March 29, 2023 – As March 2023 survey data arrives, aspiring franchisees now expect “personal sources” to make up the vast majority of funding for their business launches, with 47.4% including it in their top three sources. SBA loans and banks and other loan providers were second and third, included by 32.6% and 20.0% of respondents, respectively, to round out the top three choices.
March 23, 2023 — Amid news of bank failures and high interest rates, business startups expect personal sources to make up the vast majority of funding for their business launches. Those planning to take advantage of Small Business Administration loans and bank loans have dropped to 30.1% and 22.8% respectively, given forty-year highs in interest rates and tightening credit conditions.
March 15, 2023 – Aspiring business owners talking with franchise sales teams were largely satisfied with their experience, according to recent mystery shopping surveys over the last six months ending in February 2023. Almost half (48.7%) said they were either “satisfied” or “very satisfied”, and only 12.4% said they were “unsatisfied” or “very unsatisfied.”
March 8, 2023 – In February 2023, 59.1% of entrepreneurs surveyed say they are “more likely to launch their startups than three months ago.” Coincidentally, 59.1% of survey respondents either agree or strongly agree that “now is a good time to start a business”, consistent with the prior month, but down from the high of 73.5% in February 2022.
Now that Microsoft has unveiled its chatbot-enhanced search results into new downloads of the Bing mobile app, and to Bing desktop users by signup on a limited basis, we can further analyze the impact of chatbots on paid and organic search marketing, following up on our earlier article.
Kudos to the franchise sales teams who reached out to all of the inquirers who requested information from them in February 2023. There is no doubt that they will be finding new franchisees, unlike those teams that did not follow up with an initial contact within seven days.
February 15, 2023 — What is now more interesting to Google searchers than Kim Kardashian, and almost as interesting as TikTok? Based on recent Google Search trends in the US, the answer is ChatGPT. Over one billion visits to the product occurred between its launch November 30 and February 5, 2023.
February 8, 2023 – As of January 2023, 76.6% of aspiring business owners are planning to launch their businesses within the next 12 months. And now, 58.4% of aspiring business owners either agree or strongly agree that “now is a good time to start a business”, consistent with the prior month, but down from the high of 73.5% as recently as February 2022.
February 01, 2023 — Given three choices and the opportunity to enter their own “other” reason, over 56% indicated that they were “very interested and just wanted to learn more.” Another 28.4% “wanted to prepare before having a conversation with the franchise representative.”
January 25, 2023 — When evaluating franchise directory websites (portals), cost per lead is often the key decision factor, assuming quality standards are met. But leads submitted at portals also lead to substantial referral visits to franchisor websites, in addition to being a significant source of leads submitted at development websites, as we first reported in September 2022.
January 18, 2023 – Analyzing our content viewed over the past year, we developed a “Top Ten” list of the most popular topics among our insights in 2022 based on the readership of articles in topic categories. Along with each topic, ranked in descending popularity, are a few key and most recent articles that address each particular subject.
January 11, 2023 – It’s a new year, with new opportunities for franchise growth ahead. Yes, there are economic, legislative and regulatory headwinds, but who would bet against the collective entrepreneurial spirit, creative energy and grit of the franchise community?
January 4, 2023– A record high percentage (91.4%) of aspiring business owners are planning to launch their businesses within the next 12 months. Now 59.16% of aspiring business owners either agree or strongly agree that “now is a good time to start a business”, recovering from the prior month, but down from the high of 73.5% as recently as February, 2022.
December 28, 2022 – Headlines about war, surging inflation and interest rates, and imminent economic slowdown were no match for the entrepreneurial instincts of Americans in the final months of 2022. The control over one’s destiny continues to propel entrepreneurs towards owning a business in America.
December 21, 2022 — If U.S. adults are spending almost 46 minutes a day on TikTok, surpassing even YouTube, why not advertise there? Have you experienced it yourself, or watched someone mindlessly scrolling TikTok videos? Meanwhile, Instagram and YouTube are falling all over themselves trying to tap into the demand for TikTok-like viral video content.
