Franchise Essentials: Prep for Smooth Sailing

Starting any franchise, or business in general, you set out to make it a success. This will be your livelihood that looks after your family and will be where you spend a large part of your waking hours. Putting so much of yourself into your franchise, you want to see it grow and be proud of the service you deliver for your customers.

Unfortunately, there’s no way to 100% guarantee that your franchise will be successful, but there are certainly some guidelines that, if followed, can help get you to where you want to be. Here we’ll look at some of those franchise tips that can help you create a long-term, profitable business.

7 Franchise Tips for Success

Hire Who Can Do the Job, Not Who You Like – One of the best franchise tips for success you’ll ever get is to identify your own weaknesses and build a team that can make up for them. For example, say you can’t stand sales, you love talking with people and telling them about the work, but you don’t like putting on that ‘closer’ attitude to turn a maybe into a firm commitment. There’s no point in hiring a point person who’s going to be just like you. You need someone who relishes getting people over the line and bringing in the leads. That’s not to say you should have a team of people you can’t stand, but at least be aware of what people’s skills are and how they can round out your business’ overall skillset.

Trust the System

Being a franchise means you get access to and training in all the brand’s business processes and suppliers. These are systems that have been worked out over the years and across the experiences of many different franchise locations. It might seem obvious, but one of the most important franchise tips for success is to follow the system that the franchisor and the other franchise businesses work with. Not only are you most likely contractually obligated to do so, but it’s also what works everywhere else.

Strive for Healthy Financials

It can never be underestimated how important good cash flow and a healthy balance sheet are for your business’ success. This should also be a focus for having a successful start for your franchise by doing research on your franchisor and making sure that they themselves are in a healthy financial position. Unlike other business models, you and your franchisor have a nearly symbiotic relationship. If they do poorly, so do you, and the last thing you want is to be doing well, keeping up your end of the business but getting problems coming down the line from their end.

Under-Promise, Over-Deliver

Success can snowball once it gets rolling, and a big part of the reason why is how word spreads about good work done. A customer feeling happy with doing business with you can come down to how you have set their expectations and how you match up to them. This can be a fine line to tread, as to market yourself and get their business in the first place, you want to sound good, but then too high expectations can lead to disappointment even if you’ve done an objectively good job. The key to achieving the right balance is having a strong feedback process and being honest with how you present your business, using actual feedback from customers.

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Work with the Community

This a promising approach for all small businesses, though also one of the great franchise tips is to ensure you have a presence with your local community. Word of mouth is one of the best marketing tools for small businesses, and working with local schools, sports teams, or charities gives you great visibility in the community. You also get to give back to those in the local area, meaning your success will benefit others.

Learn from the Experts

You know who has lots of franchise tips for making your business a success? Your franchisor and other franchisees. One of the great things about being part of a franchise system is that you never have to go it alone. Most likely, there’s someone in the system who’s been in the exact same situation. There’s no need to reinvent the wheel when others, not least your franchisor, have done it possibly decades before. Lean on the knowledge resources around you. It’s an intangible asset that can be invaluable for your business.

Believe in Your Brand

For franchisees believing in their brand, i.e., the franchise, is pretty much essential for success. It’s possible to tread water and go through the motions with a franchise, a lot of the heavy lifting has already been taken out of the setup and running of the business, but to really succeed and exceed your expectations, it’s good to buy into what your brand’s about. If the franchise’s marketing and processes are focused towards customer engagement and going the extra mile, then that’s what you should be doing too, so that how you operate your franchise synchs up with how the franchise system operates and markets itself everywhere else.

How Screenmobile Sets Their Franchisees Up For Success?

Here at Screenmobile, we naturally want all of our franchisees to be as successful as they can be and fulfill their dreams of running a quality business. That’s why we provide so much training and ongoing support for our franchisees. This starts out with the 10-day training program at our Screen School to show you how to run your franchise effectively and deliver for your customers. We also provide regular webinars and field support while our team at the home office is always on hand to take a call.

As well as the training, support and franchise tips, we also provide financial support in the form of our veteran’s discount and financing assistance in certain circumstances. If you’d like to find out more about how Screenmobile can help you create your own successful business, you can read more about it here or talk to our team.