- Overview
- Top 4 Franchise Lead Generation Apps
- Top 18 Franchise Portals
- Top 6 Franchise Ad Agencies
- Top 13 Franchise Broker Networks
- Top 10 Outsourced Franchise Sales Organizations (FSOs)
- Top 14 Call Verified Franchise Lead Providers (Franchise Leads For Consultants)
- Top 15 Local Franchise Marketing Agencies
- Need Help?
Overview
Need help with franchise leads and franchise lead generation? In this article you will find our Top 80 Lead Generation Sites For 2023. I originally wrote this article back in 2019. Since then, we have been through COVID, some major overseas wars, and all sorts of economic ups and downs. Having been in the business of helping franchisors find and recruit high quality franchisees for more than a decade now, there have been some learnings worth sharing.
To be honest, there are tons of lead generation sites out there and lots of agencies and companies out there that provide leads within not only the franchising space but the broader online arena. But, you have to be REALLY CAREFUL. Some of the bigger mistakes that I have seen over the years when it comes to identifying and partnering with a provider for franchise leads include:
- Contract Length – Don’t get locked into a super long contract with a vendor, especially with PPC for franchises. We get calls all the time of people who end up paying $10K+ / mo. on leads and are locked into 6-12 month contracts that end up having no clue what they’re doing. That isn’t good for you or the vendor. If possible, see if you can negotiate something like a month-to-month contract with a cancel any time clause. That will save you a lot of time and frustration.
- Vendor Experience – Don’t work with a vendor that hasn’t managed at least $5-10M in ads within the franchise development lead generation space. What you really want is first rate franchise leads. This industry just takes a lot of time to learn, and each sub-niche is different. Education franchise leads are not restaurant franchise leads or service franchise leads.
- Cost Per Lead – Don’t overpay for PPC leads. A rough ballpark of where you should be on your CPL is probably between $20-$150 per lead. For us, we average about $32 / lead all-time. But, some categories are more expensive and competitive than others. What you don’t want to do is pay $200-$1,000+ / lead. It’s almost impossible to have a good cost per sale if your leads are that expensive.
- Cost Per Sale – Keep track of your cost per sale. The range we see is typically between $2,000-$12,000 per sale. Benchmark this against franchise broker networks which start at around $24,000 per sale and can cost much more than that depending on the price of your franchise as well as whether or not you are a new franchisor. Some broker networks charge a minimum of $40,000 per sale for the first 5-10 units, especially if you don’t have an Item 19 in place or existing franchisees (outside of corporate owned) because their closure rates are lower and it costs them more leads to sell your franchise. So, they pass that cost on to you.
- Top Ad Networks – Test both Facebook Ads and Google Ads. We see just about as many deals come through each ad network. And, it’s good to have a diversified set of lead sources. Having said that, we don’t recommend doing ads on LinkedIn unless you are in a market with a very defined demographic (like truckers or chiropractors) which require a specific job title.
- Order Of Operations – Order of operations also becomes important. Ideally, you want as many different lead sources working for you as possible. Having said that, we would recommend starting in this order: Word Of Mouth, SEO, PPC, Franchise Portals, Broker Network, and then PR. For SEO, focus on writing high quality content via WordPress online (the same way you found this article). For PPC, go with an agency that really knows the space and start with a small ad budget of around $1,500 / mo. Once PPC is working for you, use some of those profits to test a few franchise portal sites and to see if you can get a good broker network working for you. Don’t spend money on things like PR or Radio Ads at the beginning. They can be expensive and if you blow all of your ad budget there, you might not have enough to go after other mediums that can produce for you more consistently, like Google Ads and Facebook Ads.
- Franchise Sales Organizations – One thing that I didn’t go into with this article was mentioning organizations like Rain Tree, Franep, Rhino 7, and other similar franchise sales websites / companies that focus on the sales side of things as opposed to lead generation. For us, our expertise is in franchise lead generation, but there are other outsourced franchise sales organizations (sometimes called “FSOs) and top franchise development companies that can help actually sell the franchises if you need help there.
