Aug 21, 2018

FranConnect Voted No. 1 Solution Provider on Entrepreneur’s Top Franchise Suppliers List

Written by FranConnect

Franchising-focused company beats out multi-industry software gorillas and low-end entrants to rank first in the Online Technology Services Category

(WASHINGTON, DC) - August 21, 2018FranConnect, the leading provider of franchise management solutions, has been voted the #1 supplier in Entrepreneur Magazine's first-ever Top Franchise Suppliers list, a ranking of the best vendors, suppliers and partners in the franchise industry. Entrepreneur surveyed hundreds of franchisors -- from brand-new companies just jumping into franchising to top-ranked Franchise 500® brands with thousands of locations -- to find out which suppliers they do business with and how satisfied they are with them.

FranConnect was voted the Top Franchise Supplier for “Online Technology Services,” including CRM, operations, sales, and accounting systems -- beating out the dominant multi-industry software providers as well as low-cost, limited function applications.

Franchise suppliers were scored based on both how many franchisors reported using them and their satisfaction ratings. The final ranking consists of the top-scoring suppliers in each of seven categories: accounting, banking/financing, legal services, marketing, merchant services, online technology services and public relations.

FranConnect’s simple, fast to deploy and user-friendly platform is trusted by more than 700 franchisors and 140,000 franchisees. It is designed specifically for the franchise industry, giving it a distinct advantage over other, multi-industry management tools. That singular focus likely helped FranConnect beat out not only other CRM services, such as Salesforce and HubSpot, but also industry-transcending tech giants like Microsoft.

FranConnect has galvanized its customer base through thought-leadership education, including best practice guidance, insights from sales and operations index reports, conferences, and webinars. Customers are showing their appreciation, too. The brand has the highest customer satisfaction score (NPS) of any other technology in its space. 

Many FranConnect clients credit the performance of their franchise portfolio in part to the supplier. 

“Today, we have five brands in our portfolio, totaling over 1,000 units, using FranConnect,” said Mike Skitzki, COO of Franworth, “Even at that scale, we concluded that FranConnect was the only partner that had all the functionality we needed to manage our brands of all sizes at a reasonable cost. Plus, we have plans to add more brands during the year. Only FranConnect has the franchising expertise and ability to scale with us as we grow.”

FranConnect President Keith Gerson says that the ranking reflects years of work building and refining the company’s suite of products designed to help franchises through every phase of their growth.

“This is a real honor as well as a validation of FranConnect’s vision,” he said. “I’m incredibly proud of our team for their dedicated service and commitment in helping franchisors thrive. By working with hundreds of franchise brands, we’ve learned exactly what their operational concerns are, and we’ve developed tools that effectively address those concerns.”

“To receive this recognition on the heels of a report that shows FranConnect’s customers grow up to 44% faster than the competition is incredibly validating for our whole team,” he said.

About the author

FranConnect

FranConnect is the leading franchise management software provider. Based on an analytics approach, only its award-winning, unified FranConnect platform engages stakeholders to grow, scale and optimize franchise systems through a connected and complete view of the business from sales to multi-unit and multi-brand performance. Over 800 brands — including 40 of the Entrepreneur’s Top 100 Global Franchises — in 18 countries count on FranConnect to successfully grow their franchise systems. FranConnect customers span all sizes, growth phases, and industries and have grown 44% faster than the broader franchising market. Backed by private-equity investor Serent Capital, FranConnect is headquartered in Herndon, Virginia, with global follow-the-sun operations.