At GoSpotCheck, we work with a lot of franchised businesses...
...and understand the challenges of maintaining a consistently great experience as the business grows. If you are the owner or in management at a franchised business, surely one of your key objectives is to make sure that your franchisees are properly executing your formula for success.
We help franchised businesses maintain consistency across their locations and have found a lot of useful tips along the way. While there are many things you can do to help ensure consistency, here are the top 6 we have identified:
- Focus on training: Every great franchise program includes lots of great training for the franchisee. It is important that the training provided is both relevant and engaging. A great training program can mean the difference between success and failure for your franchisee.
- Provide the necessary tools: Without good tools for helping maintain consistency, whether that is a solid training manual or step by step guides that are kept on the premises, simple tools can often dramatically help improve your franchisees compliance with corporate standards.
- Encourage a conversation: Consistency for franchised businesses is key, but you also never know where your next breakthrough idea is going to come from. In the areas where you do allow a bit of customization, make sure you are getting lots of feedback from your franchisees on what is working and what is not working.
- Measure & Improve: The ultimate key is to be able to measure and improve your consistency across your operations. Make sure you capture the right data and then take action to improve your processes.
- Be a resource, not a spy: Many franchisees feel like their franchisors only check in to “spy” on their operations. This can be especially true when franchisors implement true spying methods like secret shopping. These methods are dated and often make the franchisee feel like they are the subject of a spy movie. Be open, communicate, and empower – don’t focus on spying on your team to try to catch them doing something wrong.
- Be clear on what matters: The most important thing of all is to be crystal clear on what matters. There are a million things everyday that a franchisee needs to worry about, but if you can give clear priority on the 5 things that matter most, you can have a lot more confidence that they will execute your model consistently. Sweat the big things that matter, and let the rest go!
Growing a franchise program is tough, but by using a few simple tools, you can ensure that you have the correct formula for a successful business.