Top 4 Franchise Lead Generation Apps
Before we dive into a list of top franchise lead generation websites for 2023, there are actually a few phone apps out there that provide franchise leads. I’m listing these first because if you’re viewing this page on your phone, you can literally download the apps and get started driving leads in 1-2 minutes. Here are some of the top Franchise Lead Generation Apps for iOS:
#1 – Franchise Gator App
This app has 4.6 stars and 52 ratings. It’s made by Franchise Gator, which we have ranked as the #2 franchise portal on our list (2nd only behind Entreprenuer.com). If you’re looking for a quick and easy way to drive leads via a mobile app, this is a great one to start with.
#2 – My Franchise App
This app has 4.7 stars and 31 ratings. It is made by the same group that does the Franchise.com website.
#3 – Franchise Solutions App
The Franchise Solutions app has 4.8 stars and 14 ratings. This is an extension to the FranchiseSolutions.com website.
#4 – Franchise Cost App
This one has a lower rating than the others at 3.7 stars and 4 ratings. It’s made by Franchise Ventures LLC.
Some of these providers also have franchise portal websites as well, but it is worth noting that these exist. In the future, an increasing amount of leads will probably be generated through mobile apps as opposed to your typical franchise portals.
Top 18 Franchise Portals
Here are some of the top franchise portal sites on the web for franchise advertising. When I originally wrote this article, I only had 13 franchise portals listed in this part. But, since then I have added 5 more, making it 18. I wrote a full article entitled “Top 18 Franchise Lead Portal Websites” in case you want to read the full thing.
If you don’t know what a franchise portal is, it’s basically a website that sells bulk franchise leads. They typically either rank high organically for a lot of franchise lead generation terms by having a lot of content that indexes with search engines or they spend money on their own ads and then sell those leads from their franchise portals to lots of franchisors. The thing you have to be careful with these is that everyone likes to say that “your leads are exclusive to you”. But, in reality franchise portal business models rely on having lots of people come to their websites and request information from lots of different franchisors. So, even if they spend $30 to generate a lead from running their own ads, they can sell them 5-15 times and make a healthy margin. Some franchise portals also sell old leads to franchisors. There are pros and cons to these types of franchise portal leads.
#1 – Entrepreneur.com
Perhaps the most respected franchise portal out there isn’t one that you would even think of as a portal at all. Entrepreneur is probably best known for it’s magazine. But, they also sell leads to franchisors.
#2 – Franchise Gator
Love them or hate them, Franchise Gator is still the industry standard for franchise lead portals, especially if you are a franchise broker. While Entrepreneur.com is going to give you the highest quality leads in the space, Franchise Gator is going to do the opposite and provide the highest quantity of leads.
#3 – BizBuySell
BizBuySell is one that we hear great feedback on from franchisors. It’s one of those lead sources that either works for you or it doesn’t. Some people don’t think of BizBuySell as a prototypical franchise portal because it is not. It’s a place that people who own or want to buy all sorts of businesses go to in order to find and sell businesses.
#4 – Franchise Direct
Franchise Direct is the biggest competitor among franchise portals to Franchise Gator. The leads are probably a little bit higher quality than Franchise Gator and the franchisors that do use them often times use them for a long time with lower attrition than Franchise Gator.
#5 – America’s Best Franchises
America’s Best Franchises is probably my favorite franchise portal that isn’t one of the big ones. Their team is smaller but they are easy to work with, care about getting results for their clients, and are creative on strategies for getting leads.
#6 – Franchise Business Review
What stands out most to me about Franchise Business Review is that they take the time to really put themselves in the shoes of the user of their website and evaluate the businesses listed on their site. I would equate it almost to an Angie’s List for franchise development lead generation.
#7 – Franchise.org
I could totally be off on this, but I think that Franchise.org might actually be owned or have some type of a partnership with IFA judging by the massive IFA logo that they have on the top left hand corner of the website.
#8 – Franchise Grade
The idea behind Franchise Grade is very tech savvy and a fresh approach to evaluating franchises. I don’t personally love their website all that much compared to numbers 1-6 listed above, but still it’s a good option to check out and you will at least have a good conversation with their team who I think has a good handle and understanding of the industry as a whole.
