What’s involved in surveying?

Franchise Business Review’s survey asks franchisees to provide feedback on their satisfaction with the performance of your brand in eight key areas. The survey captures both quantitative and qualitative data, and includes 33 standard questions, which we use to benchmark performance against other franchises. 

You also have the option to include custom questions to dig deeper into specific areas of interest to you.

Franchisees are asked to rank each question on a scale of 1-5, from strongly disagree to strongly agree. Franchisees can also include comments and have the opportunity to include their name or respond anonymously.

How much does the survey cost?

All franchise brands are invited to participate in FBR’s research at no cost. We’ll survey all of your franchisees and provide you with your Franchisee Satisfaction Index, or FSI, score. Using this data, you can benchmark your franchise against the industry standard.

If you score well, you’re eligible to be named to our annual list of Top Franchises. However, in order to get the true value from your survey, you can choose to buy detailed reports and online access to your survey data.

Our online data analytics tool allows you to slice and dice your data so you can gain the business intelligence you need to continually improve your operations and development efforts. 

The cost depends on the number of franchisees in your system. Schedule your free demo to learn more.

How many franchisees are needed for the survey?

In order to qualify for Franchise Business Review’s franchisee satisfaction awards, you need to have at least 10 franchise owners open and operating in the U.S. or Canada. This allows us to make sure you get an accurate reading of your franchisees’ satisfaction with your brand.

If you’re not yet at 10, you are still eligible to survey your current franchisees. In that situation, some brands opt to use a pulse survey—a shorter and more targeted survey of 5-10 questions—rather than our full survey. Either way, surveying your brand early in your growth gives you a baseline score and helps you identify potential issues early on that might hinder your continued growth.

How is the survey administered?

When you’re ready to get started, we ask for your FDD and a complete contact list of all current franchise owners. Once you notify them that the survey is launching, we handle the rest. Our survey is delivered electronically and via text to all franchisees and we track participation, following up with franchisees who don’t respond. Our basic service includes email and text contact only, while the Analytics Plus plan includes a phone follow-up as well.

Are franchisee responses anonymous?

We give franchisees the option to remain anonymous in their responses in order to maximize participation. Many franchisees still disclose their names when responding to the survey.

Do you keep our information private?

FBR’s survey process is completely confidential. None of the information we gather from you or your franchisees will ever be made public without your approval.

However, if your brand scores well in our franchisee satisfaction research, you are eligible to be listed on our website, which highlights the Top Franchises in North America. 

Neither prospective franchise buyers, nor your competitors will ever know you participated if your score isn’t high enough to be published as an award-winning franchise.

How often do brands survey?

In order to keep data fresh and eligible for FBR’s franchisee satisfaction awards, we recommend an annual survey of your entire franchise system, including all 33 of our industry benchmark questions.

With an annual survey, you can identify trends year over year and benchmark your progress, and when you use the data to make improvements in your system, you can actually see where your efforts are making a difference. You’ll be able to tie your strategic initiatives around franchisee satisfaction directly to ROI. For example, if you rolled out a new training program, you’ll be able to see if your investment paid off by looking at how your franchisees rated you in training and support. 

Some brands survey twice a year to keep a closer eye on the progress being made and review strategy mid-year. This second survey can be another benchmarking survey or what we call a pulse survey, a shorter survey with questions focused more on specific strategy and operations points.

It all depends on what you need to measure and how proactive you want to be in catching issues and improving franchisee performance.

Either way, establishing a formal process for gathering feedback on a consistent basis sets the expectation with your franchisees that you’re invested for the long haul, builds a culture of trust, and ensures their continual involvement. Not only that, the data you gather is one of the most powerful tools in your arsenal for improving operations and growing your brand.

Finally, and perhaps most importantly, it shows your franchisees that you value their input, which means your franchisees will be more satisfied, more engaged, and will validate well….all of which means you’ll award more franchises.

How long does it take to get the survey results?

FBR can launch a survey within a few days. All we need is your franchisee contact list and a copy of your FDD. Once we launch the survey, your franchisees will get an email telling them how to complete the survey online or over the phone.

We recommend keeping the survey open for a minimum of two weeks to allow everyone enough time to participate. If participation is low, we can boost it with phone call reminders or by keeping the survey open a little longer. Typically, about 70% of franchisees participate in the survey.

Once the survey is closed, you’ll have access to your standard reports within five business days. And if you can’t wait, you can also have real-time online access to results while the survey is open!

Why should we use FBR instead of doing an internal survey?

At FBR, we believe measuring franchisee satisfaction is critical to improving the operations of any franchise system. Certainly, doing an internal survey is a step in the right direction and puts you ahead of many other franchise systems. 

However, in over 20 years of franchisee satisfaction research, we’ve found that internal surveys have certain limitations and drawbacks.

