Mastering Franchise Recruitment & Selection

The importance of laying the right foundations for successful franchisee recruitment and selection is often times overlooked and perhaps even pushed aside, replaced instead with a sense of complacency that you’re the one who knows your business model best so recruiting franchisees should be easy right? Well not exactly.

Interestingly this is how many franchisors, both new and mature, approach franchise recruitment and selection. In a marketplace where competition is high, people are no longer looking for franchise opportunities that are relevant to their past trade or profession, instead choosing something completely different. An opportunity, a culture and a brand that will fuel their interest and desire to own their own business, ignite their passion and build a lifestyle they love.

So as a franchisor, the key question is firstly, how do you capture the attention of your ideal franchise candidate and; secondly how do you bring them onto a path of discovery with you, until they either deselect themselves, are deselected by you or,are granted one of your franchises?

 

There are 3 key selling skills all franchisors must have…

We’ve all heard it before…. Gone are the days where you just “flog” your franchises. It’s about granting them. Often times this is associated with a passive sales process and one that doesn’t fully support the fundamental function of a franchisor and that is to ‘sell franchises’. So if you are not in the business of selling franchises, yet your livelihood and success of the brand depends highly on it, it’s important to understand the key elements to success franchise recruitment and selection.

Build solid foundations with a solid sales process

When you understand the lifecycle of a customer in this case a franchisee and you, prepare and lay and develop solid foundations, you will accelerate your pace of expansion in the marketplace. The real statistics of franchisors and franchise sales people are dismal at franchise recruitment and only a small percentage however are real pros at it. It also helps if you’re supported with a robust system that can do a lot of the heavy lifting for you. We can talk about that a little later on. Old sales techniques simply don’t work anymore and short-cutting the franchise process won’t support you either.

So what’s a solid sales process look like and how will it support you? A well-defined sales process will clearly lay out what steps you must take in what order and at what time, so you help prospective franchisees make a smooth transition to franchisee. Take some time out now to jot down some thoughts about the steps you want your prospect to take as soon as they see your ad, land on your landing page, sign up to a webinar, or simply attend the first meeting. If you map it all out into a framework that enables the process to flow, you will be in a much better position to create leverage, scale and grow.

Building Strong Relationships

Back when I started in franchise recruitment I was a master of the Tom Hopkins style of selling. I led, influenced and convinced and won them over and yes that meant I then took their money. That style of selling just doesn’t work anymore. People are more aware; they are well educated and informed and are truly stacking your franchise opportunity up against another. I am a big believer that you just can’t possibly build strong, personal relationships with every prospect as there is simply not enough time in the day and secondly, not everyone will be the right fit for you and therefore doesn’t require as much one on one time and energy from you.  It could therefore be said that the key to building strong relationships is to have a solid sales process and follow up strategy in place that incorporates a balanced mix of personal, sms and email touch points. Prospects are still loved, and you get to focus your time and energy where it’s needed most.

Learning how to close effectively

When you listen to a beautiful music composition, you would never hear a complete pause or stop after it’s built up to a crescendo. The crescendo smoothly transitions to a decrescendo and then continues with the rest of the piece.The same can be said with closing the sale. The crescendo is the final step in the process, where the candidate must make that life-changing move and take a leap of faith into your franchise world.

Therefore it could be said that closing the franchise sale is an art and a science. One if mastered will serve and support your franchise brand in achieving both short term and long-term strategy. Closing the franchise sale requires confidence, leadership, and a clear understanding of who your ideal franchisee is and what they are thinking. It’s having clarity around what will comfortably lead the candidate to your franchise rather than further away. This one element alone separates the masters of franchise recruitment from the rest.

This is a topic that deserves a book, a suite of master class training and the rest, so keep an eye out for that on our website, however lets jump straight into how you can implement a compelling sales process as the foundation of you mastering and being more successful at franchise recruitment and selection starts exactly there, with your sales process. It’s the ‘anchor to embracing, informing, guiding and closing quality candidates who will help you build your system and franchise brand.

Your franchise sales process must be refined to work most effectively for your franchise business model and brand. Establishing your franchise sales process is about creating a solid plan for success. Follow the plan and the plan will work. Add a robust CRM and marketing automation program like Infusionsoft or Active Campaign and you will be recruiting more in less time.

Your franchise sales process is an evolving process that recognises the changing marketplace, competition, buyer motivations and current strengths and challenges within your franchise.  Every franchise brand may have a slight variation to the process however the principles are simple and highly effective. The execution is quite demanding, however when followed correctly and combined with some sophisticated automation to do some of the lifting for you, it can produce rewarding results.

The process incorporates self-qualifying and self-closing principles. These steps are:

1. Pre Qualification:

Determine WHO your ideal prospects are, pre qualify them quickly. Your initial conversation with potential prospects is critical. It’s about asking the right questions right upfront. Your closing objective is to move them quickly to the next stage.

2. Present – Explore – Qualify

Present initial information, qualify the prospect, build rapport and establish the process. It’s your role to take control and lay the framework for the next stages. Follow up can include one on one, and automated emails and sms. It’s important you explain your role in the process ie my role is to educate you about our franchise… This will help you easily transition the prospect through to the application stage. Probe with more open-ended questions to show interest and to discover more about the prospect. This will also help you guide their investigation more effectively. Having clarity around their hot buttons and where their interests lie is more important than raving on about you and your products and services.

Find out what’s the key to their decision-making and what has turned them off looking at other opportunities and dealing with other franchisors.

3. Application stage

 Request for application form, collect deposit, and move them to the business review. This stage should be short and sweet so your candidate can step into reviewing the business model in more detail.

4. 360 Review

This is the stage where you can present next stage information, webinars, videos, written material etc along with your Disclosure document and Franchise agreement. This can all be automated excluding phone calls of course.

A great closing and qualifying question to wrap this stage up is simply asking…’ now that you understand what our Disclosure Document and business model is all about, do you feel comfortable with how our franchise model works?’ franchising isn’t for everyone so make sure your prospect understands and buys into the franchise way of doing business. If not, wave the red flag and disqualify the candidate.  Bringing mismatched candidates into your franchise network will create more trouble than what it’s worth.

5. Granting the Franchise

This can be a very overwhelming and stressful stage for the incoming franchisee. It is important you support them and keep the energy up during this time. This stage includes: Franchisee approval, legal docs executed, training booked, pre launch execution.

6. Training & Launch

Before your franchisees can launch they need to be trained in how to operate you franchise system. This provides an important foundation for your new franchisees to build their success upon.

7. Ongoing Coaching & Mentoring

Many franchisors underestimate the power in ongoing coaching and mentoring. You can do this in a leveraged way using a combination of group coaching, monthly master classes, online tutorials and one on one support. Whatever you do, be sure this is part of your system.

Franchise recruitment and selection is a highly specialised process requiring sales principles and techniques foreign to most other business development strategies. New franchisors and sales personnel quickly realise the process is counter-intuitive, and doesn’t adhere to selling fundamentals you may have practiced in traditional business in the past.

 

 

 

 

The Cost of Success – How to Balance Your Focus

It’s not that often as business owners we talk openly about the cost of success. For most of us we keep our game face on and rarely expose the  other side. Regardless of whether you’ve been in business for a short time or  as long as me or perhaps even longer, you will have some idea that there can be a huge cost to success and it can creep up from nowhere if you don’t take deliberate action to ensure you keep your focus balanced between business and life.

If you’re unfamiliar with my story let me give you a quick snapshot. I started in business at the age of 20 with my husband Simon. He was an electrician and like any young couple we had a dream to create success early on in life. We set out on our adventure of building an Electrical Contracting business. Running a business with many staff doesn’t come without a lot of hard work and long hours. We always had a belief that success would come as a result
of our hard work and commitment to best practice. All we had to do was bring the customer in, provide an exceptional service and then keep them coming back for more. Repeat and referral business came effortlessly as we built a solid reputation in the marketplace. We doubled and tripled our business year
after year and when we couldn’t keep up with the work we simply grew our team. Things were going very well, we had it all so we thought… great friends, great income, a 5 acre property, luxury car, two gorgeous kids, good health, a great marriage and friendship and a successful business. What more could we ask for?

We were young, and at the time we thought we had the rest of our lives to enjoy the fruits of our labour, so we were willing to work hard and that we did, working very long hours. Sure there was some down time and that was spent with our family and friends, but now, as a business coach & consultant looking back on how things were, our focus was completely out of balance.

