DailyFranchiseNews.com

Simplifying the Internet with WSI’s Daren Coudriet

Is your franchise looking to build its presence online? If so, Daren Coudriet is the man to speak to. Coudriet, 44, has been in technology consulting and internet solutions for more than two decades and counted companies like The New York Times, Standard & Poor’s and Amtrak as clients. Just about six years ago, Coudriet became a WSI franchisee and recently moved his business from the Boston area to State College, Pa. Started with WSI on 1/1/2004 (coming up on sixth anniversary) and has been growing his client base ever since. DailyFranchiseNews recently sat down with Coudriet to find out a little more about his services and expertise. Here’s what he had to say:

Do you work with a lot of franchises? Franchises are actually my sole focus because they need an Internet solutions partner who understands their business and can formulate high-value solutions.

What franchises do you work with and how? I’m able to come up with comprehensive Internet marketing focused on franchise sales and customer acquisition for franchisees. Lots of franchisors have web sites with store locators but most don’t support localized search engine optimization and that’s a problem. If a client is, say, a cleaning company in Toronto, the local franchisee wouldn’t come up if I typed “cleaning company Toronto” into a search engine; the local cleaning company that isn’t a franchise, however, will show up.  I work with ActionCoach, Tasti D-Lite and even my own franchisor, WSI. But just because all these companies are franchises doesn’t mean I implement the same programs for them. With ActionCoach, I have implemented regional territory sites in multiple countries with web site platforms the regional marketing representatives can use to market the franchisees in their region and with Tasti D-Lite, I built the original site and worked with the company’s internal IT department to create a site focused specifically on franchise sales. For WSI, I’m in the process of building a network-wide lead nurturing and management system to be used by all franchisees as well as a corporate communication system that allows the franchisor, franchisees and third-party vendors to communicate with one another. In my opinion, one of the greatest values a franchisor can impart is the power of the network. Franchisees have so many solutions and ideas but there’s no good mechanism to share all this but a network gives them the ability to accelerate the experience of every franchisee. When it comes down to it, the competitive advantage of any company is how fast they can learn.

What do your clients need most now? What they need the most is a solid Internet marketing strategy that’s implemented correctly. Much of the community is still looking for the right solution to leverage the Internet from a search engine standpoint. Many sites (about 80 percent) are not optimized for franchise sales but I help my clients to understand how an integrated strategy can provide them with a greater ROI than any other. If you can show them how they can stretch their dollar, the proof is in the pudding. Social media is certainly gaining momentum as well but it’s a future aspect for most; search engine optimization definitely comes first.

How do you blend what a client wants with what they need? When I talk to a new client, they often define needs based on a solution they already have in mind. What I do is take the time to truly understand the challenge of what they think they need and then help them understand their solution alternative. As they explore, what they often realize is that there is a more cost-effective approach out there. Many clients have been burned by vendors in the past so since I have been consulting on this topic for so many years, I “get” this and don’t just sell a solution the client thinks they want. I provide them with a competitive analysis report, which shows them exactly what their competition is doing, followed by a comprehensive plan to help them get the rankings they want. I give them all the information they will need to make an informed business decision. It’s the best way to engage the client and have them for the long run. I don’t believe in employing sales techniques because I want an educated and informed buyer; clients appreciate my openness and honesty and know that I am there to help them make the right decisions.

Typically how long does it take for a client to see results? That timeframe definitely varies from client to client and depends on what they want to achieve. It can happen in as quickly as one to two months or up to three to six months.

To learn more about Coudriet and his business, call 978-223-2225 or e-mail daren@wsifranchise360.com.

Innovation in Franchising

Did you know that McDonald’s Big Mac and Filet-O-Fish wouldn’t exist today if it weren’t for some creative franchisees? AllBusiness.com did and recently set out to find if franchising and innovation go together like two all beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions and a sesame seed bun.

