I recently completed a seven-year global empirical research study into success factors in franchising. Here is a quotation from a key supplier partner that I interviewed as part of this research.
"Communication in franchising is not done well. A change management model is needed. Most franchisors are not willing to spend the effort to drive a comprehensive communication strategy. They just bombard their franchisees with emails and wonder why they don't read them or don't recall the content on an email received 6 weeks ago!"
Is this true? How would you rate the quality of your communication strategy?
A study by Griffith University that was commissioned by the ACCC to investigate franchising failure in Australia also supports this finding and points to the need for better communication between franchisors and their franchise partners[ACCC. (2010). Communication Lacking in Franchising Relationships. Retrieved from https://www.accc.gov.au/media-release/communication-lacking-in-franchising-relationships].
The reasons for communication failure in franchising are usually not malicious, it’s just so dammed hard and time consuming to get it right!
Traditionally, franchise groups use emails as a primary method of communication with franchise partners and supplement this with phone calls, franchise meetings and face-to-face field visits when possible. In recent times virtual meetings and video calls have been added to the mix. However, in the chaotic world of franchising, communication messages fail to achieve the desired results with many franchise partners. Emails get buried in inboxes and meetings get side-tracked. It's critical that franchise partners have the knowledge and information they need to do their jobs effectively but all too often, the messages are just not cutting through.
Often, communication is handled in quite a haphazard way and the squeaky wheels gets the majority of attention. Disengaged franchise partners in particular can chew up a lot of time.
Implementation of programs and initiatives fail without franchise partner participation and engagement. So, we must learn to communicate better and improve participation and engagement.
But what does better communication mean?
Empirical research on the topic of communication in franchising has found that a collaborative communication strategy is best suited to the franchise sector. The conventional autonomous, command and control, hierarchical communication strategies that work in the commercial world simply do not work in franchising. You can’t just tell your franchise partners what to do and expect them to do it. You need to collaborate with them to achieve engagement in your programs and initiatives
The problem is that collaborative communication is more costly than autonomous communication in terms of time, effort, and money. However, there are ways that communication can be handled more efficiently.
Use Communication Accelerators to keep franchise partners updated, engaged, and empowered.
My research study spanned seven years and during this time I witnessed technology advancements in the form of automated communication being used by some of the world’s most successful franchise groups. I was intrigued to find that automated communication was not only being used by the marketing department to attract prospective new franchise partners and generate leads for their franchise partners. It was also being used to help make communication with franchise partners both effective and efficient.
"We introduced automated communication journeys with multiple touchpoints for communication of information and knowledge needed by our franchise partners. This has freed up our time to use information-rich collaborative communication methods where they really count."
Franchisor CEO
Communication, like most other aspects of franchising, can be systematised so that it is managed efficiently, whilst simultaneously making it more effective.
As one of the CEOs that I interviewed explained, smart communication accelerators speed up the time it takes to communicate and engage with franchise partners, and when communication is handled efficiently it frees up time for information-rich collaborative communication when it is most needed.
Communication accelerators automate communication journeys for routine and repetitive communication freeing up resources to engage in richer more collaborative communication methods such as knowledge-sharing forums and face-to-face meetings.
For example, you could set up an automated communication journey encompassing a video and quiz to enable franchise partners to engage at the touch of a button. As the journey progresses the touchpoints increase in information richness. They will engage distracted franchise partners and free up time for personal communication with the sceptical, disengaged franchise partners.
A communication journey comprises multiple touchpoints using different communication methods to alert franchise partners to a new communication message. The journey might look something like this:
You can see from this example journey that you should not settle for a franchisee partner just looking at the message. It’s not enough just to share knowledge. You need to make sure that knowledge is actually transferred to franchisee partners. One of the first steps of knowledge transfer is for the recipient to take some form of action. Therefore, you need to incorporate an initial action step into the communication journey. For example, you may set up a quick knowledge tester quiz, or a self-check quiz so a franchise partner can determine what action is needed or where to start on an initiative.
if the knowledge relates to a franchisor and/or franchisee partner's legal requirement, a quick action step of acknowledgement and understanding could be appropriate. If the knowledge is in the form of an eLearning program, there may be several action steps involved.
"Automated communication allowed me to have a completely hands-off approach."
Franchisor field manager
You can also see how the communication journey progresses through to higher levels of information richness, in this case concluding with a video call, show and tell session with franchise partners who have not yet engaged. The communication journey can comprise many touchpoints and use any possible communication method. The point is that the early stages of the journey are automated requiring no touch from the franchisor, freeing up time for quality richer methods of communication to be targeted where they are really needed.
