Inside Claromentis' Franchise Expansion Manager: An Application Tour

Key Takeaways

Franchise networks are struggling to recruit high quality franchisees at speed. Claromentis’s Franchise Expansion Manager resolves this problem. Part of the full Franchise Management Software, this application manages the full franchise development lifecycle, from winning new units to onboarding and supporting them. In this article, we explain what the application is, how it works, and why it supersedes generic franchise CRM tools.

Capture, nurture, onboard and manage franchisees on a single platform

Discover Franchise Expansion Manager

Network expansion is a growing challenge for many franchises, with around a third of all franchisors struggling to recruit new franchisees.

But this is only half of the growth problem. A large portion of those that do succeed in the hiring stages experience quality issues further down the line. Indeed, 30% of large networks and 24% of smaller networks rank franchisee underperformance as their top growth constraint.

In other words, it isn’t enough to find, nurture, and sign any willing lead. To build a successful network, franchisors must pay close attention to candidate qualification, onboarding support, and post-launch development.

This is precisely where our new franchise-exclusive app, the Franchise Expansion Manager, can help.

What is the Claromentis Franchise Expansion Manager?

The Franchise Expansion Manager is an application within the Claromentis Franchise Management Software (FMS).

In a nutshell, it handles the complete franchisee lifecycle, from first enquiries and qualification processes to Discovery Days, onboarding, and continual development. It not only helps you win new units; it helps you turn these units into high-performing, engaged members of your franchise community.

In one hub, you can;

• Automatically and/or manually log leads;
• Progress and qualify them through a custom, automated sales pipeline;
• Engage with candidates inside the system, with secure extranet capabilities, notes, and email notifications;
• Funnel signed candidates into the onboarding stage;
• Provide ongoing self-service support throughout the franchisee’s tenure.

To illustrate how it can slot into your CRM and FranDev efforts, let’s walk through the 7-step process.

Inside the app: The 7-stage franchisee development process

1. Capture leads in a centralized hub

As with any CRM or franchise development application, everything begins with lead capture.

In the Franchise Expansion Manager, you can handle this in two ways — organically or manually.

For automated lead generation, add a public form to your website, franchise portal, and/or paid ad campaigns. There’s no need to worry about bot interference, as the form is protected by hidden CAPTCHA mechanisms.

Alternatively, your franchise development managers and consultants can log candidates directly within the app. Simply click a button, fill in the necessary enquiry details on the configurable form, and add them to the system for further qualification and nurturing.

2. Engage and communicate with candidates

In Claromentis, you have the ability to talk with candidates inside the system via a highly secure extranet.

Working in conjunction with our granular permissions system, the extranet provides candidates with lightweight access to your portal, all without exposing any sensitive information or wider FMS applications.

Here, they can view their progress, communicate with development managers via comment threads, and access authorized documents to help them finalize their decision. It’s worth noting that Claromentis can automatically notify candidates of any “ticket” or communications updates via email. This ensures no communication thread is lost.

To get a better understanding of how this works, take a look at the Claromentis support portal, Discover. It’s a similar premise: a secure extranet with permissions-bound access, only this is intended for customers as opposed to candidates and franchisees.

3. Nurture candidates via a custom sales pipeline

The Franchise Expansion Manager runs on an engine of fully configurable e-forms and automated workflows.

To simplify set-up, we provide you with a template, comprising seven stage-gated sections:

1. New enquiry
2. Qualifying
3. Disclosure issued
4. Discovery Day
5. Agreement
6. Signed
7. Onboarding

(There are also two additional stages, “on hold” and “not proceeding”, to account for any stalled or lost sales.)

Customize each of these stages — or build your own — with relevant fields, text, dynamic logic, and document upload buttons. And build an automated workflow to power the entire development pipeline, with timed service-level agreements (SLAs), ticket assignments, notifications, and triggers.

To improve accountability, accessibility, and efficiency, these processes also include:

• AI overviews. Get an accurate summary of each candidate’s history in just a click. This is especially useful when handing over leads to different locations, managers, or brands.
• Automated audit logs. Accountability is built into the system. The Franchise Expansion Manager automatically documents every change to a form, ticket, or record in a timestamped audit log — no matter how small that change may be. This helps you investigate problem areas and find improvement opportunities.

4. Convert and onboard automatically

Once a candidate progresses through the “signed” stage, the Franchise Expansion Manager updates and reclassifies their record. The user is no longer a candidate, but a franchisee.

As part of this action, the system creates a dedicated onboarding project and Locations dashboard:

• Onboarding project. This is a configurable task checklist, accessible to both franchisees and franchisors. The project runs in an integrated project management application within the Claromentis FMS, but is accessible via the Expansion Manager homepage. Here, you can view a list of all your current onboarding projects, with helpful red, amber, green (RAG) status updates, and click into each to access more specific information.
• Locations dashboard. Our unique Locations application enables you to build data-rich performance dashboards for every unit in your network, containing sales, compliance, operational, internal communications, and location-based insights.

These are fundamental for setting up new units and ensuring the onboarding stage goes without a hitch.

5. Open units and operate

When you’re ready, provide your newly onboarded (or onboarding) franchisees with access to the operational side of Claromentis.

This gives them everything they need to operate consistently and compliantly, including:

• A brand-aligned franchise intranet
• News updates and announcements from headquarters
• Up-to-date operations manuals, SOPs, and policies
• Knowledge base articles and FAQs
• Collaborate franchisee discussion rooms
• 1:1 in-system messaging and in-app comment threads
• Self-service e-learning courses
• Templated operational processes, checklists, and automations
• AI-powered chatbots and document-specific assistants
• Performance dashboards (in Locations)
• Rewards and recognition schemes
• Brand asset libraries
• And more

For a comprehensive overview of our FMS application suite, read our dedicated product pages.

