BrandONE

Meet Him At The IFA Annual Conference!

Take one look at the career of Ralph Yarusso, and you’ll see a legacy of leadership woven into most every facet of franchise development. Ralph – who serves as the Chair for the IFA VetFran Committee and BrandONE’s VP of Franchise Development – knows how to drive results.

Of course, this comes from nearly 30 years of expertise in the franchise industry, from front-line labor through the executive-management level. In fact, Ralph’s a Certified Franchise Executive and a USAF Veteran. He’s a mastermind in operational excellence, specializing in building foundations for organic growth, franchise sales, brand acquisition and integration. As an FAA Licensed Flight Dispatcher, he clearly knows no limits when it comes to far-reaching insight!

In 2013, Ralph became the Chief Development and Operations Officer at Full Speed Automotive (formerly Grease Monkey Intl). In under a decade, he helped steer major initiatives for the megabrand, which is one of the nation’s largest franchisors and operators of automotive aftermarket repair facilities. Ralph’s impact included:

• Reorganizing and developing a new operating system that focused on unit economics.
• Raising the average unit volume 55%, with three years of double-digit same store sales growth.
• Redesigning the training program syllabus, materials and standards manual.
• Creating a new telephone training program and helping spearhead the online university.
• Establishing an in-center/field training program, with a cloud-based business builder review program.
• Designing a profit tracker/break-even analysis tool for franchisees.
• Developing and implementing a course of action plan for field support to help under-performing units, spurring a compliance incentive program that renewed expired licenses and eliminated loss of units.
• Creating a franchise development department that allowed the company to pivot from negative net unit growth. The effort inspired a sales funnel process, guidelines and a web-based lead generation capture and processing feature.
• Leading critical workflows during multiple brand acquisitions, helping guide integration and rebranding.
• Establishing a program for getting veterans and first responders into their first franchise.

Prior to his incredible push with Full Speed Automotive, Ralph served as the Regional Vice President and Chief Operations Officer for Meineke Car Care Centers, Inc. From 2010 to 2012, he was responsible for overseeing more than 500 franchise locations and eight operations managers. It was a perfect fit, as Ralph himself was a Meineke franchisee at one point in life. At the time, he operated 15 locations, with some 75 total employees. Ralph served as Chairman of their Franchise Advisory Council and earned Meineke honors in the “Million Dollar Club” as a top-grossing franchise in the system. He was even recognized by IFA as Franchisee of the Year.

Clearly, Ralph’s career journey runs deep. He even played the role of Senior Franchise Development Specialist for Driven Brands Inc. for a few years. There, he managed franchise sales, real estate procurement, FDD, as well as franchise and trademark agreements.

The B1 crew is proud to have Ralph on our side and thrilled that he’s serving as the Chair for the IFA VetFran Committee. If you’re attending the IFA Annual Convention in San Diego from Feb. 26 to March 1, make sure to look for Ralph and connect!

BrandONE is proud to partner with Missions Inc. Org and Home Free to provide funding for much needed domestic violence services. The donation from BrandONE allows Home Free the ability to support those who need it most this holiday season. At BrandONE we recognize that our collective community benefits when everyone is supported and is able to live in a safe, secure environment free of abuse and violence. Home Free is a safe haven for victims and survivors and their children who have needed to flee their homes due to domestic violence. The shelter provides emergency housing and support services to over 600 female identifying individuals and children each year. Usually filled to capacity, the shelter can accommodate 30 adults and children with an average length of stay of 18 days. Services are provided free of charge to all residents.

TIME KILLS DEALS is the war cry of franchise sales executives across the US. It’s the opening and closing line of most franchise sales training sessions, break outs, and round tables. A widely accepted truth that the speed in which a candidate moves through the discovery process is the biggest predictive indicator of a candidate’s likelihood to commit. A universal truth that is in most cases, a lie.

