ensures smoother operations, whether it’s a conference, an audit, or a troubleshooting session. The company can take care of onboarding, training, marketing, as well as tracking performance.
You can focus on other important business aspects by adopting such tech solutions.
10. Innovation is key
The company could have stuck to selling Big Macs and fries after bringing on more than 30,000 franchisees. Instead, McDonald’s is continuing to grow by cutting overhead costs, introducing new technology, and expanding its network.
The market is always full of new franchise management systems, CRMs, and invoicing programmers’. Whether it’s about delivery times, supply chains, or marketing, try to optimize your current processes. Establish a strong foothold in your industry by implementing a continuous management strategy.
In conclusion,
Franchisees are the face of your business. Hence, Franchise Business Management plays an important role. Keeping them happy is the key to creating a successful brand. To do so, you have to plan meticulously, implement a structured workflow, and implement a franchise management system.