6. Develop your network

Franchisees still maintain permissions-restricted access to the Franchise Expansion Manager, even after the onboarding and launch phases are complete.

At this stage, the application hides any sales-related information and instead provides them with self-service marketing support channels.

Similar to the CRM engine, this functionality operates using a configurable e-form and workflow. Franchisees submit a marketing or support query, detailing their idea, deadline, and funding expectations, and the ticket automatically routes to the appropriate team in headquarters. SLAs, status updates, and ticket assignment keeps everyone accountable, ensuring every request is responded to within a reasonable timeframe.

Thanks to Claromentis’s illimitable customization options, you can also populate the dashboard with marketing messaging documents, social media templates, best practice FAQs, and more. (Anything that your franchisees may find useful!)

With around a third of franchisees struggling with a lack of marketing training, expertise, and support from corporate, this functionality proves invaluable. By simplifying marketing requests, you can help units grow while simultaneously strengthening your relationships and trust.

7. Analyze growth from one dashboard

The Franchise Expansion Manager’s homepage paints a complete picture of your franchise development efforts.

Understand how many candidates are in your pipeline (and at what stage). Monitor expansion via an integrated map module. Check the status of your onboarding franchisees. And keep track the current status of HQ support tickets and marketing requests.

You can personalize this real-time dashboard and its functionality for every user, brand, or region in your network. For instance, North American development managers only see data relating to their locations, and candidates only see information regarding their individual sales journey.

You’re also welcome to add modules, buttons, and widgets using our FMS’s extensive application suite. It may be helpful to pull through a list of relevant knowledge base articles, sales-based discussion forums, and template FDDs and agreements.

How does it differ from a CRM solution?

Don’t mistake the Franchise Expansion Manager for a generic CRM. It’s a purpose-built solution, designed to meet franchisor’s specific multi-location needs.

Here’s what sets our tool apart:

Franchise-specific features

The Franchise Expansion Manager is built to meet the unique needs and challenges of growing franchise networks.

Standout features include:

• Gradual form fills. To avoid overwhelm, the forms are broken out into staggered stages. As a candidate progresses through the pipeline, new fields appear (i.e. the cooling-off date selector surfaces once an FDD is issued).
• AI overviews. Avoid spending hours trawling through candidate form fills, notes, and audit logs. Get a complete overview of candidate-by-candidate progress with convenient AI summaries — perfect for sales catch ups and lead handovers.
• Built-in compliance and cooling-off periods. The application contains stages for FDD (or equivalent) issuance, mandatory cooling-off periods, and agreement capture, as well as accessible audit logs for regulatory purposes.
• Document handling. Upload version-controlled FDDs, proof of funds documents, agreements and more in the same system. In turn, eliminating the possibility of lost or outdated files.
• Real-time dashboards. Get a bird’s eye view of your sales pipelines, onboarding projects, and franchisee development and support initiatives in a real-time dashboard.
• Personalized views and extranets. Using Claromentis’s granular user permissions system, you can personalize dashboard experiences, content visibility, and use cases for every role, location, brand, or visitor. This includes building secure extranets for interested candidates.
• In-system messaging. Message and share documents with candidates inside the Franchise Expansion Manager system. To ensure candidates never miss an update, enable automated (and hyperlinked) email notifications.

Highly customizable interface

Other CRMs — whether franchise-specific or general — force you to adapt to their features, processes, and automations.

In Claromentis, you control the end-to-end process.

We give you the templates to guide you, but all the granular details are completely customizable. Everything from the forms and automated workflows to the dashboard layouts, themes, and content accessibility. Because of our powerful permissions engine, you also have the ability to invite candidates inside the system. This centralizes communications, improves knowledge sharing and rapport, and can help you convert leads faster.

One record, one platform

Unlike other Franchise Management Software vendors, there are no separate entities, data records, or disparate systems to synchronize behind the scenes. We promise a genuine one-click conversion from candidate to franchisee and CRM to FMS.

This is because there’s only one product.

Unlike many generic CRMs, Claromentis combines your franchise sales and operations efforts. Once a lead comes through the threshold, their record remains the same for life. It simply updates as they progress.

How Franchise Expansion Manager benefits fast-growing franchises

In a world where recruiting the right franchisees is becoming increasingly difficult, the Franchise Expansion Manager adds much needed support.

It enables FranDev teams to manage, coordinate, and track both sides of network growth — sales and ongoing development — without having to navigate between disjointed platforms, synchronize user records, or lose critical context in unreliable email threads.

Everything you need to capture, qualify, engage, onboard, and develop franchisees sits in one application, and is backed up by an integrated suite of powerful FMS applications.

The benefits for big and small franchisors are invaluable:

• Centralize franchise development efforts and avoid data silos, miscommunications, and unclear priorities
• Improve accountability within your sales, development, and support teams
• Increase transparency into your recruitment processes and speed-up decision making
• Automate onboarding and launch procedures with a single click
• Simplify handovers between development managers or consultants with helpful AI summaries and full record trails
• Enforce compliance with built-in FDD and UK prospectus stages, cooling-off periods, and automated audit trails
• Enhance engagement across your candidate pool and established units with in-system communications, notifications, and self-service support
• Provide greater marketing assistance to existing franchisees — a third of which struggle with lack of training, expertise, and localized support from corporate

To find out more about the Franchise Expansion Manager and the complete Claromentis FMS solution, book a quick discussion call with one of our franchise experts. We’ll listen to your requirements, walk you through the software, and reveal how we’ve helped networks such as Winkworth, Leak Detective, and Pharmasave streamline their operations and grow their networks.

Reach your
full potential

Achieve growth without compromise.
Scale your franchise network.

Book a Demo

Get started