Full Agenda

WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 22
Power Sessions (additional fee applies)

All Power Sessions are sponsored by Michael H. Seid & Associates

9:00 AM – 4:00 PM

FRANCHISE CEO SUMMIT – THE RACE TO STAY RELEVANT

Boost your Franchise Leadership & Development Conference experience with this intensive and exclusive pre-conference workshop for franchise CEOs and presidents.

Come to the conference a day early for a very important workshop taking place the day before this year's Franchise Leadership & Development Conference in Atlanta. The 3rd annual Franchise CEO Summit provides a very private, high-level, and interactive environment for franchise CEOs to have strategic business conversations that typically wouldn't, or simply couldn't, take place anywhere else.

The Franchise CEO Summit is designed to help you achieve your goal of building a truly great company. This program provides the environment to solve tough issues, exchange ideas, develop best practices, and discover how to respond to make-or-break decisions. Attending Franchise CEOs and Presidents gain a competitive edge by discussing critical issues with peers who are on the same firing line.

The Race to Stay Relevant is the theme of this year's summit. A new breed of CEOs that are also franchisees (or were franchisees) will share how their franchisee experiences significantly impact their leadership styles, company culture and growth strategies.....and how that experience is helping them keep their franchise organizations relevant. 

Gain insight from these high-performing and experienced CEOs and Presidents:

• Gordon Logan, Founder / CEO, Sport Clips Haircuts
• Ken Hutcheson, President, U.S. Lawns
• John Metz, Chair / CEO, Hurricane AMT

Through facilitated roundtables of attendee chosen topics, attendees will engage in high-powered discussions focusing on the strategic big picture and aspects of the leadership role often lost in today's fire-fighting atmosphere of most growth companies. Our focus on a customized agenda enables CEOs and Presidents to address real-time, bottom-line issues so the payback is measurable.

This is the perfect forum for sharing intellectual capital and ideas in the face of today's economic challenges. (Attendees will be engaged with non-competing brands.)

Program Leaders:
Therese Thilgen, President / Chief Content Officer, Franchise Update Media Group
Keith Gerson, President & COO, Sopra Brands

9:00 AM – 12:00 PM

CONCURRENT POWER SESSIONS (ADDITIONAL FEES APPLY)

All Power Sessions are sponsored by Michael H. Seid & Associates

Mastering Franchise Sales

For emerging and experienced development and sales professionals, and a must for new franchise organizations.  Are you seeking an accelerated course for closing qualified candidates? How do franchisors sell their first franchises? How can more established franchisors looking to revitalize their recruitment make it happen? How do you deal with hesitant buyers in today's market? Do you want to avoid costly selling mistakes that scare buyers away?

This interactive session addresses the basic "how to's" of constructing a franchise development program.  The workshop embraces the fundamentals of franchise recruitment necessary for any growing franchise system -- from new sales to resales.

Our session leaders will share the keys to building successful franchise growth. Franchise recruitment is a counter-intuitive selling process, and adapting to this reality is essential.   Discover the success keys for the initial prospect contact and pre-qualification, program review, franchisee validation, FDD presentation, Discovery Day event, and granting of your franchise. Learn powerful relationship-building techniques and utilize closing methods that begin with your first conversation.

Program Leaders: Joe Mathews, Founding Partner, Franchise Performance Group
Art Coley, Vice President Global Development, AlphaGraphics Inc.

How to Create a Compelling Response-Driven Website

Your recruitment website is the most important marketing tool ever developed in franchising. All roads lead to your site, and it must be number one or two in your competitive category or you will lose prospects to other concepts. How well you design, build and script your recruitment website will determine the performance of your online lead generation. You may excel in driving visitors to your website, but if you can't convince them to respond, you'll lose the prospecting game to your competitors.

This workshop explores how communication, design and direct response techniques help franchisors generate more visitors into qualified candidates. You'll learn how content, navigation and monitoring site performance can impact your recruiting success.

Discover what rates the average and top-producing sites are experiencing with their conversions of site visitors to leads; and the conversions of visitors who view your request forms that actually submit them. This is a “must attend” for development executives seeking real answers to improve their website recruitment!  