Communication Accelerators That Save Time Preparing Documents
A communication accelerator in the form of a templated document-building app can be used to assemble information packs for prospective new franchise partners in minutes rather than the hours that it often takes to do this task. The same app could be used to compile franchise agreements, disclosure documents, sales proposals and even the board report.
Any documents comprising multiple components can be compiled in minutes rather than hours. This frees up franchisor resources so they can engage in collaborative communication instead of being bogged down with admin.
One of the franchise groups involved in my study used their document-building app to create a templated proposal writing tool to help their franchise partners to prepare professional sales proposals for prospective clients within minutes.
"Document builder has helped us achieve an 85% productivity improvement."
Steve Southwell
Worldwide Franchisor
Build a Library of Local Area Marketing Campaign Templates
Your marketing team could create an online library of local area marketing campaign templates for franchise partners to select, personalize and schedule for distribution. Eliminating the arduous task of handling this manually.
They could add the business stationery and point of sale materials as well as other marketing collateral, uniforms, merchandise, forms etc. Marketing gets to control what is used by franchise partners to ensure that it is brand compliant, and franchise partners can order the location specific items they need, whenever they need it without marketing needing to intervene.
"Personalised emails are sent to our target market, our statistics are above industry average, and we get in many new sales leads"
E Von Kalckstein
Megasealed Franchisee
Marketing now has time to engage and collaborate with franchise partners and gather the vital knowledge that exists throughout the group but is often not tapped into.
If you think about it, communication accelerators can be used for all manner of communications. For example, your marketing department could use automated communication journeys for marketing campaigns and incorporate calls to action that generate leads for franchise partners
You could also use communication journeys to attract prospective new franchise partners and step them through the various stages of discovery.
Communication Accelerators to Monitor Satisfaction and Get Google Reviews
Another franchise group involved in my study uses communication journeys to request a net promoter score rating from franchise partner clients. If a favourable score was received the customer was then directed to a business review platform, in this case, Google,
and invited to leave a business review. If the net promoter score was not favourable the customer is not directed to Google, however, the franchise partner is alerted to the fact that an unfavourable score has been received so they can take action to improve satisfaction levels. This system is fully automated, franchise partners don’t need to do anything unless they receive an unfavourable review.
Then they can jump in a use information-rich communication to improve their relationship with a less than fully satisfied client.
"The Digital Review Accelerator journey has increased the franchise group’s 5-star Google Reviews by 15.5% in less than three months. Our network had previously been proactive with Digital Reviews, so to see growth is very impressive. It shows how effective the email journey is – I find myself struggling to find the time to respond to all reviews due to the high influx."
Sarah SNational Marketing and Communications Coordinator Worldwide National Support Office
Communication accelerators present endless possibilities for communication efficiency but I don’t want to give you the wrong idea here. It is not effective to automate all communication. Whilst communication journeys are a means to expedite and simplify communication and relationship building. They can’t build deep trusting relationships. The aim is to use them to free up time and resources so that you can implement quality collaborative communication strategies and build high-trust relationships. It takes real human contact to do that!
Simon Sinek, in his compelling book Leaders Eat Last, discusses the importance of bringing people together. We are social animals and need people to contact to survive, human beings need to feel that they belong. So automated communication journeys can never replace face-to-face communication. You shouldn’t see a video call as a replacement for a face-to-face meeting. It is a replacement for a phone call, and whilst it is definitely the best option for times when face-to-face contact is not viable, it will never be as rich in communication as face-to-face encounters.
In the same way, a video conference will never replace a physical conference or face-to-face franchise meeting. However, video communication is richer than non-video communication and that is how it should be used.
Sinek says “it takes a handshake to bind humans . . . and no technology can replace that. There is no such thing as virtual trust”
About the Author
Jan founded Get Smart Services in 2011 after spending fifteen years in franchise sector senior management roles. She completed a seven-year empirical research study in 2020 that created an evidence-based formula for success in franchising that became the catalyst for her best selling book, ‘The Ultimate Franchising Success Formula'.
Jan is an award-winning businesswomen, salesperson and facilitator of learning, with many years of practical experience in sales, marketing and learning and development, as well as developing and subsequently selling several successful businesses of her own.
These days Jan uses her skills, knowledge and practical business experience to help her clients to achieve extraordinary success when implementing her powerful evidence-based formula in their business improvement programs and initiatives.
For more information about Communication Accelerators go to www.getsmartservices.com.au/communicator-accelerators
References
Timms, J. (2020). Learning and Development in the Franchising Sector and Business Performance. (PhD Reseach study with publication), University Sunshine Coast,
ACCC. (2010). Communication Lacking in Franchising Relationships. Retrieved from https://www.accc.gov.au/media-release/communication-lacking-in-franchising-relationships
Sinek, S. (2014). Leaders eat last : why some teams pull together and others don't. New York: Penguin Group.
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