Franchise Lead Generation Portals Drive Discovery and Consideration of Options
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 of comparisons in one place, and ease of connection to franchise representatives.
But the same surveys show that 34.8% are “only vaguely familiar” and 38.2% are “completely unfamiliar” with the selections they ultimately inquire about. So the primary function of portal sites is to make an introduction – to generate awareness and consideration of options in a convenient “one stop shop.”
When you are looking for information on an unfamiliar subject, you might “Google it.” But what if you don’t know what you are looking for, or what criteria to use to compare the choices, or what options are available in a geography, category or price range? How do you satisfy yourself that you’ve reviewed the best options?
That is the role of franchise directory sites, or portals — they organize and present high-level information about franchises to facilitate discovery and consideration, and make the connection between prospect and franchisor.
Online franchise opportunity directories and their associated mobile apps play an integral role in discovery, awareness and consideration during the franchise buyer research process. This is in addition to the vital role they play in information and comparison shopping. Online franchise portals provide:
- Exposure to the breadth of franchise categories
- Comparison and options within a franchise category of interest
- Reminders of familiar category franchise brand leaders, and
- Introduction and consideration of franchise concepts that may not be familiar.
In this large sample from May through July 2022, 73% – almost three fourths of respondents – chose to inquire about a franchise brand with which they had very little or no familiarity prior to the portal visit — the concept was introduced to the prospect during the visit.
This very high percentage underscores the unique value of these directory resources in giving introduction and consideration to franchise concepts that may not be on the radar screen of prospects. The sum of “completely unfamiliar” and “vaguely familiar” responses back in January was 71.9%, consistent with prior monthly surveys.
Why might the franchise options be unfamiliar? These are among the likely reasons for an unfamiliar brand:
- Emerging franchise that has not yet established brand recognition
- Franchise with regional concentration, or lack of a national footprint to gain exposure
- Established B2B brand that is less familiar with consumers
The “Mystery Shop” survey is conducted monthly by FranchiseInsights.com from a sample of franchise inquirers across the FranchiseVentures lead generation platform. The data presented here is from May through July 2022.
Franchise Ventures is the leading franchise lead-generation platform for potential franchisees to thousands of growing franchise systems in the United States and Canada. Its franchise lead generation brands include Franchise.com, Franchise Solutions, Franchise Gator, Franchise Opportunities, Franchise For Sale, SmallBusinessStartup.com and BusinessBroker.net, and together they provide the largest aggregation of prospective franchise buyers in the U.S.
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Published on Wednesday, August 24th, 2022.