Program Leader: Brian Spindel, President / COO, PostNet International Corporation
Panel: 
Rob Goggins, Vice President of Franchise Development, Great Clips
David Schaefers, Vice President of Business Development, Driven Brands / Meineke
Martin Greenbaum, CFE, President, Greenbaum Marketing Communications

 

1:00 PM – 4:00 PM

CONCURRENT POWER SESSIONS (ADDITIONAL FEES APPLY)

All Power Sessions are sponsored by Michael H. Seid & Associates 

Achieving High-Performance Sales Management

Senior Executives and Sales Managers only. In an uncertain economy, sales organizations may be tempted to tighten up spending, reduce training costs and implement a hiring freeze. How do you maintain sales success regardless of economic conditions? How do franchise organizations and individuals develop comprehensive deal strategies to conquer today's complex sales environment? This dynamic workshop tackles these key challenges that must be overcome to achieve successful development. Discussions will focus on the nuts and bolts of engineering a winning recruitment process that ensures a higher level of professionalism, facilitates effective sales management, and dramatically increases the odds of capturing the right franchisees. Learn how top performing sales teams are applying new concepts and tools to close performance gaps in their companies. Workshop leaders will address how to identify and manage, in real-time, the variables that directly impact the development process. This includes employing technology intelligence to help identify, monitor and correct performance challenges in your sales and marketing efforts, and establishing milestones and metrics to guide you and your team in achieving your development goals.

Program Leader: Marc Kiekenapp, Principal, Kiekenapp & Associates
Panel: 
Mike Hawkins, Vice President of Franchise Development, The Dwyer Group
John Wuycheck, Vice President of Franchise Development, Seattle's Best Coffee
Steve Dunn, Vice President of Franchise Development, Denny's

Interactive Legal Program: The Law, Business Strategies and Franchise Sales

Some of the most respected legal and business professionals in franchising will challenge you to look at your franchise system in ways you may not have considered!  This is your opportunity to get legal answers and insights to top issues that impact your franchise development efforts: 

• Franchise Marketing and other Promotional Claims - Where are the edges of the envelope?
• Brokers – What to look for in a broker agreement?  Ensuring your interests are in alignment with those of your brokers? 
• Territorial rights - What are the trends and what are your options?
• Encroachment and Impact Polices – Should you consider them and do they work?
• Franchisees are not all the same – Should you consider having differing rights, obligations and fees for different classes of franchisees?
• Financial Performance Representation – Why they may be essential and why you may still want to avoid them.
• Costs and other non-FDD information – What you can say that is not in the FDD.
• Discovery Day – Are there risks and opportunities you may not have considered?
• E-Disclosure – It’s legal and it’s cheap.  But, is it a good idea?
• Controlling quality, brand performance and price – Are there limits to the rights you should retain?
• Validation – How can or should you deal with franchisees that bad-mouth your system and your performance?
• Helping your franchisees to retire – What can you do to help franchisees exit your franchise system?

Program Leader: Michael Seid, Managing Partner, Michael H. Seid & Associates
Panel: 
Brian Schnell, Partner, Faegre & Benson
Peter Dosik, Vice President and Deputy General Counsel, Church's Chicken
Shelley Spandorf, Partner, Davis Wright Tremaine LLP
Kimberly Ellis, Senior Consultant, Michael H. Seid & Associates

 

5:30-8:00pm            Opening Reception in Sponsor Networking Area

Sponsored by Siegel Financial Group

 

THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 23

8:00-9:00am            Breakfast in Sponsor Networking Area

9:00-9:30am            Opening Introduction

9:30-9:50am            Where Are We Now? Economic Trends Impacting Franchise Growth
Program Leader: Darrell Johnson, President & CEO, FRANdata

9:50-10:45am          Leadership Keynote Address – Jason Jennings: Hit the Ground Running

Jason Jennings - Authority on Business Leadership and Productivity

Jason Jennings' keynote is based on the most important findings from the research for his latest book, Hit the Ground Running: A Manual for New Leaders. Filled with rich stories, vivid examples, and anecdotes that make the powerful information come alive, he will present the discoveries that allow companies and their leaders and workers to achieve results fast.

USA Today called Jason Jennings one of the top three business speakers in the nation alongside Jim Collins (Good to Great) and Tom Peters (In Search of Excellence). Jason Jennings started his career as a broadcast journalist and quickly became the nation's youngest radio station group owner and the founder of Jennings-McGlothlin & Company, the nation's largest media consulting firm. His unique and legendary programming, sales and management strategies are credited with revolutionizing many parts of the broadcasting industry, and hundreds of thousands of companies around the world use his audio and video programs on sales, customer satisfaction and leadership.