My husband sadly passed away in 1999 and reality set in that we didn’t have the rest of our lives to enjoy the fruits of our labour. The gift is in the present moment, in the now. There is definitely a cost to success if your focus in unbalanced. Since then I have made it my life’s mission to help business owners grow, leverage and even franchise their business so they can build momentum faster, maximize their potential and create more time to do the things they love and want.

So today, let’s explore some quick ways that you can balance your focus, avoid looking at the downside to success and help you create a business & life you love.

Know your why and Balance Your Priorities

I love the teachings of Thought Leader Simon Sinek. Simon says it starts with Why. Knowing your why leads to inspired action. Why do you get up every day and do what you do? Is it to make a difference? Is it for your children? Is it for you? There’s no right or wrong answer, it’s a personal thing, however knowing your why acts as a driving force leading to inspired action and inspired action leads to you moving towards fulfillment. Fulfillment has never been lop-sided; it’s always balanced so this serves as a reminder of what’s important to you in all areas of business and life. If your why is for your children, then that means your children are a high priority in your life, so why do so many business owners work way too many hours and then realize they haven’t spent quality time to make a real impact in their children’s lives.

If you don’t know your why, take some time to reflect and get connected to your why. While you are working on that I encourage you to write down your top 10 priorities in your business and life. Put business on one side and life on the other. If they’re not balanced then you’ve got some work to do. Putting your priorities in a daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly and annual plan will provide some structure around what you want to achieve and need to achieve in the specific time frames. Planning provides a clear process to prioritize the activities that need to be done to ensure you achieve your business outcomes and leave room for the balance in your life.

Where Are You At Right Now?

Before you can make a change in anything it’s important to start with where you are right now. On a piece of paper answer the following questions:

  • How many hours do you work per day or per week?
  • How many business related items are on your to do list vs how many personal items ?
  • How often do you check your emails after hours?
  • Do you get through your daily activities with nothing left to do?
  • How many hours do you spend working after hours?
  • How often do you see friends and family?
  • How many quality time hours do you spend with your spouse and kids or other close family members?
  • How many hours per week / month do you spend on YOU? Meditation, Quiet, Reflective time, Massage, relax time.
  • How many times a week do you exercise?
  • How often are you eating out?
  • How do you naturally respond to stress? In other words what behaviours naturally come to the surface?

 

Now you know where you’re at right now, it’s time to write down what you’re prefer instead. Be honest with yourself and focus only on you. Don’t think about how it’s going to happen, just focus on what it is you want. We will cover the How briefly next.

Decide & Commit

Make a decision about when you will start to live your balanced life. A bit like goal setting be sure you put a date to it. It’s no use just dreaming about it and wishing for it. Make a decision to change.Commit to taking consistent daily action towards achieving your new balanced life. Being committed means you will do what ever it takes compared with just being interested which will see most doing what’s convenient. Do what ever it takes to make those daily changes towards what it is you want. It may be you finish at 5 every day or it may be you stay back half hour longer so when you get home you focus on you and your family. What ever it is be sure you make a commitment and take consistent action.

Plan and prioritize

Planning and prioritizing has been underestimated for centuries. Those who do it well, reap the rewards many times over.

  • Plan annually, quarterly, monthly, weekly and daily
  • Review the plan every quarter to ensure you’re on track
  • have a clear process to prioritize the activities that need to be done to ensure you move closer to your goals, not further away
  • Follow the rule of 5-learn to eliminate time wasting activities and implement the Rule of 5 by streamlining your focus and spending time only on tasks that will reap you the largest reward
  • What has to happen tomorrow?
  • Who do I have to call, see or spend time with?
  • Where do I need to allocate my efforts for the day (business & personally)

By writing it down and by ensuring you include your personal priorities too you will start each day knowing exactly what you should be doing in the time you have so you can start living a life outside of your work rather than your life just being your work.

Systemise and Automate

In todays fast paced world it’s imperative you systemize what you can and automate where you can. There are top systems out there to support you and the tasks you regularly perform. Take some time to determine what tasks are you doing over and over again that could be managed better, that could be systemized so you can delegate more freely or you can completely automate. Systemising and automating your business will give you your time back so you can start to live a life outside of your business. Some key areas to systemize and automate are lead generation and converting it. This is an important key area. Many business owners are working long hours to generate more leads. Stop chasing leads and instead turn to automating client attraction. This will bring in more ideal clients and literally put your lead generation on autopilot. Lead Nurturing and customer care is also vitally important so be sure this process is well laid out and systemised.

Systemization and automation will not only free up your time it will reduce the number of staff you need in your business, increase profitability and enable you to confidently delegate or have a task managed with confidence automatically so you have more time to do the things you love.

Delegate more of what you do

For most of us, delegating can seem to be more time consuming than doing the task ourselves. If you can successfully systemise and automate some key areas of your business, delegating will come easily and effortlessly as team members in house and those outsourced will be able to follow the systems and the processes to ensure the task is completed in the way you expect.Learn to lead and build culture.

Learn to become a true leader.

Gone are the days where being seen to be working longer hours makes you a better businessperson. In fact the opposite is said to be true. It’s about efficiency and with a world that is leaning towards more people focusing on balance, job sharing, 4 day work weeks, school hour shifts etc, it’s time you get into the flow of being more efficient and leading the way in the change. By leading the way and using leadership to build a new culture you will gradually re-educate your staff, your clients and suppliers about the new way of doing business. By becoming more efficient, delegating, systemizing and automating you will build a high performance culture, seize the day for what it is and give yourself more time to do the things that matter most to you.

Be the Change

It’s important to be the change. Don’t expect 100% change over night. Commit to taking daily consistent action and making a shift even it’s just a
1% shift every day will see you achieve so much more than you ever thought possible. Later never comes, so be sure you take advantage of today. As I always say Carpe Diem! Which means seize the day!

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Change Your Mind: Getting the most from your franchisees starts with a change in mindset

As a franchisor, getting the most out of what we do can be challenging for even the best of us. So how do we empower the franchisees in our network to bring out the best in themselves? How do we create more synergy within our business network, decrease
feelings of being overwhelmed and ultimately produce higher levels of success?

We hear it and we see it all the time. Some franchisees just have what it takes to build momentum seamlessly, without needing or wanting much support from the franchisor, whilst others can’t seem to get it right and steer their ship to higher ground. So how do you, as a franchisor, assist your franchisees in new ways to help them build more momentum in their business and themselves?

Be sure your franchisees know their outcomes and take consistent action to achieve them

When we jump in a car, on a boat or on a plane, we always know where we want to go. In
fact, we humans spend more time planning our vacations than we do our business or our life. It’s no wonder so many businesses struggle to build the momentum they need and want. Regardless of what business or industry you are in, it’s important your franchisees (from the moment they make their enquiry about your franchise) are empowered to know and truly identify their desired outcomes. In other words, your franchisees need to know what they truly want.

It’s one thing for them to set goals and say they want a successful business. It is another thing to really define what success means to them and then know the exact steps to take to achieve this success.

A great place to start is by educating your franchisees in how to lay some foundations
around goal setting and goal achievement. I’m sure most of you are familiar with the SMART criteria for setting goals. What I have found though, is there is a major flaw in this criteria.

Most people know how to set goals; very few know how to consistently achieve their goals. Your franchisees will have a better chance at achieving higher levels of success if they:
1. Define what success truly means to them
2. Build a mindset for success
3. Use the SMART model – but add an A to the end

By adding the A – you include the missing element to setting goals and that is ACTION.
This gives you Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, Time Bound and Actionable goals. By knowing what steps to take and in what order to take them and by taking consistent ACTION, your franchisees will soon be on their way to achieve their outcomes.

Encourage a mindset shift for more consistent results

With an understanding that human beings are conditioned by our past experiences, it’s vital to empower your franchisees to think differently and do things differently in order to have different results. If our thoughts and beliefs determine our behaviours and the actions we take and if the actions we take determine the results we get in our business and in our life, then isn’t it obvious what we have to change first?

For some it’s obvious. For most it’s not. Most people believe we just have to change our habits and actions and this will change our results. The problem is we find our old habits creeping back because we haven’t made a mental shift toward permanent change. Permanent change comes from strengthening the foundations and changing the core or root beliefs. This, in turn, will influence behaviours, habits and actions on a
whole new level. This new level will bring about faster results and more momentum then you ever thought possible.

How do you help your franchisees make that shift?

