Whether you run a popular restaurant, bar, or store, franchising your business can be a great way to increase profits and raise brand awareness. Although this can be a challenging next step, it can become very lucrative. This will take careful planning to get right, however, so if you are interested in franchising your business brand, here are some important steps to keep in mind.
Where Will Your Next Store Be?
As you will have already learned through running your current store, restaurant, etc., location plays an important role in the success of your business. Not only can this impact the cost of the leases you’re paying each month, but it can affect how many customers come through the door. Even if your business has a great reputation, the harder it is to find the store, the fewer customers will come in to shop. Make sure you pick a location that will have a good amount of footfall and is easy to find. You should also ensure that your new branch isn’t too close to your current one as this may be counter-productive. You want to attract new customers that might spend more time in another part of town, or even the county if you want to open a new site further afield.
Consistency with Branding
If you want to have a successful franchise, you need to make sure that the business brand is consistent at each site. Making some slight alterations could work, particularly if you do want to keep your customers guessing. However, deviating from the original branding too much could become confusing and may hurt your marketing efforts and overall success. Think about how the décor in your store or restaurant reflects the brand, keeping this similar at each site. You could also look at some music for businesses to have similar sounds playing at your franchisees to help build the brand as well.
A Reliable Team of Employees
You will also need to find a reliable team of employees to manage your new site to make sure it’s as successful as possible. Some of your current employees might be interested in transferring to this new site or be willing to do so temporarily to assist with training the new staff. This is also an important step, as your new employees might not be familiar with your brand and will need to learn more about this to deliver the right customer experience. You can use recruitment agencies to help you find the best candidates for your various vacancies.
Legal Steps
If you are expanding your business but are still taking ownership of that new site, this will differ from selling another individual a licensing fee to work as part of your business franchise. It is important to take some time to go through the necessary legal steps to draw up accurate paperwork for your franchise, or any other employee contracts, leases, etc. that will be part of this business expansion.
If you want to move your business to the next chapter, consider these points to help you take those steps.
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