When Ali Tafreshi, the Chief Information Officer for Authority Brands, joined the company, his goal was to ensure franchise owners could run their businesses effectively and grow their revenue without having to worry about the technology running in the background of their operations. To make this happen, Tafreshi is leading the charge on implementing advanced technological tools that enable franchise owners to onboard quickly, measure their performance easily and optimize their results rapidly.
Empowering Franchise Owners Through Technology
Recently, we have focused on making sure franchise owners are provided with systems that help them run their businesses effectively. We are focused on implementing analytics dashboards that help them understand what is working well in their business and where inefficiencies lie. This allows our franchise owners to be extremely targeted in addressing business issues and, ultimately, helps them run a more profitable operation.
From the start of the franchise experience, owners are met with advanced technology that is aimed at helping them excel at business ownership. The first step of the process for Authority Brands is the onboarding process. Our onboarding quick start allows us to get every franchise owner on the same page and integrated into a common infrastructure. This process allows new franchise owners to quickly become acquainted with owning their franchise business and gives them an opportunity to network with other owners who understand what they are going through.
Additionally, a key pain point experienced by franchise owners in every industry is system outages. We diligently researched this issue. When a system has an outage, there is inevitably a business impact. For this reason, we have migrated to a cloud system. This allows us to keep our franchise owners up and running and alleviates many of the outages previously experienced.
READ ALSO: The Number One Strategy for Increasing Business
Technology As the Future of Franchising
While addressing current challenges will always be a priority, my team and I are also focused on the future of technology and how it can be used to enhance franchise ownership.
One area we are keeping our eye on is understanding how our franchise owners connect with their consumers and how consumers use our technology. We are constantly working to enhance our customer-facing functionalities to improve the customer experience. Looking to integrate the information gathered from customers to improve the customer journey and make it easy for them to do business with us is a priority for my team.
When we understand what is happening at each step of the process as a customer conducts research and ultimately chooses us, we will not only be able to improve their experience, but we will be able to lower the cost of acquiring that customer for every franchise owner.
Technology Questions Franchise Prospects Should Ask
Staying ahead of the cutting-edge is a keystone of Authority Brands' technology roadmap. A potential franchise owner should evaluate technology when researching a franchise opportunity. Here are some questions to ask:
- How secure and operationally stable is the technology the franchise is currently using?
- Where is the franchise operator spending their resources to make my business successful?
- What does the franchise operator’s technology roadmap over the course of my agreement look like?
- What are some of the current challenges franchise owners are facing and how are they being addressed?
The way potential franchisors answer these questions will give prospective franchise owners solid insight into the priority being placed on implementing and scaling technological advancements to grow franchise owner’s businesses.
The future of franchising is intertwined with the future of technology. As Authority Brands continues to grow, placing a priority on cultivating the growth of franchise owners through the use of advancing technology will remain a keystone of the organization’s strategic plan.
We are already thinking about what franchising technology will look like in 10 and 20 years from now and how we can be at the forefront of progress. We are building out roadmaps that take franchise owner input into consideration and implementing technology that puts funding where needed to remove roadblocks and continue growing businesses.
If you're interested in learning more about Authority Brands’ family of franchises and how they are implementing digital and technology transformations, contact the home service experts today.