#9 – All USA Franchises
This is the part of the list that we start getting into a lot of the same “me too” strategies. It gets really hard to distinguish the difference between groups like All USA Franchises and the next 4.
#10 – Franchising.com
The 3 main things that are unique about Franchising.com are that they have some good conferences that they do each year (Multi-Unit Franchising Conference, Franchise Customer Experience Conference, and the Franchise Leadership & Development Conference), behind the scenes they have a good email list for their sponsors, and they are better at finding multi-unit operators than other portals.
#11 – FranchiseOpportunities.com
I actually really like the domain name that they chose at FranchiseOpportunities.com because the term “franchise opportunities” is one of the top search queries that people type in when they are looking for a franchise and by default they almost always rank #1 for this term.
#12 – The Franchise Mall
I don’t know the quality of these leads very well, as it’s not one that a lot of our clients use. And, I’m a little turned off by how they try to monetize their website through banner ads on the sides of the pages. But, there are some articles online that franchise brokers in the space say that they have used the leads and have had good success with them.
#13 – TopFranchise.com
This is the last portal that I have on my list that kind of falls in that category of being another cookie cutter franchise lead portal. It’s not one that I hear much about, but for some people it might be worth looking into.
#14 – GlobalBX
These guys have been around since about 2001, and are a bit old school but might be a decent option for franchisors who have had success with BizBuySell and are looking for another similar group to test lead flow with.
#15 – VetFran.org
What I like about VetFran is that they have a very defined niche market. This won’t work for all franchisors, but if you have special offers for military veterans or a large chunk of your franchisees tend to be military vets, this would be one that would be worth speaking with.
#16 – FranData
I haven’t spoken with FranData for a few years, but they have lists of a wide variety of franchise related data points. If your team likes to call bulk old leads, it might be worth having a conversation to see if they have some type of a list segment that would work for you.
#17 – Franchise Times
Franchise Times, like Entrepreneur.com, comes out of the era of advertising franchises via magazines. So, if you’re looking to do more education about your brand to prospective franchisees, this could be the portal for you.
#19 – BusinessesForSale
BusinessesForSale is kind of a hybrid between a Franchise Gator style portal and BizBuySell. You can both sell or buy a business here as well as list your franchise in order to drive leads.
Top 6 Franchise Ad Agencies
In addition to these, there are also several franchise websites / companies that generate leads online for franchisors via Google, Facebook, LinkedIn, and other mediums. Some of these companies include:
#1 – Lead PPC
Obviously, we are biased on this one. But, we truly do feel like we are the best agency at generating franchise leads via PPC. This is all we do and we have been doing it since 2010.
#2 – Scorpion
If you had to choose another agency to help with franchise lead generation besides us here at Lead PPC, we would probably say that Scorpion is the next best thing. They have a very large agency and have improved in the franchise lead generation space.
#3 – Curious Jane
These Curious Jane folks are very nice. PPC lead generation isn’t their primary focus, but they are well known and reputable within the franchising space.
#4 – Franchise Hive
Franchise Hive seems to be a bit newer in the franchising space. But, they have some interesting hybrid solutions for online advertising as well as CRM solutions.
#5 – TopFire Media
TopFire Media is a nice group of guy that have been the industry for quite some time. They win awards regularly from Entrepreneur.com and provide a variety of marketing solutions.
#6 – Qiigo
Franchising isn’t the only industry that Qiigo provides marketing services for. However, they do have some experience with it.
Additional Franchise Resources
Here are some additional franchise resources that might be helpful for you.
Top 13 Franchise Broker Networks
Additionally, here are some of the top franchise broker networks. I wrote an article recently called “What Are The Top 13 Franchise Broker Networks” which breaks these down in more detail. Usually, these run somewhere in the range of around $20,000 – $40,000 per sale, depending on how many units you have already sold (some franchise broker / coaching networks charge more for franchisors that have <5 non-corporate owned stores or do not have an Item 19 in their FDD):
#1 – International Franchise Professionals Group (IFPG)
IFPG has 1,300 franchisors, franchise brokers, and vendors in their network and Entrepreneur.com considers them to be the #1 franchise broker network.