Willingness to follow a proven system, and ‘Grit’ are cited by most franchise prospects surveyed. By: Franchise Insights December 14, 2022 — Two-thirds of franchise inquirers profess having both of the two most important characteristics for succeeding at franchise ownership, according to the November 2022 Startup Sentiment survey by Franchise Insights. “Willingness to follow a …
By: Franchise Insights December 7, 2022 — A record low percentage of aspiring business owners see “now” as ideal for launching their businesses. Only 50.6% of aspiring business owners either agree or strongly agree that “now is a good time to start a business”, down from the high of 73.5% as recently as February, 2022. …
November 30, 2022 – Consistently, most franchise prospects (38.5%) prefer to be emailed for an initial contact with a franchise they have chosen, according to the monthly “mystery shopping” survey by FranchiseInsights.com in November 2022. But 36.5% indicated a preference for a phone call over a text for initial contact this month. Further, in all …
Norfolk, VA, November 22, 2022 – The percentage of franchise prospects who are very likely to return your call before receiving an introductory email has reached an all-time low. In November, only 1.92% of respondents are “very likely,” and another 21.2% say they are “likely” to take a cold call. That means about 23.1% are …
November 16, 2022 – This month a shocking and record low percentage of inquirers about franchises for sale were contacted by all of the franchise systems they requested information from, according to the FranchiseInsights.com monthly “Mystery Shopping” survey. Only 42.2% of inquirers to franchises reported that they were contacted by “all of the franchises they …
Norfolk, Virginia – November 9, 2022 — Most aspiring franchise buyers now plan to use their own personal sources of funding for their business launches. Those planning to take advantage of Small Business Administration loans and bank loans are at 39.8% and 35.3% respectively, despite forty-year highs in interest rates seen in the last few …
NORFOLK, VIRGINIA – November 2, 2022 — A lower percentage of entrepreneurs see “now” as ideal for launching their businesses than any time since November 2020. Nonetheless, 53.8% of aspiring business owners either agree or strongly agree that “now is a good time to start a business”, down from the recent high of 73.5% in …
October 26, 2022 — While the headlines are about an “advertising recession” underway, with Meta to provide even more insight in its earnings report today, Google’s earnings release yesterday explains the pain felt by franchise development teams over the last year. The reported growth in Google global search revenues of 4.25% understates the impact of …
October 19, 2022 — A substantial flow of leads to franchise development sites comes from prospects originating on portal websites that are used to acquire franchise leads. In a recent article, we quantified from user surveys that 70% of prospects submitting an inquiry subsequently visited the franchise website, with 41% of those also submitting a …
October 11, 2022 – Despite soaring interest rates, volatile financial markets, declining consumer confidence and increasing lead costs, none of the U. S. franchisors responding to a recent survey say they have cut back their development budgets significantly for 2022. Moreover, one third (33.3%) have actually increased their expansion plans for this year. There was …
NORFOLK, VIRGINIA — October, 5, 2022 — A lower percentage of entrepreneurs see “now” as ideal for launching their businesses than any time in the past year. Nonetheless, 62.2% of aspiring business owners either agree or strongly agree that “now is a good time to start a business”, down from the recent high of 73.5% …
September 28, 2022 — Franchise marketers using the data on keywords that converted to visitors to tune their paid search programs suffered significant signal loss on September 1, 2022 when Google stopped providing this data in its Analytics products “to meet a higher privacy threshold.” What does this mean for franchise lead generation through pay …
NORFOLK, VIRGINIA — September 21, 2022 — In comparing lead sources, “price”, and even the holy grail – “cost per sale” – are incomplete, if not misleading. There are two other critical variables in assessing return on your investment in franchise portals or other third party lead suppliers. In a prior article, we quantified the …
September 14, 2022 — In comparing lead sources, “price”, and even the holy grail – “cost per sale” – can be misleading. There are two other critical variables in assessing return on your investment in franchise portals or other third party lead suppliers. In this article, we discuss the first one. What happens after a …
NORFOLK, VIRGINIA — September 7, 2022 — A higher percentage of aspiring business owners are eager to get started in the coming month, while fewer see business conditions improving in three months. Nonetheless, 72.6% see conditions for business startups “the same or better in three months”, 42.7% see conditions the same, 29.9% see them improving, …
August 31, 2022 – Most franchise prospects (55.3%) prefer to be emailed for an initial contact with a franchise they have chosen, according to the monthly “mystery shopping” survey by FranchiseInsights.com in July 2022. Further, in all but two of the 30 monthly surveys by FranchiseInsights.com over the last three years, email was the clear …
August 24, 2022 — A minority (6.2%) of aspiring franchise owners are already “very familiar” with the franchises they inquire about, and another 20.8% are “already somewhat familiar” with them, according to surveys of interested franchise seekers to portal sites collected from May through July 2022. They come to franchise directory sites for the convenience …