Based on this understanding, if we want franchisees to produce better results, we have
to go to the foundations and make a change within the mindset of each and every one of our franchisees. We have to change what they are thinking. This will then influence a change in their root beliefs, which will bring about a new sense of confidence and clarity and ultimately better results.

Now I know what you are thinking, “I can’t possibly help every franchisee change their
mindset.” That’s almost impossible. Here’s a mindset shift right now. Everything is possible if you put your mind to it. Using some simple belief altering techniques, you have the opportunity to help shift your franchisees mindsets quite quickly and effectively. Of course, they are responsible for their success, so ultimately it’s up to them.

Steps to changing your ‘mind’

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1. Have your franchisees define what success means to them.

2. Encourage your franchisees to set goals regularly. Be sure they are written down
and, more importantly, be sure there is an action plan in place so that they can take the
necessary actions to achieve these goals. Ninety day cycle action plans are best for
building momentum fast.

3. Have your franchisees commit to their success. Most people think they are committed and then contradict themselves by not being willing to do what it takes to reach their goals.

4. Hold them accountable to being 100 per cent responsible for their success.

5. Encourage them to say positive affirmations on a daily basis such as, “I am a confident and successful business person,” or “Each day in every way I am better and better,” or

“Increasing my business comes easily to me,” or “I live each day with passion and purpose.”
6. Empower your franchisees to adopt an attitude for gratitude. You simply cannot get more of what you want, until you are grateful for what you have.

Eliminating the F word

Ok, I know what you are thinking…what is she on about? The F word is something we see, feel and hear every day. It is something that makes us cringe. It can propel us forward, or more often, it can hold us back. It can be quite debilitating, creating a state of paralysis. It is the F word that prevents us from achieving all we want and more. FEAR is a silent killer within every aspiring entrepreneur and business person. Knowing how to help your franchisees control it and manage it will pay out dividends over and over.

The most common definition of FEAR is False Emotions Appearing Real. Fear is an emotion we feel. Fear is sometimes a good thing, as it can keep us safe from many a dangerous situation. The challenge is to know how to take control of your FEAR and move through situations that present opportunity and better outcomes.

Here’s eight quick ways you can help your franchisees overcome the FEAR factor and move forward in building more momentum in their business every day. Instill in your franchisees the following:

1. There is no failure – only feedback. This one statement alone can be extremely powerful. This enables one to completely eliminate the other F word from franchisees world. Imagine the world without the double emphasis on the F word. Failure and FEAR.
2. Take responsibility for all choices and decisions and then roll with it. Empowering your franchisees to be confident in their decisions will build more proactive franchisees for the long term.
3. B elieve in yourself. This is essential. I have met so many franchisees who just break down crying when they are with me. They just don’t believe they can do it. Changing core beliefs and achieving small milestones will help franchisees to believe in themselves.

4. Feel the fear and do it anyway – As Richard Branson has often said, “Screw it, Let’s Do it.”
5. B e aware of your inner chatter and have an alternative statement to end the negative
chatter. Being aware of the ANTs (automatic negative thoughts) is a great place to start.
Once you are aware of this process, you can make small changes to shift those thoughts in a new direction.
6. Make no-lose decisions. These are decisions that sit in the middle of both sides of what could be perceived as a right or wrong decision. Make no-lose decisions to move
forward faster.
7. Acknowledge that a high percentage of what we worry about never happens. So choose not to worry. Success is a choice.
8. Stop blaming and complaining. Take responsibility. Nothing is your fault, however everything is your responsibility.
9. Just nod your head and say, ‘Yes’.

Time to Take Action
• Have your franchisees refine their foundations by having them define what success means to them.
• B e sure your franchisees set out to take consistent action in order to achieve their goals – not just set them.
• Empower your franchisees and provide the necessary tools to help them change their
mindset first.
• Help your franchisees believe. There is no failure, only feedback, therefore they can bury the F word forever.
• Encourage your franchisees to maintain focus every day to ensure they are channeling their energy on high income and high impact producing activities.

Increase your Chances for Success

You have just started in your new franchise. You completed the training with flying colours, and you are confident that success is just around the corner. It has to be doesn’t it?

So often I see new franchisees thinking that because they’re part of a franchise network, the systems and the brand will do it all for them. This level of thinking is quite common and blows me away every time I hear it.

Perhaps you have been in your franchise for just a few weeks, or perhaps more than a few months and the initial rush and buzz has wound down and it’s starting to become more challenging than you thought it would be. You are possibly now thinking more business, increased profits and more free time would be nice. So how do you achieve that? How do you guarantee your success, how do you ensure long term sustainable success?

If your franchisor could wave a magic wand and suddenly change something about your business what one thing would you have them change? Would you have them provide you with an easier way to contact more, better qualified prospects,
and would you want those prospects as well as your current customers to view you as even more of a professional, or maybe even an expert in your field?

Perhaps you run a retail business and you would like to be a more effective sales
person and deliver more superb customer service. Perhaps you are in a service based business where you would like to be a more effective presenter, or more effective at closing sales or handling objections. Or is repeat business more important to you?

The list of questions could just go on and on. As a Franchise Coach I am often asked all these questions and more. In a nutshell people want to know how they can be more successful. How can they get more out of their franchise that they have either just bought, or have been running for a while. The systems show you how to run the business and that’s great. What can you do though, to take your business to higher levels and beyond?

The key point to make right here is the only person who should be responsible for waving the magic wand over your business is you. Sure you have bought a franchise and that should make you instantly successful right? Well not really. There are a few other ingredients you need to mix with the proven franchise system and the tools that your franchisor has given to you to make things the way you want them to be. Your goals for your business will always be different to another franchisee in your network, so it’s important to look at the other ingredients and combine them with the tools provided to create the ultimate success you not only desire, you deserve.

Throughout this article I will be discussing some areas and other factors that are critical for you to realise real business success. We will explore some of these key areas that you can begin to put to use immediately to help you improve the results in your business and your life. I could write a book on this topic so these key areas will get you started and perhaps look out for the book in the New Year, I might just have to write one. Take these general ideas and start focusing on those areas in your business.

For more comprehensive information on how to be more successful in your business feel free to email me for more information.

Start With The Right Mindset

Whether you make it or not in business, success comes down to one fundamental
characteristic, one vital ingredient. That ingredient is you must have a mindset of a successful business person. Study successful people if you have to. Look at the greats and what characteristics they had that kept them on track, that kept them persevering through the hard times and driving them forward in the
good times. If you don’t have the right attitude and the nose for business you will struggle.

Changing Our Thoughts

We all have thoughts. Everything you have done from birth to this moment is based on thoughts. It’s these thoughts that control us
and affect the way we feel. Over time these feelings create your belief systems, which include your feelings about “who you are” and “what your place is in the world.” These can be negative or positive. Our feelings and beliefs are what determine our actions. We tend to act consistently with the beliefs we have developed over time.

So our thoughts, create our beliefs, which then determine our behaviour. It is then our behaviour which determines the actions we take and it’s the actions we take which determine our results in life and business be that positive or negative.

If you want to develop your own freedom and personal responsibility for your life and business success, it’s important to make a conscious decision to do so.

The Business You Are In

If you do not take anything else from this article, remember this…
You are in the Sales & Marketing Business. Until you completely understand this, your business will be no better than, or no different to, any of the other choices your prospects and customers can select to do business with.

There are more and more franchised brands coming to play in the market, so it’s vital to understand that you are not in the business of selling coffee or making burgers or cleaning pools or mowing lawns. You are in the sales & marketing business. It’s what your product or service does for the customer and not the actual product or service itself.

The marketplace you operate in is so fiercely competitive, so cutthroat, and so unforgiving that you absolutely must do something to differentiate yourself from your competition. It could be just that little something you do to make the customer feel they belong with your company. Remember your customers names, offer that little extra, invite them to come back and make them feel welcome are just a few ideas. How many times have you done business with someone who really doesn’t make you feel welcome at all. Do you go back… No. Why would you?

Taking Action Makes the Difference

Most people I talk to they believe that knowledge is power! I believe they are only half way there with this statement. Only Applied Knowledge is Power. It’s not what you know it’s what you do with what you know that counts! Start Today, Take Action not just in your business. Take Action in your life as well.

Goal Setting

In order to take Action you need to know where you are headed. Success requires Goals! Some laugh at the old saying: “If you fail to plan, you plan to fail.” Maybe you think goal setting is not that important. I urge you to Think Again!

Clearly defined goals and strategy are the single most important structure in long-term effectiveness, profitability and sustainability in your business. They need to be constantly revisited, refocused, and re-shared with those who implement it in the real world.