#2 – Franchise Brokers Association (FBA)
FBA has been around since 2008. They focus primarily on 4 areas: Technology, Support, Scalability & Transparency.
#3 – Transworld Business Advisors
Transworld has sold 10,000+ businesses, has 600+ brokers, and has 250+ offices worldwide.
#4 – FranServe
We’ve worked with FranServe on a variety of endeavors for 5+ years, and they are a great group of people to work with. They are very focused on lead generation and franchise sales.
#5 – The Entrepreneur’s Source (TES)
TES is an extremely buttoned up organization that truly does focus on training their franchise brokers to coach prospective franchisees in order to help them discover and choose the right franchise opportunity for themselves.
#6 – FranNet
FranNet has been in business for over 30 years and has over 60 affiliated offices throughout the United States and Canada.
#7 – The Franchise Consulting Company (FCC)
FCC has 157 franchise brokers listed on their website.
#8 – FranChoice
FranChoice focuses on trying to find at least 2-3 franchise opportunities that would be a good fit for their prospective candidates and then encourages the person to make their own choice as to which one makes the most sense for them.
#9 – BAI Business Alliance Inc.
BAI Business Alliance has been around since 1991.
#10 – FRANSAVE
FRANSAVE tends to be on the cheaper end as far as franchise broker networks goes.
#11 – The You Network
The You Network will introduce franchise candidates to up to 8 different franchise brands.
#12 – Global Franchise Network
Global Franchise Network has successfully helped over 200 companies expand their businesses internationally.
#13 – The Franchise Insiders
The Franchise Insiders isn’t a huge broker network, but they might still be looking into if you’re looking for a smaller business feel.
Top 10 Outsourced Franchise Sales Organizations (FSOs)
Some franchisors are able to generate the leads that they need but need help on the actual sales side of things. I actually recently wrote an entire article called the “Top 10 Franchise Sales Organizations” which goes into each of these in more detail. Here are some of the top franchise sales organizations / franchise development firms out there in case you fall into this category for franchise lead generation:
#1 – RainTree
When it comes to FSOs, RainTree is probably our favorite. We’ve worked with them on over 40 brands over the past 5+ years, and they do a great job with handling sales so you don’t have to.
#2 – Pinnacle Franchise Development
Pinnacle is voted as one of the top Franchise Sales Organizations by Entrepreneur.com almost every year. We’ve worked with them on 10+ accounts, and they have been great to work with as well.
#3 – Franchise Evolution
We’ve worked with Franchise Evolution on 5 different brands, and although their book of business isn’t huge, they seem to be very client focused.
#4 – The Revenue Catalyst Group
These guys have a lot of brands, and we’ve worked with 5 of their clients as well. Their “Franchise MRI” offering is a cool way to get a breakdown of where your sales funnel might be broken and how to fix it.
#5 – United Franchise Group
UFG is very picky. They only have about 10 brands, but they are absolutely massive with over 1,600 locations sold. They typically want to own equity in your company.
#6 – Rhino7
The business model for Rhino7 is similar to UFG. They usually want to own part of your business. They have sold 5,000+ locations.
#7 – Franchise Performance Group
We haven’t worked with these guys, but they have worked with 120+ different brands.
#8 – Oakscale
Oakscale has access to venture funding and is similar to UFG and Rhino7 in that they typically own part of your company to engage with them.
#9 – Franchise Beacon
Franchise Beacon is a bit more of a franchise consulting firm that also acts as a cross-over FSO.
#10 – FranSmart
FranSmart has about 12 brands listed on their website and focuses mainly on restaurant franchises.
Top 14 Call Verified Franchise Lead Providers (Franchise Leads For Consultants)
As a PPC ad agency, we work exclusively with Franchisors. Having said that, we got a ton of inquiries from franchise consultants, franchise brokers, and franchise coaches who are in dire need of more quality franchise leads. If you’re a franchise broker and you’ve tried working leads from franchise portals without success, might I recommend testing out some “Call Verified Franchise Lead” providers. I have an much more in-depth article on this subject called “Top 14 Call Verified Franchise Leads Websites” which you may want to check out if you’re a franchise consultant.