August 17, 2022 – In July 2022, an improved 60% of inquirers to franchises reported that they were contacted by “all of the franchises they inquired to,” just below the average rate of 61.3% seen over the last twelve months. Those who reported being contacted by “none of” the franchises at seven days after inquiry …
August 10, 2022 – While many changes in franchise buyer behavior were noted over the last few years during the height of the pandemic, some things remained relatively constant. Despite the availability of hundreds of franchise offerings among dozens of categories in the directories at FranchiseVentures digital brands, most prospects still narrow their focus to …
NORFOLK, VIRGINIA — August 3, 2022 — Aspiring franchise owners have adjusted to financial and geopolitical headwinds, and never-ending epidemiological headlines, with 81.6% seeing conditions for business startups “the same or better in three months” and only 18.4% expecting conditions to worsen. In July, a record 61.7% of entrepreneurs planned their startups within the next …
July 27, 2022 – In a June 2022 survey of aspiring business owners, 18% indicated a preference for the option to “buy a franchise” over buying an existing business. While 38.5% indicated interest in the franchise purchase option, only 20.3% indicated an interest in buying an existing business. While reasons for the preferences were not …
July 20, 2022 — Since we last wrote about the decline in Facebook (Meta) Lead Generation, three more months of data show that the situation may have stabilized for franchise lead generation advertisers now one year after Apple’s iOS 14.5 release, though at substantially higher costs and lower lead volumes. If you have found your …
NORFOLK, VIRGINIA — July 13, 2022 — Aspiring business owners have been optimistic through the course of the pandemic and recent economic concerns, but they perceive less favorable business conditions for startup three months out. Of aspiring business owners surveyed in June, 74.4% were resolute about starting their businesses within the coming six months. Currently, …
July 6, 2022 – Despite pandemic , war, and economic headwinds, the control over one’s destiny continues to propel entrepreneurs towards owning a business in America. In a very large sample over multiple years, “being one’s own boss” remains the main motivator cited by entrepreneurs researching business ownership across FranchiseVentures, the leading network of online …
June 29, 2022 – Since the introduction of Apple’s Mail Privacy Protection (MPP) features with the September 21, 2022 release of iOS 15, email marketers have been scrambling to adjust their marketing processes and expectations to the changes. While a comprehensive response is beyond the scope of this article, we are attempting a high-level summary …
June 22, 2022 — Most aspiring franchise buyers plan to take advantage of Small Business Administration loans and bank loans, at 48.9% and 45% respectively, despite the rapid rise in interest rates seen in the last few months. Another 14.3% are hoping to take advantage of in-house financing by the franchise they are purchasing. These …
June 15, 2022 – Most franchise prospects (45.8%) prefer to be emailed for the initial contact with a franchise they have chosen, according to the monthly “mystery shopping” survey by FranchiseInsights.com in June 2022. Further, in all but two of the 29 monthly surveys by FranchiseInsights.com over the last three years, email was the clear …
June 8, 2022 — A minority (6.4%) of aspiring franchise owners are already “very familiar” with the franchises they inquire about, and another 23% are “somewhat familiar” to them according to surveys of interested franchise seekers to portal sites collected January through May 2022. They likely come for the convenience of comparisons in one place, …
NORFOLK, VIRGINIA — June 1, 2022 — While measures of consumer sentiment have been declining in recent months, optimism about starting a business remains solid. Despite war headlines, stock market declines and inflation woes, 78% of aspiring business owners surveyed in May were resolute about starting their businesses within the coming six months. Not surprisingly, …
May 25, 2022 – Despite March’s largest increase in U.S. inflation in more than forty years, the majority of U. S. franchisors have no plans to increase initial franchise fees, according to a benchmarking survey by Franchise Insights in April 2022. A minority (13.5%) of respondents do expect franchise fee increases in 2022 in the …
May 18, 2022 — Since February 2022 when we last wrote about the decline in Facebook (Meta) Lead Generation after Apple’s iOS 14.5 release, three more months of data show that advertisers for lead generation shouldn’t expect results to improve any time soon. Meta’s own CFO estimates that consumers opting out of tracking will cost …
May 11, 2022 – In April 2022, only 53.2% of inquirers to franchises reported that they were contacted by “all of the franchises they inquired to”, just above the 53.1% lowest rate seen in April 2021, but far below the average rate of 61.3% seen over the last twelve months. Fortunately, those who reported being …
NORFOLK, VIRGINIA — May 4, 2022 — April 2022 saw inflation at a 40-year high, war in Ukraine entering its third month, and the worst drop in S & P 500 performance since 1970. Despite all the uncertainty, 59.3% of aspiring business owners surveyed in April were resolute about starting their businesses within the coming …
April 27, 2022 – Taking a snapshot of each March since 2020, “funding or access to credit” has increased as the biggest consideration for franchise buyers over the next six months. Most recently in March 2022, 76.6% of respondents indicated that this was their biggest concern. From March 2020 when the total impact of the …
April 20, 2022 – In March 2022, U.S. inflation showed the largest 12-month increase since December 1981. The year-over-year increase was 8.5%, up from 7.9% in February 2022. The Consumer Price Index rose just over 8.5% in March 2022, compared to March 2021, propelled by categories like energy prices and rents, as used vehicles and …