Jason Jennings is the author of three books, It's Not the Big That Eat the Small - It's the Fast That Eat the Slow, Less Is More, and Think BIG - Act Small. His next book, Hit the Ground Running: How Great NewLeaders Drive Extraordinary Growth reveals the steps taken by the world's best-performing CEOs when they take over a company.

10:45-11:00am            Break

11:00-11:30am            Recruitment Planning and Forecasting Intelligence: 13th Annual Lead Generation and Sales Survey

The Gold Standard survey for franchise development! Get the latest industry intelligence on sales and marketing costs, budgets, top sales sources, alternate online producers, close ratios, cost per lead, cost per sale, application and discovery day closing ratios, results by industry categories, unit investment, system sales, and closing and much more. 

What are franchisors exceeding their sales goals doing differently than those below their goals?  Is your online spending paying off? Are your brokers delivering--and at an acceptable cost?  How does your sales budget compare? Are your closing ratios in line?  Is social media selling franchises?

2010 Mystery Shopping Scorecard – How Do You Rate with Your Website Performance and Sales Follow Up? (Award Winners Honored at Closing Banquet)                    

Discover what franchisors today are doing well and not so well in the tight race for franchise candidates.  Each year our mystery shoppers contact participating franchisors attending this conference to rank their website development and follow-up performance to qualified inquiries. They review their sites to evaluate key performance drivers including their search engine optimization; how easy they are to navigate;  how compelling, organized and informative the content is; and how effective the design, multi-media and direct response elements are for driving more qualified inquiries. Our shoppers then contact franchisors through the internet and by phone to evaluate their follow-up.  Find out how this year’s franchise group stacks up against prior years during this engaging presentation.  (Participating franchisors can request their confidential scorecards to review their performance ratings.)    

Programs Leader: Steve Olson, Publisher & Chief Development Officer, Franchise Update Media Group   

 

11:30am-12:30pm

CONCURRENT SESSIONS

Sales Track – How to Better Qualify and Close More Franchise Deals

This dynamic breakout session is for franchise executives seeking answers for increasing sales in a challenged recruiting environment. How do you adapt your sales presentations to be more successful with today’s cautious buyers? Are you offering incentives to fuel growth with new and current franchisees working? What about franchise brokers, or   outsourcing your development to franchise companies? Are you promoting your resale opportunities?  Panelists will also address, candidate profiling and selection; presenting the FDD and Financial Performance Representations; franchisee validation calls; and how to set expectations, get commitments and close qualified candidates through an engaging Discovery Day.   

Program Leader: Steve Greenbaum, CEO / Director, PostNet International Corporation
Panel: 
Art Coley, Vice President - Global Development, AlphaGraphics Inc.
Diane Phibbs, Marketing and Sales Consultant

Online Track –  Key Success Drivers for Developing a Top Performing  Recruitment Website

Session Sponsored by mUrgent

Your recruitment website is the most important marketing tool ever developed in franchising. All roads lead to your site, and it must be number one or two in your competitive category or you will lose prospects to other concepts. How well you design, build and script your recruitment website will determine the performance of your online lead generation. You may excel in driving visitors to your website, but if you can't convince them to respond, you'll lose the prospecting game to your competitors. This workshop explores how you can increase prospect leads and reduce site abandonment and by testing and tracking page content, navigation, layout, video and other response elements essential to your website success.    

Program Leader: Geoff Hill, Vice President, Roark Capital Group
Panel: Linda Shaub, Vice President - Marketing, Interim HealthCare
David Schaefers, Vice President of Business Development, Driven Brands / Meineke
Boris Bugarski, CEO / President, mUrgent

Lead Generation Track – Presenting a Most Compelling Opportunity through Your Marketing and Sales Channels

How attractive is your franchise opportunity now? In what ways do you stand out among competitive opportunities? “Tired brand,” “dated concept” or “no legs” are scary labels causing companies to shutter. Give prospects a reason to respond to your message. Showcase your "wow" factors, those outstanding four to five advantages that will excite prospects and catapult you into their top picks for investigation: Does your program still deliver what it takes in this environment, or should you consider changes that can increase buyer interest? How do you approach these challenges? This strategic planning session includes: How to respond to today’s buying market, develop a winning lead generation program, and   successfully communicate, market and sell your franchise opportunity. 

