Franchise Spotlight: Business
B2B franchises usually offer low overheads and family-friendly working hours.
Business franchises provide services to other businesses, which number more than 2.3 million in Australia and outsource numerous jobs they lack the resources to perform internally.
Also referred to as business-to-business (B2B) franchises, most, such as marketing, consultancy and accountancy firms, provide professional services.
In such cases, franchisees carry neither inventory nor expensive machinery, which often keeps start-up costs and overheads reasonably low.
Other industries covered by this category include signage, printing and building maintenance franchises.
Whatever their field, B2B franchises almost never trade in the evenings or weekends – good news for aspiring franchisees seeking a favourable work-life balance.
The CV requirements for becoming a franchisee vary by sector. Consultancy franchises, for example, tend to prize expertise in fields like finance, procurement or market research. Recruitment franchisors often seek candidates with direct experience as recruiters, whereas signage and printing franchisors typically accept applications from people from a wide range of backgrounds.
Franchise market analysis
The recruitment sector includes PATH4 Group, which offers a payroll service, invoicing and debtor control, and fully integrated cloud based software, plus Workforce Extensions, which promises clients “decentralised decision making for [a] faster service”.
Business mentoring, coaching and training franchises include ActionCOACH , a specialist in growth, marketing and business development strategies; FocalPoint, inspired by techniques popularized by self-development guru Brian Tracy; and Ology Business Coaching, which uses the ‘DiSC’ model of human behaviour that statistics show are used by 70% of FTSE 500 and Fortune 500 companies.
Expense Reduction Analysts (ERA) is a cost and supplier management consultancy whose franchisees draw on its global network to provide a service bespoke to client needs.
Business broker franchises, which oversee the sale of businesses, include Network Infinity Business Brokers, Finn Business Sales and Transworld business brokers.
Finally, Eazi-Sites, and Eazi-Apps build websites and mobile applications respectively for local businesses.