April 13, 2022 – The southward and westward migration of franchise interest during the pandemic noted in a recent article begs the question – how does that fit into the longer-term trend? The top ten states by share of franchise prospects grew slightly as a percent of all states from 2018 (59.53%) to 2020 (59.65%) …
NORFOLK, VIRGINIA — April 7, 2022 — After a month of invasion, inflation, and market volatility, business startups begin to settle into the new reality in March 2022. Despite all the uncertainty, 52.9% of aspiring business owners responding in March were resolute about starting their businesses within the next three months. Further, 80.5% of these …
March 30, 2022 – By comparing the shares by state from January-March 2020 to January-March 2022, there was a shift in the mix of where aspiring franchisees were expecting to locate franchises – from north to south, and east to west, according to new data from FranchiseInsights.com. Increasing state share in that period is in …
March 23, 2022 — There seem to be at least two market segments or distinct buyer groups reflected in the FranchiseInsights.com Small Business Startup Sentiment survey in their preferences for franchises. Respondents were asked to rank eight franchise characteristics in order of importance to their ultimate selection, along with a “not important to me” option …
March 16, 2022 — Most aspiring franchise buyers plan to use Small Business Administration loans and personal savings to start their businesses, at 48.9% and 45% respectively, according to the FranchiseInsights.com Small Business Startup Sentiment survey. Loans from banks or other lending institutions were identified as the third most common source at 39.8%. The percentages …
March 10, 2022 — In the February FranchiseInsights.com Small Business Startup Sentiment survey, respondents were also asked to rank eight franchise characteristics in order of importance to their ultimate selection, along with a “not important to me” option for each. On the surface, “low cost of entry” and “higher earnings potential” were ranked highest, on …
NORFOLK, VIRGINIA — March 3, 2022 — On February 24th, the day the survey launched, news headlines of the invasion of Ukraine stunned the world and roiled financial markets. Despite the uncertainty, 57.4% of aspiring business owners were resolute about starting their businesses within the next three months. Further, 76% of these survey respondents see …
February 23, 2022 — If you have not heard about the $300 billion drop in the market value in Meta Platforms (formerly known as Facebook), perhaps it is because you have had to work double-time to mitigate the volume dip and effective cost of franchise leads to achieve your franchise system growth goals. The introduction …
February 16, 2022 — The percentage of prospects inquiring about franchises and businesses for sale who cited email or text as their first choice for initial contact was dead even in February 2022, in a departure from recent months, and largely due to a dip in the preference for email compared to January. In addition, …
February 8, 2022 – In January 2022, 57.6% of inquirers to franchises reported that they were contacted by “all of the franchises they inquired to.” On the other hand, those who reported being contacted by “none of them” dropped to a recent low of 15.4%, according to results from the FranchiseInsights.com monthly Mystery Shopping survey. …
NORFOLK, VIRGINIA — January 25, 2022 — In late January 2022, news roiled markets with the threat of yet another Omicron variant, a potential invasion of Ukraine, and the largest drop in financial markets since March 2020. Nonetheless, 53.1% of aspiring business owners were resolute about starting their businesses within the next three months. Further, …
January 26, 2022 — Even though over 28% of franchise prospects in January 2022 reported being already “somewhat familiar” or “very familiar” with the franchises they considered, they chose to inquire about them at franchise portal sites among hundreds of other listings. These findings are consistent with our prior data from August 2021. When you’re looking …
January 20, 2022 — Despite the disruptions to normal human behavior due to the global pandemic, the control over one’s destiny and financial independence continue to be the most powerful motivations for owning a business in America. In a very large sample over multiple years, working for oneself remains the main motivator cited by entrepreneurs researching …
January 13, 2022 – First, the bad news. Supplies will be tighter, and costs higher for building a pipeline of franchise prospects given: Increasing Competition with Employers – Growing franchise systems will be competing with desperate employers who are offering better pay and more flexible work conditions to retain or add team members in an environment …
NORFOLK, VIRGINIA — January 5, 2022 –In late December 2021, the percentage of aspiring owners who expected to start their businesses within the next three months reached 62.1%, the highest percentage ever recorded. Further, 88.2% of these aspiring owners see business conditions about the same or getting better in the next three months, according to …
December 28, 2021 — Aspiring owners say that they are most likely to respond to an email as the initial contact about a franchise they are interested in according to the December 2021 “mystery shopping” survey by FranchiseInsights.com. But in a reversal of the trend seen in the first half of 2021, prospects now …
December 22, 2021 – The flow of franchise prospects usually ebbs on days leading up to holidays, as travel and spending time with loved ones takes precedence. Following the Christmas holidays in the US, franchise inquiries usually increase, as interested prospects have extra time to ponder and make big plans for the coming year. But …