How Supporting Strategies Utilizes the Franchise Navigator to Recruit Top Quality Candidates

When Steve Schultz joined Supporting Strategies as the brand’s vice president of franchise development, its corporate team was new to the franchising industry. After forming in 2004 and launching a business ownership opportunity in 2013, Supporting Strategies’ system was still in the process of getting its development efforts off the ground. So in order to ramp up its process and bring in more qualified candidates, Schultz turned to Franchise Central’s proven Franchise Navigator behavioral mapping system.

For the past 20+ years the Franchise Navigator has integrated behavioral sciences the franchising (arena space). As the only scientific, proven and market-validated franchise recruitment, coaching and support process the Navigator is designed to make the franchisee selection process more efficient—and ultimately more profitable—for brands.

During the initial Navigator step, when a brand’s existing franchisees take the Navigator survey, Franchise Central is able to determine specific, unique key performance attributes. Those attributes are then used to segment and identify a system’s top, middle and low performing franchisees, which then steer brands in the right direction when selecting new candidates to offer agreements to.

In Supporting Strategies’ case, Schultz reached out to Franchise Central’s founder and president, Craig Slavin, to ensure that the brand was only growing with candidates who had the potential to be top performers. That’s why Shultz decided to have prospective franchisees take the Navigator survey at the beginning of their development process.

Franchise recruitment process

“I built the Franchise Navigator right into my discovery model. It’s one of the first things that we have candidates do when they inquire about opening up their own Supporting Strategies franchise. That way, I know right off the bat if the prospective owners in my pipeline are a good fit for our brand,” said Schultz.

“When franchisees join our system, I always tell them that I’m asking them to do a tough job. Running your own business takes hard work. But after our franchisees take the Navigator survey and I’m able to figure out where their personal strengths align with ours, I’m confident that they’ll be able to do the job well.”

Supporting Strategies is far from the only brand that Franchise Central’s Navigator tool has helped. With an ever-expanding list of high profile clients that includes Which Wich, Sears Hometown Stores, REGIS/Supercuts and ARCPoint Labs, the Franchise Navigator has been matching brands with their ideal profiles and candidates for nearly 20 years. Its system is based in behavioral sciences, which Slavin says is key for franchise brands that are looking for long-term success.

Behavioral science impact

“Behavioral science impacts everything that we do in in our lives and business. Once your brand has the ability to understand how people act, think and behave, it becomes easier to attract franchisees that are the best fit for your system. That’s why the Franchise Navigator is such a game changer,” said Slavin.

“There isn’t another test, survey or tool out there that can achieve the kinds of results that we’re seeing on a daily basis with the Navigator. By utilizing Navigator and making it an integral part of your development strategy, you have the ability to boost revenues and even speed up the time it takes for franchisees to break even on their investment.”

That high rate of success is evident to the Supporting Systems team. To date, the brand has sold and opened more than 60 franchises. And by continuing to use the Navigator when identifying which franchisees to take through the entire discovery and application process, the brand is planning to fuel its development with only the best possible candidates for its individual system.

“Using the Franchise Navigator has absolutely changed Supporting Strategies’ franchise development process. Not only is the entire Franchise Central team accessible and knowledgeable, the Navigator results tells me which franchise candidates to pursue and which ones aren’t the best fit for our system. The Navigator is perfectly tailored to our unique brand,” said Schultz. “In order to be successful in franchising, it’s critical for brands to grow the right way. By using the Navigator, we’re actively taking the right steps to ensure our system is set up for continued success as we expand.”

Cassie has over five years of digital and traditional media experience. She joined NLA after working as a television news producer in both Milwaukee and Chicago, and now specializes in aligning strategies across the board for her clients, ultimately building buzz and telling compelling stories through content marketing, social media, digital campaigns and traditional PR. Cassie has a Bachelor of Arts in Broadcast and Electronic Communications from Marquette University.

In her spare time, Cassie enjoys traveling and exploring what new cities have to offer in addition to spending time with her friends and family.