If you are too busy to spend time with your strategy, you are too busy to succeed and will ultimately fail. You only have to look around at others who have failed this lesson.

Focusing on one’s goals helps make business enjoyable, and lessens that feeling of being torn apart at the seams. After all life should be fun and enjoyable. When you have a direction and a plan then you don’t have to worry about so many unknowns. The benefits of goal setting are enormous, and there are meaningful values to be gained from practical goal setting. Goals direct us, they help us achieve higher results, because they are focused on results. Just remember: your goals should be SMART goals.

Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic and Time Bound.

Eliminate Procrastination

It’s a word that we all understand from first hand experience. In business, procrastination costs time, money and sometimes the goodwill of a customer or a fellow worker. So how can we stop putting off what we need to do? Sometimes a task or a project seems mind boggling. Plot it out on paper to make it more manageable. Break the project into smaller chunks. Decide on a deadline to complete each task and block in time on your calendar to do it.

As you jot down your project schedule, figure out your most productive work hours. Set aside at least a couple of hours at your best time of day to grab the project by its horns. If you work in an office, you are probably interrupted an average of every six to nine minutes. So, put a note on your door saying “quiet time” and ask your staff not to interrupt.

Keep these tips in mind. Don’t just plan. Start NOW. Do something, anything, to get the project going. Work at least ten minutes and chances are, you will get involved and keep working Furthermore you might finish sooner than
you think.

The Most Profitable Thing You Can Do In Your Business

Follow Up With Your Current And Past Customers With An Unrelenting Vengeance

The most effective, the most cost-efficient, the most profitable thing you can do in your business is to create a database of your current and past customers and follow up with them. It doesn’t have to be an elaborate system, plan or strategy and it doesn’t have to cost you a fortune either, it does have to be well thought-out, planned and tailored to the unique wants of your customers if you want it to be overwhelmingly successful.

This one strategy is the most overlooked, yet most effective marketing tool you have in your “toolbox” for getting your customers – current or past – to buy from you more often, extending their buying lifetime with you and getting them to refer others to you.

Closing The Back Door
How to Keep Your Customers For Life!

For the most part, your financial and business success is largely dependent on two factors:

1. The amount of income you receive, and
2. Your ability to control expenditures.

The first factor, your ability to generate income, is perhaps, the most important
activity you can pursue on a daily basis.

Income, or the amount of money your business takes in, makes everything in your
business possible. The creation of revenue dollars for your business can be divided into two sections:

1. The acquisition of new business, and
2. The retention of existing business.

The retention of, or reselling to existing customers is much more profitable than
acquiring new customers. It is far easier to sell additional products or services to existing customers – people who already know you, like you, and trust you, than it is to new prospects.

The average business spends six times more to attract new customers, than it does to keep its existing customers on the books.

So Why Do Customers Quit?

It seems almost futile for a business to spend the time, effort and money to bring a thousand or more new customers in the front door each year, only to lose nearly that many out the back door. Yet that scenario is all too often experienced by too many businesses each year.

Why is it that so many people leave one business, and begin trading with another?People who, at one time were so happy with the company, business, advisor, or
salesperson they dealt with, the product or service they purchased, or the price they were paid for it, but left to go somewhere else and start up an entirely new relationship with another salesperson and company. Why do people do that?

The correct answer to that question is critical, and will pinpoint the problem.
Once identified, you can begin to develop a solution. Your implementation of that
solution will determine the amount of your renewal or repurchase income.

A survey on “Why Customers Quit,” revealed some interesting statistics:

  • 3 percent move away
  • 5 percent develop other friendships
  • 9 percent leave for competitive reasons
  • 14 percent are dissatisfied with the product
  • 68 percent quit because of an attitude of indifference toward the customer by the owner, manager or some employee.

Start getting feedback from your customers, perhaps have a questionnaire they can fill out, start measuring the numbers. What ever you do though make it a point to call and follow up your existing customers and ask them for their
feedback. This will show your customers that you care and take their comments seriously.

Where to from here? As I said earlier in this article this is a topic that I could write a book on. You have been exposed to just a few areas that are available to help you become more successful. Ultimately it’s up to you. Just
being exposed to them is not enough. You must do something with them.

Start planning, take action and you will be amazed at your results.

Choosing A Franchise

Choosing a successful franchise

It’s exciting times ahead. You have decided to go into business for yourself, and not by yourself. You believe that investing in your own franchise is the best option for you and it’s more than likely been a long and hard decision, eliminating a few industries or franchise types along the way that you know just aren’t a good fit.

Now you have short listed some industry sectors down to those that interest you, a good place to start looking for available franchises is your major city newspaper, or industry specific franchise magazines and websites. Here you will be able to either call the company or email them if online and request an information pack. Some information packs provide in depth information whilst others provide a general overview of the franchise opportunity which can then be further explored, should the potential franchisee be interested in taking his or her enquiry to the next level.

What do you do now? Which one is going to be the right one for you? Is there a market for the franchise you are looking at? Can you afford it, and can you make enough money to make it worthwhile?

Buying a franchise does not guarantee your success so it’s vital you do as much as you can to research what could lie ahead. The more due diligence you do, the better chance you have to finding the “right” franchise model for you and the better chance you have for success.

Investigating Your Options

Regardless of whether you choose to buy a new franchise or buy an existing franchise, research is the single most important activity in making your decision. Without adequate information, you could be making a very costly decision, effecting the rest of your life. Below is an outline of the advantages and disadvantages of buying a new franchise or buying an existing franchise which might assist you in your search and decision. Either way buying a franchise has some definite advantages and disadvantages and these should be evaluated before deciding to purchase one.

Buying A New Franchise

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Buying An Existing Franchise

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Overall Advantages of Buying a Franchise

Consumers today are becoming more brand loyal which means your chances of being success in business could simply rest on the fact you belong to a strong brand in the marketplace

Owning a franchise allows you to go into business for yourself, but not by yourself.

A franchise provides franchisees with a certain level of independence where they can operate their business.

A franchise provides an established product or service which already enjoys widespread brand name recognition. This gives the franchisee the benefits of customer awareness which would normally take years to establish.

A franchise increases your chances of business success because you are associating with proven products and methods.

Franchises may offer consumers the attraction of a certain level of quality and consistency because it is mandated by the franchise agreement

Franchises offer important pre-opening support:

  • site selection
  • design and construction
  • financing (in some cases)
  • training
  • grand-opening program

Franchises offer ongoing support

  • training
  • national and regional advertising
  • operating procedures and operational assistance
  • ongoing supervision and management support
  • increased spending power and access to bulk purchasing (in some cases)

There are of course some disadvantages to buying a franchise and the most important one to look out for is if other franchisees are performing poorly or the franchisor runs into unforeseen problems then it can damage the overall system and image of the company.

Let’s have a closer look at some of the important areas you should consider when choosing a franchise.

Your Passion!  Where Do Your Interests Lie?

With over 900 franchise systems within Australia alone, it is important that you gather as much information as you can about the types of franchising opportunities that are available and what they have to offer you and to the market or end user (the customer). Have a clear idea of where your interests lie and what areas you are passionate about, as this will help you eliminate some franchises in industries that just don’t interest you. You should start a business in an industry that you will enjoy for the next 10 to 15 years.

Making the correct choice of industry is the foundation for success.

Ask yourself:

  •  What do you like to do? (interest and hobbies)
  •  What do you know how to do? (experience)
  •  What do you do well? (special skills and talents)
  •  Which industry(s) involve your interests and use your skills and talents?
  •  What products or services could you sell in this industry(s)?
  •  Would you rather sell a product or service?
  •  What products or services would you like to sell the most?

Determine If There Is a Market

Before purchasing your franchise, determine if there is a market for the franchises product or service.

  • How many potential customers are in your area?
  • Will your product or service sell?
  • What need does it satisfy?
  • What problem does it solve?
  • What trend or fad does it address?
  • What should the appropriate pricing be?
  • Who are your competitors?
  • How many competitors do you have?
  • What do they offer?
  • How will your product or service be unique?
  • What marketing niche can you capture?

A Fully Informed Decision Is a Good Decision

Like starting any business, buying a franchise involves a risk. Studies show that successful franchisees:

  • conduct their own marketing research
  • use their own financial and legal advisors
  • develop thorough marketing and business plans
  • have prior work experience

As a prospective franchisees the more time you devote to researching the franchises available and evaluating the strength of the franchisors, the happier you will be in your decision.In order for you to make any decision about entering into a relationship with a franchisor and becoming one of their franchisees in the network, it’s important you are in a position where you can make a fully informed decision about whether it’s right for you, or not.  Reading an information pack just isn’t enough. Think about areas such as the company’s vision, philosophy and values. Are they in alignment with your values, and are you comfortable with what their products and services offer the marketplace?

