Why an online franchise manual is essential for success

"No no, our franchise manual is still perfectly up to date!"

"That is good to hear! When was the content last reviewed by several people across the organisation?"

"Let me think... (silence)... well, er, we did a brief inventory back in 2018! Oops, time flies!"

The above is a real fragment from a conversation with a sizeable franchise organisation. Unfortunately, this organisation is far from alone in this situation.

The importance of the franchise manual

The manual makes the franchise formula tangible. It captures the operational implementation of the formula and serves as a guide for the franchisee, both before launch and during day-to-day operations. Just as importantly, the manual has legal value, because it is linked to the franchise agreement. It is therefore essential that the contents of both documents are aligned.

As a responsible franchisor, it is your duty and your duty of care to guide and support your franchisees throughout the partnership. What does that look like in practice? Think of support across areas such as:

• All purchasing, inventory management and sales processes.
• Practical and efficient access to the most relevant and up-to-date information on internal and external decisions, processes, benchmark data and ongoing developments.
• Initiating and sustaining intensive, energetic and inspiring two-way communication.
• Regular reality-checks by multiple stakeholders from every layer of the business. What was originally designed. How does the formula function today compared to that?

These are processes that should not be missing from any self-respecting, professional franchise organisation!

Our experience shows that, due to the pressures and priorities of daily operations, franchisors often do not (sufficiently) get round to maintaining this important and dynamic document. Creating shared responsibility between franchisor and franchisees can offer a solution.

An online franchise manual has countless advantages

With a physical manual, the process of implementing changes is highly inefficient. Just try getting every franchisee to actually replace the updated pages in their physical manual! You may already be making your manual digitally available, for example as a PDF via the cloud. Inside a PDF, however, navigating and searching is awkward. PDFs are also generally hard to read on smartphones. In short, with an online manual in PDF form, it is difficult for franchisees to find the right information quickly. As a result, the manual is often not actively used. An effective manual must be clear, efficient, time-saving and easily accessible for both parties.

A specialist online solution offers exactly that! An online franchise manual in a purpose-built cloud system offers numerous advantages:

• Assign tasks across different access and responsibility levels.
• Actively monitor use of the franchise manual.
• Allow franchisees to submit change proposals.
• Publish and easily update agendas and annual calendars.
• Integrate order forms and other forms within the franchise manual.
• Work on articles collaboratively.
• Set and monitor reading and editing obligations.
• Automatic version control.
• Easily searchable with intuitive search functionality.
• Always at hand, securely, via computer or smartphone.
• Modern portal and interface with your own look & feel.
• Schedule regular reminders to review (parts of) the franchise manual.
• Chat function.
• Assign and monitor tasks.
• And much more.

For these and many other reasons, modern franchise organisations are choosing an online franchise manual.

An online franchise manual with an affordable subscription

With an online franchise manual, everyone is informed of the latest developments at the same moment and the team keeps each other sharp. Factors that are indispensable for your success!

Schedule a demo of the online franchise manual system

Curious what an online franchise manual could mean for your organisation? Schedule a free online demo with one of our franchise consultants.