Franchise CRM solutions

Franchise CRM solutions are available for most sectors we understand the needs of the Franchisee and Franchisor.

This solution was developed after the Franchisor found themselves in charge of results not activity, as such they were unable to play an active role in driving the growth of any failing franchise. Centralised Campaigns to generate new business were impossible to manage, central reporting on pipeline was equally impossible.

Regional managers had no visibility of Franchisee pipelines which left the Directors virtually blind.

The Client £10+ million turnover dealing with insurance companies, loss assessors and claims adjusters; there was a need to catch-up with the rest of the claims handling sector.

Identify any barriers to change
The Client had tried a few times to impose standards within the franchise network without significant take up, some used Goldmine, some used ACT! Generally there was a lack of IT skills within the Franchisee network and most delegated data entry to untrained staff viewing CRM as an administrative function.

Franchisor IT skills were good but a lack of budget meant corners were cut and suppliers were often asked to work for free or at a heavy discount as a result “project creep” was a daily issue. Being responsible for a project without commitment from the board and a limited budget was always going to be a challenge.

Create and implement a plan for change
All data was collated and tagged by the Franchise ID as this would be used to govern who was allowed access to the data later on.

The permissions module controls access at record level and then at field level can can alter depending on who is looking at the record relevant to the stage of the record within the business. Our security remains extremely robust and flexible.

Define the Database
The layouts and templates were agreed and implemented with consideration for device and team differences, corporate branding deployed with branch details being pulled into all templates.

Some Franchisees preferred certain vertical markets whilst others worked in partnership with local authorities and surveyors as such the screen layouts where many and varied depending upon a variety of preferences.

We host the CRM and Marketing elements of the database until a prospect becomes a live deal. We established a VPN using SSL – SHA1 to ensure data was able to pass securely from our facilities directly into the head office Claims handling system. Some franchisees wanted their own office copy of Sage 50 Accounts integrated with the central system which was simple to achieve.

Setup Access Permissions
Permissions were the same for most branches except where a Franchisee had more than one Franchise (Branch or region) Regional Managers were generally allowed by Franchisees to see but not edit the data of a Franchisee although in some branches they would allow editing of specific fields by their regional manager.

Access to some records would change based upon the type of record, Flood, Fire, Commercial, residential etc. This was achieved using various techniques that checked to see if certain conditions were “True” before presenting the layout or granting levels of access.

Handover and Training
Initial setup took 4 weeks, training was given in remote sessions as requested over a week with branches logging in at agreed times. Full control was offered to the Client within 4 months. We established the VPN and completed all work asked of us within budget and schedule.

For any system to remain in use it needs leadership and clearly defined benefits to be understood and for “Champions” at al levels to be encouraged to offer feedback that is listened to and acted upon.

Billing
Because WiredContact is database agnostic we are able to integrate with a wide variety of external database systems including popular billing platforms. Some Clients have developed the entire billing and stock control system within WiredContact.