Paul Flick is the CEO of Premium Service Brands, a leader in home services franchise opportunities.
From facial recognition tools and navigation apps to customer service and supply chain management, artificial intelligence (AI) is a driving force in the business world. While technological advancements march forward, the franchise industry can embrace AI to gain a competitive advantage and stay relevant as it charts a course for the future.
AI refers to the ability of computers to perform tasks and problem-solving that typically require human intelligence. The term artificial intelligence first debuted at Dartmouth College in 1956 when a group of experts convened to discuss a variety of topics, including machine learning.
The debut of free platforms such as Chat GPT by OpenAI and Bing Chat by Microsoft has made AI accessible to the masses, and it already plays a major role in our daily lives. AI powers social media, facilitates home automation, helps improve medical outcomes, prevents fraud and much more.
How AI Is Reshaping Franchising
Competition in franchising is intense. With thousands of franchise brands across numerous industries, generating franchise leads can be challenging. At the same time, a tight labor market poses a problem for existing franchise owners as they struggle to recruit reliable talent to help keep pace with customer demand.
AI has many applications the franchise industry can implement to solve these problems.
• Franchise development: AI technology can help determine the overarching characteristics of your successful franchisees, which allows you to improve your recruitment strategy to boost conversion rates.
• Chatbots: Franchises can use chatbots on their websites and social media to support and engage customers. Chatbots save time and money by answering simple questions without adding additional staff.
• Personalized marketing: By analyzing customer data, AI gives marketing efforts a personal touch. It also allows franchisees to tailor campaigns to various demographics to expand their reach and increase conversions. AI content generation can also save time and enhance creative efforts.
• Training: AI can enhance recruitment and streamline training by offering virtual tutorials and AI-simulated solutions.
AI Best Practices
Implementing an AI initiative can improve efficiency, increase innovation and reduce costs, but it requires careful planning to see an impact. Company leaders need to exercise caution and be mindful of the risks. AI has numerous uses, but I’ve determined that a slow and steady approach is best.
To successfully add AI, focus on one area of your business at a time. For example, as a home services franchisor, training is one of the key aspects of our business. Our training platform needs to allow our franchisees to flourish. As a result, we focused on how AI could propel our training efforts forward.
We do not require our franchisees to have experience in home services to launch a business. They just need leadership and business skills to be effective. As a result, many of our new franchisees need to hone their sales skills and techniques as they get started. We rely on role-playing sessions during their initial training at our headquarters to enable them to get up to speed.
We turned to AI to help them further sharpen their skills once the initial training ended. Franchisees can put on a VR headset and participate in a virtual sales call with an artificial human. We also use AI training tools to help our franchisees train new employees and translate our training materials. Our virtual training gives participants a self-guided, 360-degree experience.
Here are some best practices I learned when we began incorporating AI into our business model.
1. Understand your objectives.
Before starting an AI initiative, understand the goals and objectives you want to achieve with the new technology. To determine our objectives, we implemented a task force composed of members from various departments to evaluate a path forward. We identified areas of our business that could benefit from automation and increased productivity.
We knew that having a solid training program improves the success of our franchisees, increasing our number of franchise prospects. As a result, we decided to start our AI journey by improving our training programs. Using AI for training had the potential to save our corporate team time, streamline training and provide flexibility for our franchisees.
2. Choose the right partner.
When evaluating an AI vendor, make sure their solutions will meet your needs and integrate with your current systems. As with any business endeavor, you need guidance and advice. Tapping the resources of a firm that understands your objectives and has experience will help you achieve results.
When you’re searching for the right partner, make sure you choose a vendor with a good reputation in your industry, and pay close attention to testimonials from its customers. And request product demonstrations to gain further insight.
3. Test new solutions.
Take your time and start small. Be sure to pilot-test any solution before launching it across your system. Get feedback to ensure it is user-friendly and effective. Vendors offer demos and trial periods to evaluate if the solution will be an asset to your business.
For example, we did a beta test of our AI training tools at a small number of franchises to iron out the kinks before we started offering it across our system. To measure the success of our AI training solution, we surveyed franchisees who participated in our virtual role-playing solution. After doing two virtual sessions, sales call confidence levels jumped between 35% to 50%.
4. Be adaptable.
AI technology is evolving. Stay abreast of AI advancements to remain on the cutting edge. After implementing a new program, plan to periodically review the solution. I also recommend choosing a vendor that regularly upgrades its products to incorporate technological advancements.
AI will never replace the human touch, but it has made significant advancements in recent years and will play a prominent role in reshaping our future. Staying on top of the latest AI developments will help generate franchise leads and supercharge your franchise.
Forbes Business Council is the foremost growth and networking organization for business owners and leaders. Do I qualify?
Read the full article here