It amazes me that many people make a spur of the moment decision about their future and their next 10 or so years. A franchisor does not need a license to become a franchisor, so how do you know if your investment is safe?

A great place to start is to investigate the franchisor’s history:

  • How long has the franchisor been in business?
  • How many current franchisees are there in the network?
  • What is the failure rate of the franchisees?
  • Are there any pending or past lawsuits and what have they been for?
  • Does the franchisor have a reputation for quality products or services?
  • What is the franchisor’s financial health?
  • What are the earnings claims and profit projections? On what are they based? Are the projections based on franchisor or franchisee-operated units?
  • How long have the franchisee operated units been used for projections been in business?
  • What is the background of the principals/management? What is their business experience? Have they personally had any bankruptcies? Have they personally had any recent litigation?

Transparency

Transparency is another important ingredient to the decision making – due diligence process. The more open the franchisor is, the more you can find out whether it’s the right fit for you.

  • Is the franchisor open when communicating the business model to you?
  • Do they offer you the opportunity to speak with other franchisees?
  • Are you able to meet the franchise support team?
  • Do you have the ability to review the operations manual and possibly sit in on a training class?
  • Have you the opportunity to work in an existing franchise for a couple of weeks and really get to know the
    • System
    • Manuals
    • Training program
    • Support
    • Earnings potential

Speaking with current and past franchisees is important as it allows you to get a general idea of their experience in the business and what it’s like working within the franchise network. Hearing a franchisees’ prospective (make sure you speak to a few and not just one), is a fundamental part of your due diligence and you get an idea of what to expect and what the culture is like and what the franchisor is like from a Franchisees’ prospective.

Speaking with franchisees that have left the system and finding out why they left gives you more insight into the franchise. Be sure you contact more than one so you can average out the responses. Not everyone’s going to be right for the franchise and a few will leave the system either because they were asked to or because they failed to do their proper due diligence initially and realised it just wasn’t for them. So ensure you speak to more than one past franchisee.

When speaking with or visiting existing franchisees, try to cover areas like:

  • The level of training
  • The quality of products or service
  • The level and promptness of support
  • The operations and quality of the operations manuals
  • The earnings potential/claims
  • Any problems or difficulties with the franchisor
  • Franchisor-franchisee relationship
  • Level of franchisee commitment

Franchisor-Franchisee relationship

How does the franchisor treat the franchisees in the network? This is an important area to ask questions about. Ask current and past franchisees as well as the franchisor. The ideal situation is if the franchisor treats it’s franchisees with the respect, as fellow business people who are in business to achieve profitability and mutual success. You will find yourself in a much safer and more successful environment and network if this is the case. Franchisees who are who are respected as fellow business partners are more likely to respond to the franchisor like switched on business people motivated and ready to seize opportunities and deliver products and services to their local area as best as they can. They are proud to get out into the local market representing the brand they belong to.

Commitment

Is the franchisee committed to the franchise? A franchise offers strength in the market place in the brand as well as in the numbers of the network. How committed is the franchisor to ongoing support and training? You can find this out just by asking a few current franchisees. Is the support and training broad which means it not only offers business operation training and support they provide much broader support and training which covers all key areas of business along with offering management resources, support and advice.

Franchise Agreement and Disclosure Document

Carefully study and obtain professional advice concerning the franchisor’s Disclosure Document and Franchise Agreement paying special attention to:

  •  Costs including franchise fee and fit out fee
  •  Term (duration of) agreement and renewal provisions and conditions
  •  Termination clauses
  •  Franchise territory
  •  Procedures and restrictions
  •  Training and assistance
  •  Earnings potential – gross sales, net profit
  •  Expansion plans
  •  How fast do they plan to grow?
  •  Where do they plan to grow?
  •  Do they have a business plan for your area of location?
  •  What is their analysis of the competition in your area?
  •  How many units are being planned for your area? Why that many?
  •  How much is going to be spent in regional advertising in your area?

Let’s expand on a couple of these key points.

Franchise Fees

One of the most common questions is how much does it cost, and what are the other fees I have to pay? Every Franchise system is different. You will more than likely find a general overview of the fee in the information pack and you can find out the full list of fees payable, both upfront and ongoing, in the Disclosure Document. The fee will vary depending on the maturity of the business and the complexity of the system.

Upfront Fees: Before you start your new franchise, there will be an upfront fee payable to the franchisor. This is the fee to enter the system and gain the right to use the intellectual property including the system and brand name. Most will also require a training fee to be paid which will cover the initial training provided to you so you have the knowledge and the skills to operate your business from day one. Some franchisors will also ask for an upfront marketing or initial promotion fee which is used to promote your franchise in the local area during the initial launch period.

Royalties / Ongoing Fees:

Royalty is the most common word used for the ongoing fees that are payable to the franchisor. This fee usually covers business, management, technical and marketing support. These fees vary from franchisor to franchisor. Some base their fees on turnover whilst others set a fixed amount. Some franchisors do not charge an ongoing support fee at all; instead they earn their income from the sale of their products to franchisees, which the franchisee then sells to their customers. Usually these products are exclusive to the franchise system and can only be purchased direct from the franchisor.

Marketing Fees:

Marketing fees are collected by the franchisor to go into a marketing fund or marketing pool. This allows the franchisor to market the brand for the benefit of all. This generally is a fixed fee or a percentage of turnover. Not all franchisors require you to pay into a marketing fund. Please check the franchisors Disclosure document for this. Be aware that you will still be required to pay for your own Local Area Marketing for your franchise.

Fit Out Costs:

The fit out fee is commonly included in the total investment set by the franchisor. This is known as a “turnkey” solution where by the franchisee can sign the agreement, attend the training and then commence in their premises with everything ready at their fingertips to operate the business. Where the fit out costs are not included as a total investment the franchisor will give the franchisee an estimate to fit out the site. Every site will be different so these costs will vary from site to site. Fit out is done in the most cost effective manner and in alignment to the design and layout standards.

Training:

The initial training provided to new franchisees is a vital ingredient to the success of the franchisee. For many new franchisees, this is the first time they have been in business for themselves so it’s important to ask what’s included in the initial training. From my experience training that includes the operations of the business, use of the system as well as other management and marketing processes sets a more solid foundation for success. Assisting franchisees in areas such as marketing, bookkeeping, staff recruitment and training, quarterly planning and so on will increase the chances of overall confidence in the business which will ultimately lead to a higher chance of success.  The more proactive franchisors provide the services of a franchise coach to assist the franchisee in all key areas of business.

Support:

Ongoing fees are charged in return for a certain level of support provided to the franchisee. It is always a good idea to ask what level of support is provided and what is included in this support. Does the support cover all key areas of business or just the franchise system?

Obtaining independent legal, accounting and business advice before signing any binding documents is absolutely essential!

In Summary:

Before buying any business, you must carefully consider many factors that are critical to your success:

  • costs
  • training and support
  • your abilities
  • franchisor’s experience
  • demand and competition
  • expansion plans

Brand Name:

How well known is the franchise name?

Does it have a reputation for quality?

Have any consumers filed complaints against the franchise? If so why?

Costs:

How much money will this franchise cost before it becomes profitable?

Can I afford to buy this franchise?

Can I make enough money to make the investment worth my time and energy?

Training and Support:

What kind and how much training and support does the franchisor provide?

Do existing franchisees find this level of training and support adequate?

Your Abilities:

Do you have the technical skills or experience to manage the franchise?

Do you have the business skills to manage the franchise?

Is the franchise of interest to you?

Franchisor’s Experience:

Has the franchisor been in business long enough to have established the type of business strength you are seeking?

Demand:

Is there enough demand in your area for the franchisor’s products or services?

Is the demand year-long or seasonal?

Will the demand grow in the future?

Does the product or service generate repeat business?

Competition:

How much competition do you have, including other franchisees?

Are the competing companies/franchises well established?

Do they offer the same products and services at the same or lower prices?

Is there a specialty or niche you can capture?

Expansion Plans:

Is the franchisor planning to grow at a rate that is sustainable? Part of your due diligence when considering which franchise network to invest into should include looking at the individual success of the franchisees. Have a look at what individual franchisees are achieving. Has the franchise met all their expectations and if not where has it fallen short.  Do you have the ability to own multiple sites within the franchise network?

