Exploring the world of franchise opportunities is no easy task – you’ve likely reached a stage in your life where you want to take control of your own destiny and work for yourself. You have then taken to the internet and scrolled through numerous franchise websites, reading about franchises from a wide range of sectors and completing numerous enquiry forms – but are you any further forward from when you started?
Analysing a variety of different business models is time consuming and can certainly be very confusing. It is however possible to simplify the whole process into five steps, which should result in a more assured search for the right franchise for you – YOU being the key word. If a franchisor can develop a profile of their ideal franchisee, then you should develop a profile of your ideal franchise.
Your motivation – what is your why?
Why are you here? No, it’s not an existential question – why are you seriously considering franchise opportunities? I speak to thousands of people about franchise opportunities and there certainly are common themes amongst them – whether it’s to increase your long-term earning potential, to better support your family, to have a better work life balance or to simply build something that you can be proud of there are many great reasons that make franchising such an attractive proposition.
Your personal profile – who are you?
This step is not as easy as you initially think, who knows me better than me right? Start with reviewing your CV, what roles have you enjoyed and excelled in, what skills have you developed and in which environments did you thrive? You could also do some personality tests online to dig deep into the type of personality you have which again can allow you to make a better judgement as to the type of business you will enjoy. One other important task for this step is to note down your hobbies and other things you enjoy. The goal of this step is to build a short list of skills in which you are competent and are highly transferrable, and to better understand the best working environment for your personality.
Your expectations – start with the end in mind
What are you expecting? Aside from matching a franchise to your motivations from earlier, you also have other expectations. For example, if you want work-life-balance, you may still have expectations such as “I need to earn a minimum of £75,000 each year” or “I want to build a business than I can sell in the end for retirement”. These are all important as there are certainly no equals in the franchise world with each having its merits and of course its drawbacks.
Your situation – understanding your limitations
A very important part of the process is understanding your current position so that you don’t waste time on unrealistic opportunities and know exactly what you can or can’t get. Examples for this are things such as understanding your finances – how much capital do you have access to, are you willing to offer property as security, do you have any credit issues etc. Another factor to consider is time, how much time can you commit to running your business? Most businesses require a lot of time commitment, and so it is best to know exactly how much time you are prepared to give as all businesses will vary.
Build your profile – franchise criteria
You now have a wealth of information organised and can now pick out what’s important to you in a franchise. You may not be able to filter all the franchise opportunities via search functions however this will help with your initial questions when speaking with franchisors. It may not be possible to meet all your criteria too so knowing your negotiables and non-negotiables is also key.
This article comes courtesy of Driver Hire the UK’s No.#1 recruitment franchise opportunity.
