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Now more than ever, franchisors and franchisees must squeeze every opportunity out of every lead they generate. Truth be told, that always was the case, but in the good ole days — last year! — no one noticed the results nearly as much as they do now.
Selling doesn’t make sense any more
Franchisors looking for franchisees, and franchisees looking for customers — they’re all facing the same issue: Converting a lead to a sale.
Traditionally, it’s called selling.
Do you want to be ’sold’? Didn’t think so.
But today, people resist selling more than ever. No one wants to be sold. No one wants to feel like they’re in the process of being sold. As a result, people who sell are struggling. And many people who sold in the good ole days are now looking for work!
Selling is old school; especially in franchising.
It’s time to abandon selling
“I encourage franchisors to abandon the sales paradigm,” says Joe Mathews, co-author of Street Smart Franchising and founder of the Franchise Performance Group.
“The sales paradigm is in no one’s best interest,” continues Joe. “Scrap it.”
The same advice is given to franchisees.
Use a recruitment paradigm
In Joe’s world, franchisors and franchisees are encouraged to replace the “sales paradigm” with a “recruitment paradigm.”
“Look at what’s best for the candidate,” explains Joe, “and help the candidate see that you (the recruiter, aka sales rep) are looking out for their well being, and not that you’re out to sell them something.”
It’s more difficult to contact candidates today
Joe says that most of the franchisors who contact him these days complain that they are not getting the response from leads that they used to get, which makes opportunity squeezing all the more problematic! “The reach by phone,” explains Joe, “is about 25 percent today. Furthermore, those leads that do get reached, they’re afraid” and they don’t buy.
“So as a community, we’re losing franchisees that we should have recruited and would have recruited a year ago,” continues Joe. “Viktor Frankl once said ‘an abnormal response to an abnormal situation is completely normal’ . . . I tell my clients that we’re in serious abnormal times, getting abnormal responses, and abnormal is the new normal. So get used to it!”
Would you know how to recruit and not sell?
Joe says he’s found the best way to “get used to it” is to use the recruitment paradigm. The problem is, most people who are charged with sales in a franchise organization do not have recruitment skills. They have sales skills!
Recruiting more and selling less
The Franchise Performance Group teaches recruitment skills. The firm then relies on its own formula to help franchisors (and other clients) close more sales via recruitment. Here’s the formula:
- Personal connection. The recruiter and the candidate must develop a personal connection. “They’ve got to ‘get’ each other,” explains Joe. “The relationship must move from a transactional relationship to a trusted advisor relationship. The buyer thinks, ‘They’re trying to sell me something,’ so the recruiter must demonstrate that the personal relationship is of greatest importance.” . . . It’s equally as important that the recruiter “gets” the candidate. “The recruiter has to understand the candidate — who he is, what he wants — and then let the candidate know that the recruiter will take a stand to help him achieve his goals as a franchisee.”
- Business connection. “The buyer and the business itself must connect,” Joe continues. “Zig Ziglar told us that people don’t buy drills, they buy holes. Carry that into franchising and you’ll see that people don’t buy franchises, they buy a desired life. They buy their goals. Most franchisors do a poor job of connecting the dots between what the candidate wants and how he or she can get it through a particular business. “But once a candidate gets that, you can’t keep it from them!” says Joe. “People don’t want to buy a franchise, but we (as a franchise community) are too egotistical to understand that and we buy our own rhetoric. People buy results; that’s what they want.”
- New skill set. Development people “need to learn recruitment skills to implement a recruitment paradigm,” continues Joe. “It’s a different skill set to make a personal connection on a consistent basis, and to tell the franchisor’s story in a way so that the candidate sees how the business can help them achieve what they desire. . . .Recruiters need to acquire a whole new set of skills, which would include brilliant interview techniques, brilliant listening techniques, and getting people out of their fear and into a problem solving mode.”
Granted, the move from selling to recruiting doesn’t occur overnight, but in the new economy it’s a requirement . . . not only for franchisors, but franchisees, too.
And, Joe says, the companies that understand this shift, and implement the recruitment paradigm, are the companies that will still be in business in five years.
Today’s blog is sponsored by The E-Myth Partners
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