Obtaining independent legal, accounting and business advice before signing any binding documents is absolutely essential!

If you are making the decision to get into franchising, your success will be determined by the level of due diligence to do, the level of understanding you have gained of the franchise business and the level of commitment you are willing to give to your success. Your future success and prosperity will also largely depend on how well the relationship between the franchisor and franchisee is managed.

Recruiting your Ideal Franchisee

As a franchisor, you’ve seen in your own vision, drive for success and in your company owned operations that success is possible simply by doing the right things in the right order and at the right time, in other words by following the “system” that has enabled you to create the success you have achieved thus far, there should be no reason why others cannot achieve the same level of success or more. After all that’s the reason why you franchised your business in the first place, so others could enjoy in your success.

If you can do it, then why do some franchisees fall short from time to time and some more often than not?  It’s rare for a franchisor to be completely satisfied with the performance of most franchisees. Too often, franchisees implement only portions of the franchisors system, take significantly longer to develop and grow their business and consistently fall short when it comes to financial expectations.

In extreme cases, under-performing franchisees are catalysts to dissatisfaction among other franchisees, which ultimately can undermine efforts to attract new franchisees into the system. It goes without saying under performing franchisees can become a significant problem.

This article presents a brief insight and introduction to some ways you can optimise Franchisee Performance.

Your Franchise Recruitment Process

We all know the importance of franchisee selection. Select a bad apple and you will pay the price for a long time, select a good one and your life becomes slightly easier. So why do we see franchisors still falling short in this area?

Having a solid recruitment process in place is generally a good place to start. Knowing who your ideal franchisee is, what they look like, what their character traits are, what their goals are for the future and how they have operated in the past in their career and or another business is a crucial element. By developing a solid 7-10 step recruitment process, recruitment process becomes a reliable system that will enhance the foundations right from the start. It will help you attract your ideal candidates, allow you to take them through the selection process and lead them into moving forward and you making a decision to grant a franchise to the ones who are a match to your defined selection criteria. Your aim is to get the candidates jumping out of the process and walking away so you are left with the good apples, the ones who see your system as a match for them and the ones who you see are a match for you.

Take some time over the next week to review your current recruitment process. Where are the Gaps? Where could you improve and what could be removed altogether as it just isn’t supporting you. Oh and if you don’t have a solid well defined and documented recruitment process, then take some time to develop one.

The Franchise System

Does Your System Need an Update?

The core of any franchisor‐franchisee relationship is the franchisors system for developing and operating a franchise. Effective franchisors have a consistent, repeatable system for operating a franchise. It is designed to produce franchisee success even if the franchisee knows little about running a business in general or that type of business in particular. This system usually consists of a comprehensive set of specific guidelines for everything operating the business effectively. Your system should comprehensively cover all key areas of the business including but not limited to Administration, Key Operations, Sales and Marketing, HR, IT etc. Don’t forget to look at Support and Training.

The system allows the franchisor to grow by both attracting new franchisees and by enabling each new franchisee to be consistently successful. Thus, the system is the essential foundation of the franchisor‐franchisee relationship.

Franchisee success, is dependent on the quality of the franchisors system, among other things, so it is critical that the franchisor system is complete, easily understood and effective. While all franchisors have a system, as discussed above, its sophistication and comprehensiveness often lags at least a little behind their growth and, in some cases, may be substantially out‐of‐date. Anything less than a comprehensive, realistic and effective system undermines the value of both the training and the system’s discipline.

The best way to develop a great, widely accepted system is to combine the broad knowledge of the franchisor and the top franchisor team members with the knowledge and expertise of the high performing franchisees. Generally the high performing franchisees know how to make the system work. By combining the best of both the franchisor and franchisee perspectives the system will encompass the ‘real’ story of what it takes to develop and manage a successful franchise.

To a new franchisee coming into the “franchise network” or an under performing franchisee, the “system” is a vital element in their success. Any gaps in the system will result in the franchisee instantly blaming the franchisors system for their lack of results.

I see this time and time again and yes although all franchisees should be 100% responsible for their success, what can you do to enhance the “system” that enables them to create a certain level of success?

Training & Support

Providing initial training to new franchisees should be just the beginning of the ongoing training and development you provide your franchisees throughout the term of their franchise agreement.  Training and Ongoing Development and support should be a significant element in your franchise system. There are modern day ways to deliver ongoing training and support so be creative and think outside the square so that your delivery methods allow your franchisees to learn in an environment that supports them and their overall effectiveness, and the delivery methods support you also as a franchisor. Ongoing training and support can include both offline and online programs and delivery methods.

Perhaps now’s the time to review your “system” and see if there are any ways you could make improvements that could optimize your franchisees performance.  Have a look at where your franchisees are possibly falling short, what are their challenges, and how can you support them.

Consider a system enhancement, perhaps the creation of more online training videos or the development of an online group coaching & support program showing how to run the business consistently and more effectively may be beneficial to your franchisees. Whatever it may be it’s always a great idea to carry out a system review every 12 months to ensure your franchisees have every opportunity to maximize their potential. If you need some great tips on how to spruce up your franchise system talk to us today, we’d be happy to help.

Increasing Effectiveness

As human beings not one is the same as the other. Franchisors can often times fall into the trap of expecting every franchisee will run the business as efficiently and as effectively as you would.  Unfortunately it’s far from reality so the best thing you can do as a franchisor is to support your franchisees in becoming more efficient and effective in what they do.  We all know many franchisees are wasting time by focusing on the wrong activities.

To increase overall effectiveness, it’s important for your franchisees to know and understand how to accurately identify where they spend their time. Once they know where their time is being spent it’s easier to identify what areas and activities they can focus on and what areas and activities that really should be delegated to staff.

How To Get Started

1. Do a Brain Dump. Simply write down all tasks, business and personal activities that are done during working hours. This can be done manually or using online software such as Time Doctor or Yast.

2. Separate the tasks under headings daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly.

3. Circle the tsks that are repetitive, tasks that you don’t love or enjoy or is not worth your hourly rate.

4. The items that are circled should be the activities that can now be delegated to staff members.

5. If the process or procedure to carry out the task is not documented then create a system for this so team members can complete the tasks / activities efficiently.

6. Consistent Daily Action is the key to success.

Mindset is Key

Mindset can either make or break your franchisees. It has been proven that a mindset shift will pave the way for more consistent results. Based on this understanding, if we want franchisees to produce better results, we have to go to the foundations and make a change within the mindset of each and every one of our franchisees. We have to change what they are thinking. This will then influence a change in their root beliefs, which will bring about a new sense of confidence and clarity and ultimately better results. Now I know what you are thinking, “I can’t possibly help every franchisee change their mindset.” That’s almost impossible. Here’s a mindset shift right now. Everything is possible if you put your mind to it. Using some simple belief altering techniques, you have the opportunity to help shift your franchisees mindsets quite quickly and effectively. Of course, they are responsible for their success, so ultimately it’s up to them

Have your franchisees define what success means to them.

  1. Encourage your franchisees to set goals regularly. Be sure they are written down and, more importantly, be sure there is an action plan in place so that they can take the necessary actions to achieve these goals. Ninety day cycle action plans are best for building momentum fast
  2. Have your franchisees commit to their success. Most people think they are committed and then contradict themselves by not being willing to do what it takes to reach their goals.
  3. Hold them accountable to being 100 per cent responsible for their success. Put a plan in place for this to ensure it’s achieved.
  4. Encourage them to say positive affirmations on a daily basis such as, “I am a confident and successful business person,” or “Each day in every way I am better and better,” or “Increasing my business comes easily to me,” or “I live each day with passion and purpose.”
  5. Empower your franchisees to adopt an attitude for gratitude. You simply cannot get more of what you want, until you are grateful for what you have.

Growing and Developing your Franchise

Growing a business can be challenging at times and also extremely rewarding, but what can you do as a business owner to help create momentum week by week, month by month and build the business of your dreams?

Whether you are just starting out or you have been going at it for a while, my intent for our time together in this post is to share with you some simple business growth tips that when implemented into your business will help you start to produce some solid results.

Grab a tea or coffee, a notepad and pen and read on. It’s no use reading this article and not doing anything about it, so as you read through the points outlined, I encourage you to think about how it relates to your business and what you can do to get going, moving and taking action so that you can in fact grow and develop your franchise into a top  performing business.

