Are You an Ideal Franchisee? Here's How to Find Out.

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Both Elon Musk and Guillermo Perales are wildly successful business owners. But their business styles couldn’t be more different. Musk is a maverick, looking to change and innovate. Perales, whose Sun Holdings owns more than 1,200 franchise restaurants, excels at replicating the same pattern of success. Before you consider becoming a franchisee, you must know if you’re a Musk or a Perales.

What is your business personality?

Both types are entrepreneurial spirits who want something more than the typical nine-to-five job. They are both hungry and crave success, but one likes following rules and one likes making the rules.

The wealthiest franchisees like Perales are lever pullers. They enjoy and rejoice in pulling the same lever and making money. They know if they follow the systems the franchisor has in place they will get the same successful results. They aren’t looking to create a better mousetrap. And their ego doesn’t believe that they have a better way. On the flip side, an entrepreneur itching to create something new, and always believing they have a better way, will do better starting their own business and not joining a franchise.

Entrepreneurs come in many different flavors. They share common traits like curiosity and creativity, and they take responsibility. Additionally, successful franchisees are collaborative, confident, resilient, detail-oriented and hardworking. While any personality type could be an entrepreneur, the most common Myers-Briggs Personality types that thrive as entrepreneurs are ENTP, ESTJ, ENTJ, INTJ and ISTJs.

Knowing your personality type can help you determine if you would enjoy starting your own business or becoming part of a franchise. Additionally, your personality can also help narrow down the type of franchise business best suited to you. For example, according to SCORE, introverts thrive in an inbound retail concept like a QSR restaurant, whereas extroverts might enjoy an outbound retail franchise like a fitness center.

The formula for franchisee success

Being successful in franchising is quite simple. You follow the systems and processes that the franchisor created and that are proven to achieve results. If you look at the top franchisees in the world, 99.9 percent have done just that. They haven’t tried to reinvent the wheel. They used a proven roadmap and coupled with strong business acumen, achieved financial success.

You can easily see the proof in the pudding when you see a successful franchisee purchase an unsuccessful store from another franchisee who didn’t follow the systems. When the new owner replicates the same systems and processes followed in their other stores and brings the store up to those specs, the store turns around.

Franchising hinges on every franchisee following the same systems. Think about it. When a customer goes to McDonald’s for a Big Mac, they are confident that the Big Mac tastes the same in New York as it does in New Mexico. If you have a rogue franchisee that is trying to make a better Big Mac, it undermines the brand and the success of other franchisees. As a franchisee, you have a responsibility to your franchisee counterparts and the equity of the brand to follow the rules.

Franchises work because of the systems and processes in place. These ensure a consistent product for consumers and consistent rates of return for owners. Private equity investors are increasingly investing in franchisors and franchisees because they like the predictability inherent in the business model. They know they can deploy a lot of money into franchising with consistent results.

Finding the right franchisor

To be successful in following a franchisor’s systems, you must first find the right franchisor to get into business with. Once you determine the industry you’re most passionate about, the trick is to find a newer franchise brand that already has processes in place.

Mature brands like McDonald’s and Subway definitely have strong systems. But they don’t offer new franchisees other necessary ingredients for financial success, like prime territories, low start-up costs and the opportunity to ride a growth wave. For anyone getting into franchising now, the key is to find an emerging brand with good bones.

Many new brands are coming to market each year. You either need strong research skills or the help of an experienced franchise consultant to help you evaluate specific emerging brands. For example, my company works exclusively with emerging brands and, even though the concepts are new, we’re confident in their systems. Rise, Brooklyn Dumpling Shop and Taffer’s Tavern all rely on technology to improve the way their restaurants run. JARS, Duff’s CakeMix and Curry Up Now have processes in place that eliminate the need for skilled chefs and in some cases, the need for traditional, expensive restaurant kitchens.

Get wealthy today

If you’re the type of person who likes to follow proven systems and processes and have a roadmap for success and financial independence, there isn’t a better path than franchising. It offers the right personality the opportunity to be their own boss instead of an employee. But, with the security of knowing that if you simply pull the same lever other franchisees have, you too have the key to franchise wealth.

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