These types of lead providers typically buy leads from franchise portals or run their own ads on Google and Facebook. And, then they call and verify those leads for you prior to your calling them. The result is a higher quality lead. These leads run about 2-5X more expensive than franchise portal leads, but the quality and sales conversion rate does tend to be better. Here are the top 14 call verified franchise lead providers that we’ve been able to identify:
#1 – 5th Avenue Leads
I would say that 5th Avenue Leads is probably the most well known and respected provider of call verified leads within the franchising space. There are certainly larger companies out there that provide services not only in franchise development lead generation but in lots of other industries. But, 5th Avenue has been around since 2004 and has a solid handle on the franchising space. If I was going to choose a provider, this is probably the one that I would go with or at least have a solid conversation with.
#2 – Prospect Direct
Prospect Direct is a team out of Dallas, Texas (my home town) that has really dialed in call verified, executive level franchise lead generation. Their client list is quite large, they have great testimonials, and they have been around since about 2003. Their focus is on finding owners and leaders in upper-level management and generating warm qualified conversations with them for you.
#3 – Phone Verified Franchise Leads
PhoneVerifiedFranchiseLeads.com has a good looking website with a straight forward business model. You get 1 lead per day Monday – Friday for 90 days which comes out to $1,999 / (22 * 3) = $30 per lead. This is actually a great price. And, they have a promotion where you can receive your 1st lead within 24 hours.
#4 – izmoLeads
izmoLeads is a bit of a new comer to the marketplace and has been around since about 2017. However, as an owner of an ad agency, I like their process of basically running ads and then being very transparent on their follow-up process which includes: 7 call attempts, a variety of calls, emails voicemails, and texts, and attempts are made at different times in the day.
#5 – CallVerifiedLeads.com
CallVerifiedLeads.com is going to be a better fit for franchise brokers specifically over many of the other providers (as opposed to franchisors), although either may have success. They have partnered with some of the best and largest franchise broker networks out there like TES (The Entrepreneur’s Source), FBA (Franchise Brokers Association), FranChoice, IFPG (International Franchise Professionals Group), Sunbelt, and FranNet.
#6 – Executive Leads (execleads.com)
Oddly enough, Executive Leads is another group out of Dallas Texas that offers call verified franchise leads. Their leads are not cheap ($90-$234), so keep that in mind. If you do end up buying their gold level leads and you’re seeking a CPS (Cost Per Sale) of around $5,000 that means you’re going to need to close about 1 out of 20 leads consistently into franchise deals which is not an easy task.
#7 – Mercury Roads
These guys have been around since 2006 and has worked with over 500 clients in the franchise sales industry. Their website still uses Adobe Flash (which many browsers no longer support) and could use some serious updating. But, as far as experience goes they have been around the block and can work with franchisors, franchise brokers, and franchise broker firms. So, if you’re struggling to find a call verified lead provider for your unique situation, they might be a good group to check in with.
#8 – FranchiseConsultantLeads.com
It’s hard to tell much from this website other than it being fairly straight forward that they are focused on driving leads exclusively for franchise brokers, coaches, consultants, etc. with phone verified franchise leads. It is nice that you can pause leads as needed for Discovery Days. Their CPL is $3,125 / 25 = $125 per lead. So, they are not cheap but at least they have transparent pricing and you can order online immediately (something that most vendors do not offer).
#9 – Uplead
Uplead is a group that works in a variety of industries such as franchising, real estate, travel, mortgage, and auto leads. Franchising isn’t their only focus. However, if you’re looking for a strong group that isn’t a mom and pop type of a business, this one might be a good fit for you.
#10 – ExecutiveFranchises.com
ExecutiveFranchises.com has been around since 2012. One unique feature is that they allow for “Hot Call Transfers” directly to your sales team. Additionally, 1/3 of their leads set appointments and non qualified leads may be credited and replaced for a new lead.
