Franchise Support

UNIVERSITI MALAYSIA SABAH BG33303 PENGURUSAN PEMASARAN FRANCAIS Chapter 20 Summary NAME| MATRIX NUMBER| Safrina bte Ahmad Shah| BB10110567| Julianne Wing| BB10110274| Mohammad Harith b. Elias| BB10110334| Norhanim bte Hj. Yasin| BB10110442| Norhafizah bte Kasman| BB10160784| Ching Siok Chun| BB10110093| Franchise Support Constructive support of franchise is important for effective operation and overall success of the franchise system. Franchise support of franchises is important because it will develop and maintain sufficient and improve communication skills between the franchisee and franchisor.The franchise support service will ensure profitability, self-employment, striving to be successful, opportunity for growth, and a success or failure story. Opportunity to earn profit is the major driving force for people to start a franchise business. Franchise service support act as an intermediaries in between the franchisor and franchisee in providing training, suggestions to maintain str ong sales and improve profit margin to the franchise business. Regarding the self-employment matter, this franchise support service provides methods, programs, and suggestions for improving and assists in solving problem.In order to become successful in the franchise business, the franchise support staff should offer praise, encouragement, and instruction to the franchisee because working in the positive environment will ensure success to the franchised business. Franchise support services help franchise business to grow by introducing new product and services, marketing techniques, and carefully planned promotional campaign will help franchisees to keep a positive outlook on the business and continue to look for alternative to expand business and increase profit margin.The success or failure story of the franchise business is determined by the management team on how they manage their business properly. Getting the right employees with good discipline, giving good hospitality servic es, working environment is comfort and relaxing, and others show that the franchise supports service assists them in order to maintain the high standard of the franchise system and vice versa. COMMUNICATION As we know, communication is very important factor in daily business activities.Communication involves individual or group in particular businesses. In franchising, a good communication process is very important for the franchisor and the franchisee. Information system that been used by franchise system should be clearly and easy to link with other function and decision making as well. The more effective the communication, the more effective the supervision. There are several communication tools that are typically been used to deliver the information First is telephone.It is highly effective mode of communication, because it is more faster and get 2 way communication. Telephone contacts are important to keep the franchisee informed about the plan and activities for parent company , to evaluate franchise performance of record and also to let the franchisee know what assistance to expect from the franchisor. Phone contact can be set up in many ways, such as through planned telephone calls. These actually to develop interrelationship between franchisor and franchisee in order to retain the support between them.Usually planned calls are to discuss the sales level, product and service support, promotional plans and also to raise any questions given by the franchisee. Second are spontaneous telephone calls. It is actually to boost the morale and feelings of interdependence of the franchisee and the franchisor These kind of calls actually can help the franchisor to understand the immediate concerns of the franchise, get a feel for the franchisee’s general attitude over time and determine if there is nything the parent company could or should be doing over and above the regular services its providing. While the third one is conference calls. These calls being conducted by contacting several franchisees at the same time. Letter or earlier phone contact should be prearranged to ensure the attendance of franchisees within a district area or region. These calls usually to inform the franchisee about the current plan of franchisor such as promotional activities, new product and services, and new contest or customer relation project.Another communication method is internet websites. It helps people to get connected with other people around the world. Same goes to franchise, all business activities can be conducted through internet such as processing orders from suppliers and channel members and do promotion. For franchise, it can expand internet into intranet where it allows the franchisees to access their information system by using secret password. By this way, franchisees can read the report and also any updated issues or activities provided by the franchisor.Chat room is available for them to do the conversation and discussion about certa in issues. Moreover, franchisor and franchisee also can work together through extranet, where they can make their order after review the supplier’s products. Next is email. Email is more convenient to use in order to send any documents or messages to other functional members, suppliers, staffs, different companies, family member and also between franchisor and franchisee. This is because, email can save their costs and required less time compared to other communication methods.Through email, the messages can deliver faster to the other parties and also get their feedback. Moving on to the next communication tool is mail contacts. Mail contacts are mails that are in forms of newsletters and activity reports that are distributed for the purpose of providing instructions, supplying advertising, promoting materials and discussing any legal matters that arises. In other words, mail contacts communication are follow-up information that are resulted from conference calls, issues or questions raised by franchisee, spontaneous calls or suggestions for advertising promotions.These letters are sent by sales manager or the president of the franchise system all for the purpose of assuring a continuing support and service from the main office. Last but not least are visits. Visits are one of the communication tools that come in the form of personal, support-service and training visits. Personal visits are very important to a franchisee when it is especially done by a representative of the main franchise home office such as the president, vice president, franchising directors and many more.Personal visits can be known as an excellent public relations tool which is effective for solving and addressing problems that may arise from the company. Whereas for support-service visits, the purpose of these visits are for helping and aiding the franchisee in order to resolve the problems in its operations by providing hints in dealing with the rapid change in competitive condit ions. As for training visits, it is where visits are made by home office staffs that are involved in the preopening and grand opening training of respective franchises solely for the purpose of the value of royalty fees being returned to the business.FRANCHISEE TRAINING To developing a training operation involves three major actions by a franchisor: designing and implementing a training unit or function, establishing a training location, and developing the training program, including the philosophy, learning and skills to be achieved and the methods to be used in providing the training. Usually a person who was in charge of training program has experience in each