Success starts with planting the Seed and doing the right things in the right order

I would like to share a little story with you. Imagine your business as a freshly planted seed of a tomato plant. You have taken care to plant this seed in fresh, nutrient dense soil, in a place where it gets the right amount of sun and shade.

You’ve got down on your hands and knees and with your finger have poked a hole in the fresh soil where you gently placed the seed. You then covered the seed with more fresh soil and gave it the right amount of water to allow it to grow.

Why did you plant the Seed?

This is the same for your business. Why did you get into your business in the first place? What’s your ultimate vision?

Without knowing your why, it’s almost impossible to produce the consistent and long term results you first set out to achieve. It will also make it near impossible to stay inspired and motivated day in and day out if you don’t know what you are doing and why you are doing it.

Let’s continue with the story….

As you get up from planting the seed you vividly imagine all the delicious tasting tomatoes this plant is going to produce for you and your family as it grows over the following months.  As each day follows you check on your seed to see if it has peeked out of the ground. You can barely contain your excitement because you know how gratifying it will be to successfully grow something of your own.

You check the soil to see if it’s moist enough, you give it water when it gets too dry. A week goes by and still nothing peeks out of the ground.  You ask yourself, “Did I give it too much water? Did I give it enough? Did I plant it in the right place? Maybe it’s just the weather?” You go into the house and look on the internet to see how long it takes for a tomato seed to sprout once it’s planted. You find that it takes about two to three weeks for a leaf to show. You now feel a sense of relief knowing that you are probably on track.

You continue reading and you discover that the average plant will not produce fruit for about two full months. You remember reading about this earlier and now you are very content to have fruit in two months.

You can almost taste and feel exactly what it’s going to be like biting into that perfectly ripened tomato and then you read one last fact that no one ever told you before. The tomato expert writes,

“Some plants won’t produce fruit the very first year depending on the seed. Sometimes you have to care for the seed until it grows then wait till the plant germinates and drops another seed in the ground that will grow the following year.”  You stop and think, “I wish I knew this before I started this whole thing”. You make a mental note to plan better next time before embarking on a farming adventure. As you absorb this information, you feel less excited than you did just one week ago. You hope that all your work will produce fruit this year.

As another week goes by you check on your seed only to find that it’s not a seed anymore, it’s now a tiny little plant with one leaf peeking out of the soil. You feel your excitement return because even if this plant does not produce fruit this year at least you have the satisfaction of knowing you made something real.

You planted a seed and it’s now growing every day.

With your new found excitement that comes from noticing your successes, you begin to ask yourself, “Is there anything that I can do to make this tomato plant grow faster?” Is there anything you can do that will tilt the scale in your favour that would get you fruit this year?

So, you make a wise decision and decide to seek advice from an expert. After a short consultation from the best tomato grower in the business, someone who knows how to get these tomato plants to grow and produce more fruit, you go back home to your tomato plant and follow the instructions to the letter. You tirelessly do everything that’s required and your plant now grows and grows and grows. Two more weeks pass and you are getting so close to when most tomato plants will produce fruit. Will your plant produce fruit this year? You can barely wait, you feel confident because you have done everything right.

The next morning you wake up and to your surprise you notice several tiny tomatoes on your plant. You feel great; you feel immense satisfaction that you will get ripe fruit this season and your efforts will be rewarded.

It’s time to celebrate and like any good tomato grower you also know it’s now time to make even better decisions regarding your plant. Feeling confident and ready you now take all the appropriate action to ensure that you will be biting into a perfectly ripe and fresh tomato in just a few more weeks.

Building and growing your business is just like growing the tomato plant.

It’s important to do the right things in the right order to build higher levels of success. The expert in the story is, in fact, your franchisor and possibly even a business growth consultant like myself.

Support, knowledge and expertise are available to you so ensure you tap into that regularly.

If you just so happen to have a franchisor who isn’t as accessible as you had hoped, then find the support elsewhere. There are so many resources out there to help you grow your business.

It’s up to you to go and make it happen.

The seed has been planted.  How will you nurture and care for it to ensure you produce fruit year in and year out?

Setting goals. creating a new blueprint for Success

As part of a franchise group, you should have a blueprint or plan for business growth to follow, but it shouldn’t stop there. What can you do to take ownership and work that plan? The sentence should now read.  It’s a new year so it’s time to review your goals and plans as you progress forward in your business. Perhaps you are not as close to where you wanted to be, or perhaps you have reached the next stage of success.

Whatever your position is right at this moment, NOW is the time to REVIEW

YOUR PLAN and DESIRED OUTCOMES for the year.

Here’s a quick review of how to successfully set and achieve your goals.

Set goals the Smart way and take consistent action to achieve them

I am sure you have heard this before either from a past article, from my newsletters or even another resource. Your goals should be SMARTA goals. Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, Time Bound or Time Framed and Action.

Here’s the flaw in this.

It’s no use setting goals if you are not going to take the action on a daily basis that will move you closer to achieving them.

How many times have you set a goal only to review them in six or 12 months time and have become overwhelmed or disappointed at how many you just didn’t achieve?  It happens often for many business owners and here’s the reason why:

You have to take the necessary action to achieve your goals. Setting them just isn’t going to do it for you.

With this in mind, start to review your current plan, think about what you want to achieve this year and put a plan of action in place to ensure every day is moving you closer to achieving your desired outcomes and not further away.

You Must Be Committed To Your Success

Make a total commitment to your success.

Once you have made the decision to be in business, be in that business. Get into it with both feet and don’t let anything hold you back. I have found there are two types of people: those who are interested in success and those who are committed.

Those who are simply interested, do what is convenient to them. Those who are truly committed will do whatever it takes to achieve their desired outcomes and the next level of success.  What are you doing every day to ensure the best outcomes for you, your customer, the franchisor, and the franchise network?  Make a commitment right now to start doing whatever it takes to make your business a success.

Start with writing a list of all the things you could do better in your business, or what you could do to go a little bit further for your customer, your staff, with your suppliers, and in other areas of your business. It only takes one or two things that could make a massive difference to your bottom line.

Communication Is The Key To Building A Successful Franchise

Now, of course communication is not the only key to success.  There are many other areas that are equally important but, here’s the thing:  if you cannot communicate effectively with your staff, your franchisor, or with your customers – you will have to work 10 times harder to make things happen.

In a franchise it is vital you maintain communications with your franchisor.

Keeping the communication lines open has major benefits. You also have to know how to communicate and when to initiate communication. As the franchise network grows your franchisor may not be as accessible as they used to be. It is important though to chat to them about it and find out what other methods of communication and support are available. Don’t wait until your business is almost nonexistent and blame the franchisor for not being there.

You as the franchisee should be 100 per cent responsible for your success.

Effective communication can be the difference between someone achieving average revenues and someone doubling and tripling revenues every year. With this in mind it is vital you also communicate effectively with:

  •      your    prospects
  •      your    clients/customers

Without prospects there are no customers. Without customers there is no business

Before your communication begins, you’ve got to know who you will be communicating to and what you will communicate. In other words, what’s your message?  What and how will you say it?

These fundamental elements should be part of your sales and business growth process, a process that every successful business relies so heavily on. As part of your sales process you should put together an ideal client profile and review it regularly to ensure you are maximizing your potential, year in, year out.

Take time now to consider who your ideal client is. Your ideal client profile should include elements such as:

  • how    they     think
  • why    they     buy  (wants versus needs)
  • what   they     want   – ‘hot    buttons’ (remember:  people don’t   buy      what    they need, they buy what they want)
  • who    to         target  –  (decision makers and influencers)

Once you know who your ideal client is and why they buy your type of products and/or services you have to find a way to effectively communicate your message, focusing on the benefits of your product or service and matching the reasons why they buy.

Taking a close look at your ideal client’s decision-making process reveals who you REALLY need to be communicating your message to.

Communication is more important than ever and not just in your initial lead generation or once you have secured a customer. With only four per cent of leads ready to buy right now and therefore 96 per cent not ready, if you don’t have a process in place to nurture your leads you could be wasting your time and your money in your upfront marketing efforts.

Every time you communicate to your prospect it’s vital you stand out of the crowd, grab their attention, create a strong interest and desire for your product and service and, of course, lead them over the finish line. With this in mind, all of your marketing/ communication efforts must follow a strict formula.

You must grab the prospect’s attention, build a strong interest and desire in what you are offering, including the benefits, all which must then be supported with a strong call to action.

Gone are the days where it’s enough to say “we are the best and this is why…..”