“Some franchisees, and some franchise systems, are more effective when franchisees can innovate,” says John Hayes, a franchise consultant, former franchisee and franchisor, and author of several franchise-related books. “More often, however, when franchisees have to search for answers or experiment, the results are likely to be frustrating and quite often the franchisees lose money. Innovation belongs to the franchisor and it's the responsibility of the franchisor.” However, that’s not to say that innovation on the franchisee level hasn’t happened successfully. In fact, franchisee input was the driving force behind the aforementioned McDonald’s menu items as well as Domino's Pizza’s new American Legends pizza line and line of breadbowl pastas which was developed and tested by a Los Angeles franchisee. At WSI, an Internet consulting franchise, innovation is so highly valued that an international excellence and innovation conference is held annually to recognize franchisees who have provided internet marketing solutions in their local markets around the world. In addition, Ron McArthur, president of the franchise, personally meets with the top 30 revenue producing franchises eight times a year to discuss ideas. And 90 percent of the products and services within the WSI e-marketplace have come from franchisees. “New franchisees are trained on the basics of business but innovations are introduced on a quarterly basis to ensure that we are offering the latest and best internet marketing processes to end clients that deliver results,” says McArthur.

There’s an old adage that says two heads are better than one. If that’s true, then it naturally follows that hundreds or thousands of people can make one system run better than just one. But be sure to first research what policy the franchisor has in place for accepting new ideas and then, only after you’ve demonstrated that you can follow the system at hand, introduce your idea. Because, when it comes to innovation, not everyone sees it in the same light.

Photo: Ron McArthur of WSI.

An Easier Way to Save

Trying to save money? There’s now an app for that!

WOWT-TV (NBC Omaha) reported Valpak, the direct mail marketing company best known for its blue envelopes stuffed with money-saving offers, has debuted an iPhone application.

“The color pops up to offer you different categories.” Scott Farkas, president of Valpak in Omaha, showed off the new coupon iPhone application. You pick a category, it pops up deals at businesses closest to you. It shows how many miles you are away, it even gives you a map to get there. Best of all, you don't have to carry around all the paper coupons. "If you forgot the coupon at home, you can pull it up on your phone, show it to the person at the register, it has a unique code so the business can actually track it and you're good to go.”

Valpak says the jump in local consumers using coupons has been dramatic. The company's Web site traffic saw its numbers jump from 190,000 visitors to 280,000 visitors per month.

Catering Counts

While many think adding a catering program is a simple add-on service to boost sales and gain new customers, it takes a significant amount of time, effort and ingenuity for one to become successful. Thankfully, there are experts in place to lead the way.

Nation’s Restaurant News reported that since sales of off-site meals have to be integrated into the whole business plan and not just tacked on as an extra service, several restaurant companies are implementing operations software designed specifically for catering. Many nationally franchised brands turn to Altametrics, a California-based firm whose eRestaurant software suite has a module for catering and event management. Mitesh Gala, co-founder and chief executive of Altametrics, says catering is a natural extension of serving food, but the tactic requires planning. “You have to remember to look at the business holistically,” he said. “If you think catering is this silo that doesn’t impact other parts of the business, it’ll hamper your success. Make sure whatever you’re going to do is going to integrate, otherwise the left hand isn’t going to know what the right is doing.” As operators take orders using Altametrics’ system, the food and labor requirements for those meals flow into those metrics measured for the whole location, automatically coordinating scheduling and purchasing. About 44,000 locations of brands like California Pizza Kitchen, Wendy’s and Rock Bottom Restaurants use the eRestaurant suite, Gala said.

McAlister’s Deli, the fast-casual chain of nearly 300 locations, does healthy catering sales without dedicated software—about 8 percent systemwide—but it plans to test a Web-based catering module in units near its Ridgeland, Miss., headquarters starting in January, said vice president of training Vickie Frisbie. Currently, the brand manages catering orders with a blend of its point-of-sale system and pen and paper, Frisbie said. Catering software would allow McAlister’s to track customer data better and build reliability within those relationships. “By knowing the group you’re delivering to, you can tap further into the broader audience you have,” she said. “That leads you to the sports complex, then the coaches, then the [athletes’] moms, who end up being your social-catering clients.…This lets you segment out your database and market with things that will drive more sales in that area.” McAlister’s already sells lots of sandwich platters and gallons of sweet tea, Frisbie said, but it also will push its side dishes and holiday cookie platters to get more people thinking of the brand as a go-to catering option. “The relationship of catering and the economy today is important,” she said, “and we’re making sure we have reliability and great relationships with our customers. To perform detailed sales and profit analysis is going to be critical to us in 2010 to continue to grasp that market share.”

