What lessons have been learned about recruiting franchisees? Here Patrick Marion shares his mistakes and offers some tips for better recruitment…
Over the 25 years Citiwide Homeloans has been in mortgage broking and the last five as a franchise business, we have certainly learned a lot about the recruitment of potential franchisees.
Attributes
Initially, I focused on marketing our business to those in the banking and financial sector, believing that having insider knowledge of the financial industry and its culture would be beneficial to franchisees. Over the years, this initial perception has shifted dramatically. The ability for franchisees to go out and effectively market themselves and their business is incredibly important to generate business. Some of our most successful franchisees have come from sales backgrounds, in vastly differing fields.
I’ve learned that it really comes down to having the personal attributes that customers find appealing and a desire to create a successful business, rather than a foundation in numbers, that will ensure success as a broker.
Ensuring candidates financial preparedness is also an important step and one that we overlooked in our early years of recruitment and acquisition. People need to have the financial capacity to carry out the work.
Many people underestimate how much it costs to start up a business; most businesses won’t start to generate profit for the first six months or year that they are operational.
Potential franchisees need to be prepared for this initial shortfall in order to be successful in the long-term. The requirement to show a sound financial position is now part of our application process.
Commitment, commitment, commitment
Many people are attracted to our industry because of its flexibility and ability to create real work-life balance. It still requires hard work however – and a lot of it – if you want to be successful.
When we first began as a franchisor, we accepted candidates without fully exploring their commitment to running their franchise as a full time operation and subsequently, many worked on a part-time basis or saw the business as a sideline to their other occupation.
Ultimately, this always ended in failure for the franchisees. We now work closely with candidates to ensure they understand the demands of the business so they can better prepare themselves.
For those that are married or have long-term partners, we’ve also found that bringing them in to meetings at the initial stages is critical to success. Understanding by a significant other of the demands of the role, the growth process and the journey that a broker will go through is absolutely vital to a brokers’ success.
Top three tips
- Candidates that possess the character attributes that are key in your business may be more successful than those that have the necessary knowledge.
- Ensure that candidates fully understand the time and financial commitment that will be required of them in order to build a successful franchise.
- Look for candidates who have the full support of their family, as this will be vital to the success of their business.