A franchise model for your home service business is an effective way to branch out to different locations by teaming up with franchisees or franchise owners. You as the franchisor will allow franchisees to leverage the brand name and earn and share revenues.

Doing well in a home service business is dependent on establishing great coordination between the franchisor and franchisees. You need to offer support to franchisees and put the terms and conditions of the franchise agreement into effect. To bring off these tasks, the need to have a full overview of your home service business becomes essential.

Herein arrives the high-octane franchise management software that comprises an ace suite integrated with various facets of the workflow used by franchisors. Home service-based franchise management software brings about seamless collaboration between franchisors and franchisees. If configured properly, the software can expedite things, reduce costs, and boost productivity.

franchise management tools

• Effective management of work orders

In a home service franchise business model, you can set up a smooth-running supply chain for your franchisees by implementing franchise management software. You’ll be responsible for supplying goods, services, items of equipment, and spare parts to your franchisees.

However, more often than not, you may not have the scope of rendering support and services to your franchisees in a well-timed manner. Every now and then, franchisors find themselves overburdened by scheduling tasks to provide for the requests put in by franchisees. When you do the scheduling of jobs on spreadsheets or whiteboards the propensity of errors to be committed rises.

Solidly built franchise management software facilitates seamless scheduling of tasks. By and large, you may find the suite offering the following features.

• Scheduling calendar

The tool gives you an elaborate picture of available agents thereby ensuring the scheduling job to be managed easily. Once a service request is put forward by a franchisee to the franchisor, the latter resorts to franchise management software to find out available agents. A work order is instantly assigned by the software after an available agent is located. The software preserves a comprehensive database that puts the experience and skillset of field agents on record. Subsequently, the scheduler tool looks in on the database and sends appropriately qualified agents to perform the job. Information about the job at hand is conveyed to field reps via a notification. Simultaneously, the franchisee receives an alert from the franchisor that contains information about the field agent appointed to execute the job.

• Dynamic scheduling abilities

Every so often you may come across changes in the situation after scheduling. As an example, there may be a development of an exigency at one outlet that calls for immediate intervention. The dynamic scheduling capability of franchise management software allows schedulers to create tasks afresh or effectuate changes in already open tasks. Under such circumstances, managers are expected to include multiple field agents to execute a certain job, set responsibilities for all team members, and bring in adjustments to the schedule. Dynamic scheduling involves reassignment of resources, rescheduling of appointments, and independent actions. Promptly triggered push notifications make all team members aware of the changes.

• Complete visibility of field operations in real-time

Through the consolidated platform of franchise management software managers may oversee field teams. The former keeps track of the progress in work assigned to any field worker and intervenes if needed to address any delay. The performance of field agents is governed by thorough tracking. An agent spending excessive time while doing a job at a given location sends out wrong signals as far as the capability of the corresponding franchise is concerned.

• Incorporated dispatching and tracking

With more efficiency and lower cost in operations, you realize greater success in your home service franchise business. However, time and again, because of highly dispersed franchise locations operations may move slowly. Sluggish functioning results in ineptitude which in turn leads to dissatisfaction among franchisees. Field agents taking excessive time to reach a particular franchisee location entails the deferment of downstream operations. As a consequence, they end up serving fewer franchisees on a given day thereby raising operational costs.

• Franchise management software dishes out a constructive solution to bring about an improvement in agent efficiency. The suite comes up with the below-mentioned functionalities.
• Smooth incorporation of inventory suite into the franchise fold to affirm spare parts availability prior to dispatching thereby precluding the chances of any wastage and improving first-time fix rates as far as repairs and replacements are concerned.
• Proper travel route optimization makes sure field reps quickly reach the franchisee locations. All-inclusive software for franchise management is equipped with maps and charts to find the shortest, best route to reach the destination. The feature takes several factors such as road condition, traffic, etc. into consideration. On that account, field agents get to spend less road trip time. In consequence, they devote more time offering support to the franchisees. This gives rise to a manifold rise in productivity and improvement in franchisee satisfaction level.
• Franchisees, managers, and other concerned executives get an idea of the estimated time of arrival (ETA) of field agents to do repairs, replacements, servicing, etc through real-time tracking. Franchise management software creates a link with the GPS on the smartphones of field agents and offers real-time tracking. 

• Rigorous audits and inspections

When it comes to the home service-based franchise business model, audits and inspections form an integral part. By regularly inspecting the outlets at franchisee locations you can ensure operational compliance with respect to the franchise agreements. Thorough inspections help track down inefficiencies and flaws. In this scenario, the intervention of franchisors becomes necessary to put things in place. Franchise management software comes up with robust options for conducting audits and inspections. It offers a set of the following programs that have a uniform design and the ability to share data.

• Hundreds of custom forms and templates are readily available. They’re crafted with help from experts and encompass all the scenarios of inspection. They’re also in compliance with audit standards laid down by the franchise.
• With stylized forms franchise owners secure the option of digitizing the currently existing paper forms. These forms are customized and data entry is done. Next, they’re uploaded to conduct regular inspections following all existing norms. The need for field agents to undergo a learning curve becomes optional. The software authorizes field agents to upload graphics, videos, and voice clips and attach them to the forms. This process helps unclose greater potentials than in-person inspections.
• Dynamic customized reports can be prepared in real-time and automatically delivered to the recipient’s email. The standard of reports with no paperwork and coupled with real-time inputs is highly enhanced.
• Analytical insights involve a review of audits. Over time, the reports obtained post-inspection determine the variance with respect to established means. The comparison of reports and historical audits helps consolidate company best practices that in fact serve as the yardstick for identifying inconsistencies.

• Seamless workflows

Automated streamlined workflows are rendered by franchise management software that allows franchisors to be in charge of multiple franchisees and expand through the addition of new franchisees.

• With the help of powerful tools such as APIs and integrated connections, you can extract information from several databases and consolidate them in a single insightful dashboard. The dashboard can be accessed by field crew and others from their smartphones no matter what their location is. As a result, work completion is eased and expedited. For example, field workers may need to dig out complete CRM information meaning that they’re up-to-date about the franchisee prior to making an entry into their premises.
• In-depth data analysis is required to detect underlying issues related to franchisees that may not be apparent. At the same time, data analysis helps in the identification of discrepancies as far as operational figures and volumes are concerned. The onus also lies on the sales team to keep track of daily or weekly reports received from franchisees. They’re capable of spotting any discrepancies and generating new work orders to resolve problems.
• The integrated accounting functionality consists of seamless connectors that empower franchisors to synchronize franchisee accounts. Consequently, royalties are paid smoothly and no accounting issues are encountered. The feature authorizes a franchisor to identify those franchisees that have low sales volume and probe the deep-rooted issues. The franchisor may identify franchisees having low volumes and probe the underlying causes.

How well a franchise business model does is solely dependent on the controlling competence of the franchisor as far as every operational facet is concerned. This is only feasible by having the right franchise management software in place. The software is a compelling tool ideal for performing these tasks. You can recompense the investment in a short time span and gain a substantial competitive advantage through enhanced productivity, cost savings, and better speed.