Photos from top right: Mitesh Gala reviewing eRestaurant results with Applebee's area director Vilma Tawil; a McAlister's Deli location.

Young But Driven

Traditionally, franchisors have preferred individuals with years of related experience and savings when selecting new franchisees. If the last year has taught us anything, however, it’s that things can change when you least expect them to.

The Wall Street Journal reported that a host of companies are rethinking that logic and are aggressively recruiting twentysomethings through franchise brokers, marketing themselves in youth-friendly venues like Facebook, and in some cases offering financial lures to get young people on board—such as deep discounts on franchise fees, which many beginners can't afford. Why the big change? For one thing, many boomer franchisees are retiring, leaving room for newcomers. And many franchisers say that today's crop of twentysomethings are much better prepared to run a business than earlier generations of youngsters, since more colleges are offering strong training in entrepreneurship. "Sometimes the younger people have more drive and are willing to put in more time and maybe are hungrier than a corporate person who has other commitments," says Patty Meyer, a senior consultant for Toronto-based MatchPoint Franchise Consulting Network, which helps companies recruit franchisees. "Younger people are able to get things moving faster in some cases."

One company taking this route is Valpak: Last year, the Largo, Fla.-based direct-mailing company created the Entrepreneurship Award Program in an effort to recruit young people who could open new franchises or take over existing ones as owners prepare to retire. The potential franchisees sign on with the company as salespeople, and if they hit certain goals they get a discount on their franchise fee. One hopeful is Nicholas Hernandez. If he brings in $1.1 million in three years—the average sales raked in by the top third of the company's performers over the past three years—the 23-year-old becomes eligible for one of three things: $50,000 toward the fees for one of Valpak's dormant territories, which start around $43,000 but range higher as the market size increases; $10,000 toward the franchise fee of an International Franchise Association member company; or $10,000 toward an M.B.A. or other advanced degree. "Quite frankly, sharp people coming out of school have choices, and so we're trying to give them a reason to at least consider us," says Joe Bourdow, president of Valpak, which has about 170 franchises in the U.S. and Canada. He started the program after visiting colleges and finding himself impressed by the students he met.

Click here to see what other franchisors like WSI and CertaPro Painters are doing to attract younger franchisees.

Photo: Valpak sales rep Nicholas Hernandez (right) and his boss, Valpak franchisee Bobby Coco.

From Finance to Franchising: No Bull (or Bear)!

Fact: There are opportunities beyond Wall Street. Where, you ask? In franchising! Click here for a great slideshow on BusinessWeek.com profiling several individuals that have found new careers with companies including Floor Coverings International, Martinizing Dry Cleaning, Tasti D-Lite, CertaPro Painters, Hungry Howie’s Pizza, Liquid Capital and WSI.

Photo: FCI franchisee Mark Woodward.

Business Gets Buzzed

Are you one of those people who can’t truly start their day without a cup of coffee? Just think of what it must be like to be a coffee shop owner!

Specialty Coffee Retailer reported that in addition to caffeinating the masses, coffee shop owners are always trying generate buzz in a different kind of way. Click here to read some great tips from Ron McArthur, president of WSI, about how to use the Internet to take these businesses to the next level.

Photo: WSI's Ron McArthur.

Technology to the Rescue!

It’s impossible for a business owner to be everywhere at once, especially franchisors who often have locations in various states and countries. How does one know exactly what’s going on at a distance, you ask? Read on.