#11 – DrFranchises.com
This group is more of a marketing agency. However, they do have services for manually verifying leads. They are a bit more of a “jack of all trades” type of an agency, but they seem to have a handle on the industry and might be worth looking into if you’re trying to do due diligence on a lot of different lead providers.
#12 – FranchiseLeads.org
FranchiseLeads.org is unique in that they basically purchase leads from 25+ different franchise portals and then they call and verify them for you. They have 5 different regions within the United States that you can choose from for your geographic area. And, leads can be purchased in blocks of 50. The program is designed specifically for franchise brokers.
#13 – Executive Franchise Leads
Similar to many of the other call verified lead providers on this list, Executive Franchise Leads allow for geo targeting options. Their geo targeting is a bit unique in that they can drill down to the State, County, or even Zip Code level. They have been in business since 2004.
#14 – Vziom
Vziom is similar to DrFranchises in that they are a marketing agency. They work in a lot of different industries and it’s unclear exactly how they “manually verify” their leads. But, as a last resort it might be worth looking into if you’re really doing a lot of due diligence on lead providers.
Top 15 Local Franchise Marketing Agencies
While there may not be that many ad agencies that focus on “franchise development” (the process of recruiting new franchisees), there are quite a few agencies that offer services for multi-location franchise systems. I have an article that I wrote called “Local Franchise Marketing Ideas” that contains some of the information found below. If you’re looking for more tips around local franchise marketing, then I would highly recommending giving it a read.
A few of these (like ourselves here at Lead PPC) do offer both franchise development and local franchise marketing services. But many of the ones below focus exclusively on local franchise advertising. I’ve tried to organize them in a way that focuses more on some of the more reputable ad agencies specifically in the franchising space that we actually know and have experience working with. Here they are:
#1 – Lead PPC
We are a bit biased on this one, but as far as PPC advertising for franchisee locations goes, we consider ourselves to be the best at it. We’ve been in the business since 2010, worked with 200+ franchise brands, and we have developed some great systems for scaling advertisements for local franchisees. If you’re interested in have a discussion with us about your local advertising needs, please fill out our Contact Us form to connect.
#2 – Scorpion
All things considered, Scorpion is probably the next best vendor out there for local franchise advertising. Their main focus for years has been working with law firms and dental offices, but they have expanded into franchise advertising and to bolster their position within the space even purchased Wheat Creative, which has helped them to improve their marketing abilities.
#3 – NinthRoot
Although these guys aren’t super well known in the space, they do a good job with local franchise advertising, especially when it comes to SEO, content creation, and Google My Business listings. We’ve shared dozens of clients with them over the years, primarily on the organic side of things, and they have a high retention rate.
#4 – Franatics
Franatics isn’t a team that I’ve had an actual conversation with, but they do rank #1 organically for the term “local franchise marketing”, so they must have some skill at least on the local SEO side of things. According to them, “We offer franchisees a variety of localized content marketing tools. This includes on-site photography and videography for commercials and other promotional materials, social media management, paid social ads and lead generation services.”
#5 – Curious Jane
Curious Jane is one of the nicest groups that we have met in the franchising space. A big focus for them is on coordinating and creating synergies between national ad budgets and local franchise marketing.
#6 – Reshift Media
Reshift Media has worked with 200+ brands with 25,000+ locations across 22 countries.
#7 – ChoiceLocal
Some of ChoiceLocal’s numbers are impressive. They say that their average franchise client has a 282% increase in new customer inquiries, $15.54 in customer revenue for every $1 they spend on marketing with them, and a 96% annualized client retention rate. This isn’t a group that I have ever met or heard of before, but they say that they have around 50 franchise brands that they work with and that they donate 10% of their profits back to helping others.
#8 – Hyperlocology
I actually really like the Hyperlocology website. It’s right up there with NinthRoot. Hyperlocology works in 3 industries: franchising, financial services, and retail. But, you can tell by their website that working with multi-location franchise brands is their primary focus.
#9 – Qiigo
Qiigo helps build brand unity across locations and helps create consistency across all franchise locations.
#10 – SalesOptima Digital
SalesOptima Digital provides local SEO, local paid search, social ads, and brand development services.