It’s all about the prospect now. It has to be about the benefits you will provide to them and what value you will add to them. They are tuning into “What’s in it for me?” and unless you can match your solutions, services and products to what your prospects want, you will have a very hard time growing the business of your dreams.

Maximising your potential in business is not that hard. It just requires commitment, clear communication, daily action and doing the right things in the right order.

Generating Leads

Your aim is to generate leads and opportunities and convert these into increased revenues to your business. This article outlines some of the challenges you may be already facing and highlights some quick simple steps of how you can generate more leads into your business.

In my experience one of the fundamental challenges most business owners face is not being able to generate enough leads into the business. Without a consistent supply of leads into any business, the business is usually faced with poor cash flow and finds it difficult from one month to the next.

You may have already experienced this and you now can be in a position where you have the opportunity to change what’s going on.

If you want to create amazing results in your business, and want to turn your vision into reality, the only way this can happen is if you are fully accountable for your success and are responsible for the actions you take on a daily basis.

Leads are prospects or potential customers.

It’s important though to attract quality leads into the business and not just any lead as this can waste your valuable time and money.

Your marketing efforts will determine the quality of the leads you bring into your business and the challenge businesses face in this area is 80% of all marketing doesn’t meet the expectation of the business owner.

Try not to limit yourself when it comes to advertising and marketing your business.

Traditional marketing methods include local paper advertising and emailing.

Opportunities let outside the square and can include strategies such as, building your referral networks.

Ads and direct mail are only the beginning!

They are important, however they should not be the only source used for generating leads for your business.

Not all lead-generating techniques are created equal either. Some techniques will work well for a certain business, and those same strategies won’t work for another. Much is dependent on your type of business, your location, timing, how well you apply the lead generating strategy, and a host of other variables that tend to make marketing an inexact science. Therefore it’s important to test and measure each strategy to find out what works, and make it work.

So here’s a brief look at what you can do to start bringing more quality leads into your business.

Firstly start thinking WHO, WHERE, WHAT, HOW & WHY when it comes to marketing your product or service.

Who are my ideal clients / market?

Understand who he/ she is and why.

Where are we going to find our clients?

Why will they buy from me? What makes us unique? Remember people shop on value and emotion.

Now you know who you want to target,

Create a Lead Generation Action Plan for the month

  • Listing at least 2 to 6 different lead generating strategies,
  • What steps you need to take to implement the strategy.
  • Who will complete the task/s required  to complete the strategy, and
  • Be sure you also have a Due date for the activity so you stay on track for the month.

Daily Consistent Action will produce results in your business that you need!

Here is an example of a lead generation action plan. (Click the image for a bigger version)

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Increasing Your Personal Effectiveness and Revenues

If you want to grow your business revenues much faster than you are now, it’s important to start focusing on the right activities in your business.

The key in achieving personal effectiveness is to focus the majority of your time on high- impact, revenue-generating activities that are most essential to your business. To increase your overall effectiveness, it’s important to know and understand how to accurately identify where you spend your time.

The 80:20 Rule

I’m sure you have heard of Vilfredo Pareto or at least Pareto’s Law. Pareto came up with an economic principle that said 20% of the people typically own 80 percent of the wealth. Two decades later, management guru Joseph Juran introduced this “80/20 Rule” to the business world, calling it Pareto’s Principle, or Pareto’s Law. Over the years, Pareto’s Principle has been applied to many areas of business, concluding that 20% of our efforts produce 80% of our results, or 20% of your team produces 80% of your results.

For you, this means that to increase revenues it’s important you focus on the right activities in your business and then hire, barter or outsource people to do everything else.

Multiply your business revenues and personal effectiveness many times over using the 80:20 rule.

Suppose your business has 25 different activities, such as sales, marketing, operations, finance, customer service and more. According to the 80:20 rule, 20% of those activities will generate 80% of your revenues. Conversely, 80% of those activities will generate only 20% of your revenues. Doing the math shows that 5 out of the 25 activities will produce four-fifths of all the income your business generates.

Now, assume that your business takes in $50,000 a month. According to the 80:20 rule, 5 of your 25 activities would account for $40,000 of your monthly revenue, which works out to $8,000 per activity. Conversely, 20 of the activities would produce only $10,000 each month, which works out to be just $500 per activity. Sixteen times 500 equals 8,000 so your top 5 revenue-producing activities are 16 times more effective than the bottom 20.

Suppose you took it even further and moved the 80/20 ratio to 90/10, so that only 10% of your activities produced 90% of your revenues. That would make you 81 times more effective than you currently are now. Merely by focusing your time and attention on the five or ten activities that have the highest impact on your business, you can increase your revenues and income by 16 to 81 times!

Here’s the million-dollar question: what specific activities should you be focusing on?

Here’s a brief three-step process to help you work more effectively in your business.

Step 1. Identify your Passion and Purpose

Passion is a very powerful emotion and is infectious. When you express passion, people are automatically attracted to it. When you’re passionate about what you do, your product or service speaks for itself. So the first big question is: what are you passionate about. What do you love doing?

Next, look at your purpose. Are you in business merely to earn an income, accumulate wealth or do you have a strong desire to help others and be a service to others?

When you can match up your purpose and passion, magic happens. It puts you in front of all the others who have lukewarm enthusiasm for what they do. What is your purpose in business, how does it match up with your passion, and how do you combine the two to make the world a better place?

Step 2. Identify Your Strengths

The biggest mistake business owners make is thinking they have to do everything themselves. Everyone has strengths and weaknesses. In order to succeed in business, you must get very clear about your unique abilities and then focus on them almost to the exclusion of everything else.

You will become a better business person when you identify your strengths and spend most of your time using them to perform the highest-impact activities in your business.

Step 3. Manage Your Time

When you’re a business owner it’s difficult to manage your time. What you can do is manage your activities by tracking where you spend your time on a daily basis and using that information to help you focus on high-impact activities.

One of your most important tasks is identifying the highest income-generating activities in your business and devoting a minimum of 80 percent of your time to those activities. This principle works whether you’re a “solo-preneur” with one product or service or a larger operation with a larger product or service offering and a team to support your daily efforts.

Monitor & Measure Your Activities

You can’t manage what you don’t monitor or measure so your first step is to identify where and how you spend your time. It’s important you identify what you are currently doing and what you should be doing, based on your highest income-producing activities.

For the next two weeks write down every activity you do in all areas of your business and how much time you spend doing it.

High income-producing activities include making a sale or something that leads directly to a sale. High-impact activities include producing a great website or making sure that your ad copy is properly written to make sales for you. These activities don’t directly make a sale, but they play an important role in generating revenue. To determine whether an activity represents one of your unique abilities, ask yourself two questions: What drives me crazy when other people don’t do it as well as me? What do I play at that other people consider work?

Track all your activities over a two-week period, noting how much time you spend on each activity each day. Before the two weeks is up, you will probably begin to see that you need to be spending more time on some activities and less on others. You will also begin to see that there are lots of activities that you should not be doing. This doesn’t mean they don’t need to be done, only that you should not be doing them.

What activities should you be doing? For the entrepreneur and small business owner, the highest income-producing activity is generating revenue. Every day, your primary focus should be on how your company will generate more revenue. If you’re not spending a minimum of 80% of your time on income- generating activities, your business will struggle to grow and increase revenues.

What about all the other activities that are just as crucial to your business? Here’s the challenge: For a small business, generating revenue must come first and management second. Otherwise your business will never grow to the point where management becomes as important as sales.

Revenues are consistently increased when the owner leverages his or her personal strengths through the use of other people’s unique talents and abilities. In other words, successful business owners focus on their highest income-generating activities and then build great teams around them to do all the other important activities they don’t do well.

It’s a fact, you don’t have to do everything yourself. Start focusing your efforts away from working in the business and focus them toward working ON it.

Make a commitment to yourself to spend one hour each day to identify which activities you need to be doing and tracking how you spend your time. Over the course of 365 days, that adds up to the equivalent of nine 40-hour weeks, or two solid months of working on your business rather than in it. Just imagine what you could achieve with that kind of concentrated effort!

Time to Take Action

  • Keep an hourly log for two weeks of your business and personal activities during your working hours
  • Determine which are the real high income and high impact producing activities vs. the tedious menial few
  • Take consistent action and maintain focus every day to ensure you are focusing on the high income and high impact producing activities.

To receive an expanded whitepaper on this topic including a full worksheet on increasing effectiveness please email tania@vision-alliance.com or call Tania on 1300 76 49 20.