Program Leader: Steve Olson, Publisher, Franchise Update Media Group
Panel: 
Grant Kreutzer, Franchise Recruiting Director, Jack in the Box
Mark Mele, Vice President of Franchise Sales, RetroFitness LLC
Martha Flynn, Director - Franchise & Development Services, Dunkin' Brands

Development Track – Boosting Performance through Sales Process Automation and Metrics

 “You can’t improve what you don’t measure!”   Despite today’s emphasis on improving performance, 43 percent of polled franchisors in 2009 couldn’t provide their cost-per franchise sale.  This certainly doesn’t have to be, as technology intelligence for tracking and improving franchise recruitment results is greater-than-ever.  What metrics really matter?  Learn more about the tools and systems necessary to effectively manage recruiting costs, the sales process, lead generation, candidates and sales team. What type of contact management system should you use? How do you manage sales conversion percentages, identify training needs and establish benchmarks?  What sales process is most effective?  This session of experts share their experiences in conquering these challenges.  

Program Leader: Rob Goggins, Vice President of Franchise Development, Great Clips
Panel: 
Greg Longe, Co-Founder / Managing Partner, AFS Group of Companies
Sean Fitzgerald, National Vice President of Franchise Development, Wireless Zone
Jenny Langfeld, Franchise Development Support Manager, AlphaGraphics Inc.

12:30-2:00pm          Lunch in Sponsor Networking Area     

2:00-3:15pm            All Star Role Play Competition: Pre-Qualification, Validation, Selling Discovery Day, Closing the Deal

You can’t miss this most memorable on-stage performance!

 

3:15-4:15pm            CONCURRENT SESSIONS

Sales Track –  Mastering the Psychology of Franchise Buyers: Rising From Good to Great Selling

Understanding prospect behavior, apprehensions, needs, expectations, dreams, and personality styles can catapult selling success to the next level—empowering you with stronger relationships and more franchise deals.

This session addresses “engaging skill-sets” that include adapting to buyer motivations and behaviors;  taking control of the process through leadership; setting expectations; qualifying and pre-closing candidates during each step; selling the  opportunity and ownership benefits of your franchise,   not just what your business does; adjusting to the different personality styles; employing winning "power probes" that reveal what candidates really think; taking cues from their actions not from what they say, preparing candidates for  validation calls; avoiding “TMI” too much information presented too soon;  overcoming buyer’s fears, tears and hesitancy to commit at closing time.

Program Leader: Jim Squire, Director of Franchise Development, Honeybaked Ham
Panel: 
Keith Gerson, President / COO, Sopra Brands
Theresa Huszka, Director of Franchise Sales Development, TSS Photography
Paul Mangiamele, President / CEO, Salsarita's Fresh Cantina

Online Track – Online Lead Generation 2011: What’s Next With SEO,  Content Delivery, Ad Portals, Social Media and More

Understanding the competitive and dynamic  world of lead generation. Qualified prospects are everything. This workshop examines the "how to's" of successful online lead generation. Understanding this competitive and dynamic  world is the key to your success: evaluating and choosing the right franchise advertising sites; the power of videos, testing ad banners and marketing copy to generate higher responses.  With today's online invasion of marketing options which includes well over 100 franchise advertising portals, franchisors must employ marketing intelligence that effectively guides them through the internet jungle of prospecting for buyers. It doesn't matter how impressive, informative and compelling your website is, unless the buyers you desire know how to find you. Learn what you must do to own your own Internet space including effective website SEO and the role of social media as a part of your development plan.

Program Leader: Gary Gardner, CEO, Franchise Update Media Group
         

Lead Generation Track – Target Marketing for Greater Franchise Sales and Area Penetration 

This interactive workshop is ideal for young franchisors, area developers and mature franchisors targeting unsold territories requiring local marketing efforts.  Do cutting franchise fees in open areas produce qualified buyers or is it a misguided approach?  Session leaders will discuss initial market profiling and analysis, commitments, timelines and development strategies necessary for building out specific markets – whether through the employment of corporate-based reps, regional sales reps; or area development franchisees.  This workshop also addresses prospect generation through local online campaigns, PR, newspaper and direct mail, referral networking, sponsorships, brokers, real estate relationships, seminars, and other grass roots efforts effective for establishing franchises in targeted territories.  