major function.There are two critical requirements that must be met by anyone put in charge of a franchisee training program: The person must have knowledgeable about effective training process and must have both depth and breadth of understanding of the operational needs and characteristics that will ensure success in the particular franchised business that necessary because need to be able to incorporate into training program (1) production/operations methods of the franchised business, (2) accounting, marketing and personnel practices and (3) effective methods of developing and maintaining constructive franchisor-franchisee relationship.Training function was important to continuity and growth of the franchisee system, the head of training is part of the upper management of the organization. The center is the original location of the franchisor that can locate almost everywhere or can locate regionally. Example insurance company that provided located for training program in their regional in headquarters. It’s because to enhance their control of the training process and ensure continuity of subject matters to be presented.Training program usually will take at least five days long and may last for up to two months and vary considerably from one franchise system also provided that vary in lengt h, complexity, and subject matter. This training will teach the franchisees and other employees the skills necessary for them to more successful in this business. The objective for training is the skills to be learned, and the training methods to be utilized are carefully put together. From the book or manuals the franchisees can learn the business rather than be taught.Franchisor also provided lectures, group discussions, situational problem analysis, and an independent, hands-on performance under the guidance of experienced trainers was the best business. Other than that the focus in this program is self-application through actual performance of operational required within the franchised system, whether the training takes place in a training center or on the job at the franchisees own franchised business. Three major component of franchisee training:- ) Preopening Training ( Formal ) Preopening training was a first general franchisee training that we will explain. Usually preopeni ng was the most intensive training period. Most franchised require one week or 300 hours of opening training. For preopening the training will consists in classroom that include planning the franchised business, hiring, purchasing, merchandising, advertising, business management, cash and inventory control, and production/operational methods.Franchisees have the opportunity to meet three and twelve or limited number of franchisees to discuss their expectations, desires, strengths, and worries with other franchisees as the individually and collectively anticipate running their own operations. After meet for the training franchisees will feel the advice was very helpful in developing loyalty to the franchise system, creating individual within the franchise organization, and learning or improving skills of operations for the franchise.Manual for the operations usually include finance, operations, marketing, management, and service/production. Will include audio or videotapes, that can descriptions of all franchise operations and usually include operating procedures suggested or required by the franchisor. A manual was an important thing to both franchisor and franchisees because franchisor not only offers a training approach, but also affords protections incase any dispute or questions arises regarding appropriateness of methods used in training franchisees.But for franchisees, the information they need to know on order to function effectively within the business environment of the franchisor was in the manuals. Lastly, references was already provides to refresh the memory or to solve some problem that arises during a workday. 2) Grand Opening Training ( On-site ) For the grand opening of a franchised business, most franchisor sent either the training manager or a member of the training unit to work with the new franchisee. Grand opening training consists of one to two weeks of in-depth work experience in which the trainer assists the franchisee with grand openin g of business.They are trains the staff in operating procedures associated with service/production, finance, marketing, and operation. The franchisor representative often stays with the franchisee until the newly opened unit is running smoothly, which may take from several days to several weeks. The length of time can vary considerably as a result of the normal difficulties of any grand opening or because of unexpected problems or complexities. For the service-oriented businesses, franchisors provided between two and seven weeks from the time the training begins to the actual grand opening business.This period includes one to three weeks of intensive training at headquarters as well as one to three weeks on on-site training to prepare for forthcoming grand opening. At the time of grand opening, the franchisor representative stays with the new franchisee for the first full week of operation. In this way help both parties, franchisor and franchisee in builds a good business relationsh ip, as the evidence of franchisor commitment and as a return, hopefully earning loyalty, enthusiasm, and team spirit from the franchisee. ) Continuing Training Program ( Postopening ) Some franchisors provide training at quarterly, semiannual or annual meetings between the franchisor and franchisees. Others hold seminars on specific topics of current interest to franchisees as the need arises. Most of the national or international franchise systems provide a regular schedule of training at their headquarters or at the site of the franchisee requesting the training.The training is given during the regular weekly or monthly visit by the field representative to the franchise site and addresses such areas as quality control, financial or accounting methods, advertising or marketing developments, or new methods, equipment, or products and services being introduced by franchisor. There are some franchisors are provided specialized training and advice to some franchisees. In example, a fra nchisee who has a territory that appears ripe for expansion may receive training in location analysis, market analysis, lease negotiation and construction services.There are many franchising firms provide ongoing training to their franchisees and the employees of the franchisees. Ongoing training varies widely from franchisor to franchisor and from industry to industry. Regional and national meetings for franchisees are often loaded with training opportunities such as marketing updates, industry trends, new product and service developments, franchisor policy and procedure changes, or informal exchanges of ideas among franchisees themselves or between franchisors and franchisees. The most important role in the delivery of continued training is field representative.They often work directly with the franchisee at the business site, providing expert counsel, giving on-the-spot management and operational suggestions, providing instructional video or audio materials for the franchisee and employees and serving as a channel for sharing new ideas that a developing across the franchise system. Ongoing training is the primary method for most franchisors to initiate new products or services into the franchise system and also as the ideal vehicle for transferring the knowledge and skills required to keep the franchise system be more efficient.