Entrepreneur.com reported many of today's entrepreneurs are recovering lost revenue with new technologies that track output down to the last French fry or drop of alcohol. Take BEVINCO, a company that curbs shrinkage by conducting weekly audits of drink inventories at bars and restaurants. Auditors weigh every keg and bottle while feeding the information to a laptop running the company's proprietary software. The software then plugs into the bar's sales system, revealing the difference between drink sales and inventory levels. The program even goes so far as to consider varying densities of different liquors into its calculations. For bar owners, the results can be a rude awakening.

"They are absolutely shocked. Most owners when we walk in say 'I've got everything under control,' and they're mortified to discover they're losing 30 percent,” says Vanessa De Caria, vice president of operations for BEVINCO. In the last six months, BEVINCO's sales have increased by 20 percent, De Caria estimates. Businesses that once declined the company's help have quickly become receptive. The lion's share of the company's customers are independents. "In these times, particularly in this economy, people are relying more and more on technology to solve some of these issues," she says.

Of course, plenty of losses occur from simple oversights, especially in high volume, low margin businesses like restaurants. Mitesh Gala, CEO of Altametrics, entered the restaurant industry as the operator of several Jack in the Box franchises, where he saved $50,000 a year when his homemade inventory program caught an over-portioning problem with the company's French fry containers. Now, his company's eRestaurant software helps restaurants track everything from inventory to shift schedules. The software is web-based, meaning that users need only an internet connection and a web browser to access it. eRestaurant tracks the amount of food lost to waste, portioning errors and theft. The software can suggest the appropriate number of employees to schedule for each shift based on previous sales, as well as compare sales to supply orders. The latter feature helped one restaurant catch a supplier error that had the restaurant paying for boxes of 20 hamburger patties but receiving boxes that contained only 18. All in all, most clients reduce their food costs by 1 to 3 percent of their sales, Gala says. Depending on the size of the restaurant, that can translate to a savings of $3,000 to $30,000 per year.

"Using eRestaurant you can see if a single slice of cheese missing at the end of the day," he says. At Altametrics, too, the number of new customers is growing, with Gala estimating that sales have doubled in the last year. Technology has offered businesses greater efficiency for some time, he says, but that offer was often ignored. Now, many companies can't afford to resist change. "There's a new level of urgency to these things," he says.

Photos from top right: BEVINCO president and CEO Barry Driedger performing an audit; Altametrics co-founder and CEO Mitesh Gala (left) reviewing eRestaurant's findings with Applebee's area director Vilma Tawil.

Switching Gears and Careers

In the past, a person could start a job after college and keep it for their entire career. Times have clearly changed and many are wondering what they’re to do if their long-time employer decides to downsize. Thankfully, Business.com's What Works for Business blog has proof that life after corporate America exists: With the U.S. economy shedding jobs at a pace unseen in a generation, increasing numbers of late-career workers are opting to start their own businesses rather than wage battle in the employment line. Many late career entrepreneurs prefer to buy a pre-packaged franchise rather than start a business from scratch. While there are no guarantees, a franchise offers a proven business concept, a ready-made set of operating procedures and often marketing help as well.

Take 52-year-old Bob Mabry. He worked in petrochemical engineering for many years helping to design refineries and chemical plants but when some of his projects started to be outsourced overseas, Mabry began contemplating a new career. He felt he was too young to retire, but too old to retrain and start over so he explored business opportunities that could leverage his existing skills. When he came across a franchise called Handyman Matters in Kingwood, Texas, Mabry and his wife Tish decided it was the business for them. They started servicing home fix-up needs on Houston’s north side in 2004 and haven’t looked back since.

The same goes for Enrique Rosselli. The 53-year-old worked for Pepsico Inc. for 17 years in many parts of the world but now he’s the successful owner of an AlphaGraphics business in Las Vegas. After a company reorganization at Pepsico, Rosselli was offered early retirement. He then spent some time working for Coca Cola in Europe, and then DuPont. At age 50 he left the corporate world to start his own business and chose AlphaGraphics.