Program Leader: Ray Titus, President / Founder, United Franchise Group
Panel: 
Reggie Wright, Director of Franchising, Dunkin' Brands
Lynette McKee, Chief Development Officer, Checkers Drive-in Restaurants, Inc.
 

Development Track – How Do Successful  Multi-Unit Franchisees Find, Investigate and Buy Additional Brands?

52% of today's franchise units are now operated by multi-unit franchisees, and experienced multi-unit/multi-brand operators continue expanding in spite of the economy! These high achievers seek opportunities to grow existing brands and diversify their portfolios by adding new franchise concepts – including non-food brands. So, how do franchisees shop for additional franchise opportunities, what components of a franchise system do they look at? What are the best marketing sources for attracting these business builders?  What type of research do they do? What turns franchisees on and off to potential brands?  What are FDD deal breakers? Our workshop leaders are pros at recruiting these mega franchisees, who will share their experiences.   

Program Leader: Therese Thilgen, President / Chief Content Officer, Franchise Update Media Group
Panel: 
John Metz, Chair / CEO, Hurricane AMT
Greg Vojnovic, Vice President of Development, Popeyes Louisiana Kitchen
Karen Spencer, President, Fran-Systems, Worldwide, Inc.
Charles Franklin, Senior Vice President - Franchise Development, Play 'N Trade

4:15-5:15pm            Franchise Sales and Business Solutions Roundtables

Don’t miss this opportunity to engage with peers on specific drill down topics. Tables will be facilitated by industry leaders and rotate every 30 minutes to maximize your learning experience.

• Resale Best Practices
• Profiling Candidates
• Working a Trade Show
• Selling through Ad Portals
• Public Relations
• Public Relations and Social Media
• Non-Traditional Locations
• Multi-Unit Franchisee Lead Generation
• Website Development
• Creating Multi-Media Recruitment Strategies
• Working with Brokers
• Financing and 401k's
• Online Local and National Lead Generation
• Building a Strong Online Presence
• Geo-targeting through Telecommunications Systems
• Selecting the Right Real Estate and Lease Negotiations
• Outsourcing Recruitment Services

6:30pm            Franchise STAR Awards Banquet

Sponsored by Systino 

STAR Awards sponsored by Kiekenapp & Associates

 

FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 24

8:00-9:30am            Breakfast with Top Franchise Legal Experts: Are You Legally Fit to Market and Sell More Franchises?

Session Sponsored by Roetzel & Andress

Join this lively session addressing compliance issues franchisors need to be aware of as they aggressively market and sell franchises.

Are you effectively using or abusing the FDD in recruiting franchisees? What are the do's and don'ts of providing Financial Performance Representations? How about your marketing materials and promotional claims? Franchisee claims on webinars with prospects? Referral fees? Broker representation issues? What about today's resales -- how can you help franchisees more without increasing your liability? And, what are today's key considerations when developing Multi-Unit Franchisee Agreements?

We will explore the new opportunities for negotiation and closure of deals with experienced developers. Don't miss this one!

Program Leader: Joyce Mazero, Partner, Haynes and Boone 

9:30-10:15am           Financing Experts – Where’s Credit Loosening Up?  Where’s the Real Growth Money? Are There Alternatives?

What's the latest scoop on SBA loans, private equity groups, 401K financing, conventional and non-conventional sources, leasing options, special minority lending and inner city programs? What new programs and opportunities are available that may not be on a franchisor's radar screen? What types of financial incentives and direct funding are franchisors now offering to attract and close more deals?

Program Leader: Darrell Johnson, President, FRANdata

10:15-11:30am          Mind Share Solutions – Ever-Popular Interactive Roundtable Workshops Tackling Today’s Hottest Development Issues:

Our ever-popular mindshare finale harnesses development expertise in a team-building format. Experienced development leaders will challenge the group for solutions, as franchise executives collectively pool their sales and marketing intelligence in responding to today's recruitment market. How are the leaders of growing franchise companies leveraging their people, budgets, brands and resources to meet their development goals in 2010 and beyond? We will conclude this high-energy session with at least 10 takeaways in a stimulating environment of interactive networking and information sharing. Don't miss this profitable forum guided by two seasoned development leaders.