With a third-party survey like FBR, you’ll typically get a higher response rate, giving you a better representation of your franchisees and more honest feedback. Second, internal surveys won’t give you a frame of reference. 

We’ve worked with more than 1,300 brands to create  the Franchisee Satisfaction Index or FSI. Every franchise company that surveys with FBR receives an FSI score, so you can benchmark your  performance against other franchise brands.

Finally, internal surveys aren’t as meaningful to a potential investor if the data was gathered by you. FBR can help you use your satisfaction data as a franchise development tool, not just an operational tool.  

How does FBR compare to other survey tools?

Franchise Business Review is the gold standard in franchisee satisfaction research. We’ve worked with more than 1,300 brands and surveyed tens of thousands of franchise owners. No other company or platform can offer the benchmarking and data analysis that FBR provides.

When you survey for the first time, we’ll take you through our online analytics  tool and all of the custom reports we’ll put together for your team. It will be clear that using FBR for your franchisee satisfaction survey puts you well ahead of other brands.

You don’t have to take our word for it, though. You can see what some of them have to say here, and you’re welcome to reach out to any of our current clients to get their opinion. We’re happy to provide some contacts at your request. 

Who in our company will benefit from the survey results and who should be involved in the planning process?

Everyone in your system can benefit from the survey. We recommend you get buy-in from key stakeholders before launching the survey—that includes your executive, operations, development, and marketing/PR teams. You can also add custom questions to the survey to dig deeper in any of those areas. 

The real key, however, is making sure you use the survey results to identify areas for improvement and make necessary changes to improve your franchisee satisfaction. Organizations that have all their teams involved in analyzing the data get the most value. More on who FBR helps here.

How can FBR help us interpret and take action on the results?

The first time you survey, we’ll schedule a call to walk your team through the results. We’ll help you identify areas of strength and weakness within your system and offer recommendations on how to address them.

If you choose to purchase your full results, you’ll also get our standard reports and access to our online analytics tool. The tool allows you to filter your data so you can really drill down into different segments of your franchisees. 

If you need help analyzing your data or figuring out how to apply the results to your strategic goals, FBR can provide an executive analysis. The executive analysis will identify opportunities, areas of weakness, and recommendations for immediate, actionable steps to improve franchisee satisfaction and performance.   

How can I use a survey to help my brand grow?

Franchise buyers increasingly care about franchisee satisfaction and there’s nothing more powerful than sharing objective, third-party data on your franchisees’ satisfaction with prospective buyers.

Sharing your franchisee satisfaction survey results with candidates can increase the effectiveness of your validation process, and it reduces the amount of time your busy franchisees spend speaking with candidates.

Plus, when you make FBR’s list of Top Franchises, you gain countless marketing and PR opportunities to promote your brand.

What’s the best way to share survey information with my team and franchisees?

It’s always best to get buy-in from your corporate team and your franchisees before launching your survey. FBR has a number of tools and templates to help you communicate the value of the survey across your system. 

Once you have the survey results, it’s important to get key stakeholders, including executive, operations, development, and marketing/PR teams, on the wrap-up call with FBR to identify and prioritize which challenges you need to tackle. We’ve found that companies that get the entire organization involved reap the most value and are able to tie the success of corporate objectives directly to ROI. 

It’s also important to share the results with your franchise network. When sharing your results with franchisees, point out highs AND lows, and talk about goals and expectations. You can do this at your annual convention, via a web meeting, and if franchisees shared their name, we encourage you to reach out to them directly to thank them and ask for ideas on how to improve. Franchisees are more likely to be engaged if they feel like you’ve heard them and are acting on their feedback.

Are there other ways I can use surveys to gather useful business intelligence?

Franchise Business Review’s research goes well beyond franchisee satisfaction. You can use our survey process to help you identify how your brand is performing with:

• Employee engagement surveys 
• Post-training surveys
• Post-field visit surveys
• Scheduled quarterly check-ins or pulse surveys
• Customer satisfaction surveys at the unit level
• Buyer surveys, administered to new franchisees asking them for feedback about the sales process
• Non-buyer surveys, to find out why a candidate decided against your brand
• Grand opening surveys to assess the store development process, site selection, build out, grand opening marketing, etc.

In short, we can help you measure your performance in almost any area and provide you with data to help you make smart decisions about how you can be even better.

Who participates in the satisfaction survey? 

The survey is completed by current franchise owners across franchise systems. Feedback is collected anonymously (with the option for franchisees to share their name if they choose), ensuring honest and unbiased responses that reflect the true experiences of franchisees.

How are the survey results used? 

The results are analyzed and shared with franchisors to help them make data-driven decisions to improve their systems. Additionally, top-performing brands may receive recognition in Franchise Business Review’s awards and rankings, which highlight their commitment to franchisee satisfaction.