The Changing Realities of Phone Calls to Potential Franchisees

A couple of interesting things –

• It’s amazing to think that there was so much uncertainty about the merits of caller ID! In the modern telephone world, basically 100% of phones have the technology. Just 24 years ago, it “it is also clear that caller ID does not offer quite as much as telephone companies seem to imply.”
• The percentage of Americans who still remember the days without caller ID is dwindling quickly. Let’s assume that if you were 35 or younger when caller ID started becoming popular, then your use of it is ubiquitous. (That means that anyone under the age of 60 uses it fairly religiously.) By this math, 85% of Americans use the technology. If you limit this to simply the target franchise market, we’ll say age 25+, then you come up with 78% of the addressable market.

So what is it about caller ID? Why does this matter?

Well, something very interesting happens when you can see the number / name of every person that calls you. You start to get WAY MORE SELECTIVE about which calls you answer and which ones you don’t.

So I’ll ask one more time, when your cell phone rings and you don’t know the number, how often do you pick up the call?

And there may be no industry more sensitive to changes in users phone behaviors than us here in lead generation. As a business who provides phone numbers for potential leads, if no one answers the phone, then it’s a poor reflection on us.

(Before I get into the horrors of phone answer rates, remember that we’ve mostly solved this issue by relying more on text messages. However, given that the majority of franchisors focus on calls in lieu of texts for franchise sales, it’s important to focus on how our phone strategy as it relates to you.)

Let me give you an idea for how this plays out here at FranchiseHelp.

When you submit a lead on FranchiseHelp and choose to be verified by call (a choice only made by 10% of our users), we use an automated phone system to call you from (336) 939-8975. All that happens when we place that call is to ask people to press 1 to confirm their request.

Given that caller ID is on basically 100% of phones, that number pops up as calling our potential leads. This happens immediately after submitting the lead (the easiest time to get a hold of these people).

Any guess what percentage of these leads answer the phone?

13%.

That’s right. 87% of people who consent to being called immediately after submitting a lead don’t answer and press 1.

Phone calls are a tough ball game.

So what does this all mean for you?

Right now, not much. This is not a five alarm fire.

But something is smoking. And it’s getting worse.

The desire of Americans to pick up the phone and speak to people they don’t know is becoming extinct. And as this trend becomes stronger, we’re working to roll out new products that better accommodate the changing preferences of potential franchisees.

And our first foray into this world is by developing a new class of leads focused on email exclusively rather than both emails and phone numbers. The fact of the matter is that there are thousands of qualified franchisees who don’t want to give out their phone number on the internet.

And we certainly know that an interested franchisee that gives a phone number is more valuable to you than someone who prefers contact only via email. But we fundamentally believe that the franchises able to adjust their sales process to handle these types of leads will completely outclass their competitors.

If you currently work with us, click here to schedule some time to speak about the new product. If you’re not currently working with us but want to hear about how our lead generation strategies may work for you, check out this page.