It is not the speed in which a candidate moves through your process that matters, but rather that your process can match the speed, pace, and tempo of your candidate’s ability to process the information. A prospect pipeline is made up of a variety of profiles. Some candidates are 100% gut-based decision makers, moving swiftly from call to call, FDD review, franchisee validation and discovery day. Their ability to commit is based on how your process makes them feel. I love gut based decision makers, I’m one of them. I see it, I like it, I buy it.

Alternatively, a candidate may be a data driven decision maker. You know the type, the guy with the 12 tab excel spreadsheet with analytics for every single possible scenario. This guy, the data guy, needs TIME. I mean lots and lots of time. As a result, a successful franchise awarding process must allow for a candidate to still stay engaged in your process while other candidates may push past him to the finish line. He is not less likely to commit, just not likely to commit to an artificial timeline.

At BrandONE we pride ourselves on building a customized awarding process for not only each franchisor client, but also for each individual candidate. Years of experience and thousands of deals under our belt allows our development team to clearly identify a candidate’s learning style, establish a reasonable timeline, and set accountability.

Before you snap a deal in half because your timing expectations aren’t being met, ask yourself:

What type of learner is the candidate? Adjust your process accordingly with various resources such as webinars, eBooks, validation phone calls, and email drip campaigns. More platforms available in your awarding process will yield better results by speaking to multiple behavior profiles – at their own pace.

Ask your candidate to identify a timeline that works well for them. Adjust your timeline to their expectation and hold them accountable. The accountability factor will tell you if they are a buyer or not.

Give a candidate time. Squeezing someone into the next step of the process rarely yields results. Don’t kill the deal before it’s a deal, if your candidate needs time – give it.

The next time you’re at a franchise rah-rah session and someone yells, “time kills deals!”, just remember their loss is often another franchisor’s gain. Flash them a thumbs up and be rest assured the BrandONE development team is set to snatch the deal when the time is just right.

A little over a year ago, we all became well versed in Zoom and all things virtual. It was the beginning of a new era. Covid19 forced our collective hands to give up the comfort of the in-person Discovery Day. We had to educate candidates on all aspects of the franchise business and support system while learning enough about each candidate to award them a franchise – all from the comfort of home.

The struggle was real. So many things had to change to effectively execute a virtual Discovery Day. First, the content had to be strong enough to hold candidates’ attention. No longer trapped in a conference room, candidates could choose to tune out your operations guy on a whim. In addition, candidates had to be pulled into the conversation and engaged to reveal their strength and weaknesses. Neither presenter nor participants could be passive on a relatively passive platform. As a result, we had to retool our entire Discovery Day approach.

As we return to in-person Discovery Days we have stopped to ask the question, did the virtual format reveal anything we don’t get in person? For the BrandONE team the answer… yes. Virtual connections allowed us to see the behaviors of candidates when they thought no-one was looking. For example, is their office space/background a mess with amazon boxes stacked to the ceiling? If yes, this is an indicator to how they will treat business assets. Without the forced social decorum of an office visit, how did the candidate dress for the virtual discovery day? Pajamas or business casual?

Recently we had a high-net-worth individual join one of our CEO sessions from the comfort of his bed. Yes, his bed. On paper this prospect had business acumen, strong financial statements, and was an ideal candidate; however, his behavior revealed something different. Without the socially acceptable parameters of an in-person meeting, the virtual format revealed true character profiles.

At BrandONE we are constantly asking the question, “but what is their behavior saying?” Candidates rarely tell you who they are, they SHOW you who they are. With decades of experience, the BrandONE team can read candidate behavior and apply a predicative indicator to their level of engagement as a franchisee. Not easily learned, but rather earned through tens-of-thousands of candidate conversations.

Our takeaway from this unique time in development, the Zoom and virtual platform is just another tool our team uses to recruit franchise talent. At BrandONE our customized franchise award process allows us to build an intelligent Discovery Day, because if you’re calling in with bed head – we want to know.