#11 – Silvercrest Advertising
Silvercrest is a bit more of an overall marketing partner. Some of their key service offerings include: territory management, national ad fund budget tool, coupon bar code scanning, grand opening automation, print advertising, specialty “swag” products, and email marketing.
#12 – BrandMuscle
These guys are provide similar services to Silvercrest and focus mainly on brand management, fund management, marketing execution, virtual assistants, and printing.
#13 – SOCi
These guys are a bit less of an agency and more of a multi-location marketing platform. Over 600 multi-location brands use SOCi.
#14 – Elysium Marketing Group
Elysium is out of Philadelphia. They have about 16 franchise brands listed on their website that they have worked with and offer just about every type of local franchise marketing solutions that are out there.
#15 – Local Hero
Local Hero seems to focus primarily on restaurant franchises and is similar to SOCi in that it is a platform based approach.
Need Help?
Our company, Lead PPC specializes in franchise lead generation. If you need help generating more franchise leads, feel free to reach out on our “Contact Us” page.
Video Transcription
I haven’t done a ton of these videos, but I think it’s important to stay connected not just through writing but also through videos. So, today I’m going to be going over what I consider to be the top franchise lead sites that are out there and just kind of walk through, ’cause there’s a lot of people that are looking for franchise development leads but they don’t even know what their options are out there to generate those leads. Some people think that it’s just portals or some people think that you just have to do your own advertising or it’s all about organic content or what have you.
Here are … And I guess just a little background on our company. We work with 70 different franchise brands roughly and probably drive about five thousand leads a month in the franchising space. We’re widely unknown; not that many people really know about us. But we’re really good at what we do. Our average cost per lead, all time across all of our brands is around 32 dollars and most of the leads that we drive are from Google ads and Facebook ads.
But I want to take a second and not just talk about us but talk about other lead providers that are out there because in the franchising space, you want to have several different lead sources and not just put all your eggs in one bucket. So, I’m not going over franchise broker networks because it’s kind of a totally different beast, although they buy leads through a lot of these different providers. But let’s just jump right in there.
The first thing I wanted to go over are four franchise lead generating apps that are out there, ’cause I think that this is where a lot of things are kind of moving toward. You’ll see Franchise Gator has their own app. Actually, it’s a really smart thing to do ’cause we drive some leads in the software as a service space, the SAS space, and honestly you can drive leads here for … I don’t know. We drive a lot of leads for like a dollar. So, I’d imagine these are probably some of the more profitable leads. So, you can download … People just download the Franchise Gator app on their phone and search there. And it’s pretty user friendly.
Another one, Franchise Solutions. This one … I’ve played around with this one as well as the Franchise Gator app. Oh, sorry. And This one is really similar to the Franchise Gator app. It’s basically the same thing. The notifications you get are basically the same, so I’m not sure if it’s the same person that made them. Maybe Franchise Gator owns this and takes up two spots that way. But there are a lot of leads that come from people searching and they’ll just go to the app store and they’ll just search for franchise or franchise opportunity and a lot of leads come from there these days.
Another one, Buy A Franchise. Pretty similar. I haven’t played with this one, but pretty similar. And the last one, Franchise Cost. This one is also pretty well unknown. I don’t think they have near as many users of this. 3.3 out of five – not the best rating. 4.5, so … Just something to be aware of that in the franchising space, more and more leads are being generated through apps; not even people going to franchise portals.
These are a little more well known but good to know about. So, again, here we have Franchise Gator with their website. I’m going to close out of some of these. Okay. So, here’s Franchise Gator. A lot of these work really similarly. They’ll kind of preload whatever state your IP address is in and then you can choose your industry or what have you.
A couple things just to know about how franchise portals work, and I’m sure kind of how these apps work, is a lot of people think that when you advertise with a franchise portal that the leads you get are only from people who go to Rosati’s or that they look into that. I think it really is interesting, a lot of these groups now … And this is a little more mobile-friendly, but they’re moving toward this kind of shopping cart approach. But if I were to go in and I say … Yeah, let’s just say I want to know about two of these – Healthier for You Vending. Request information. Okay. It says I have two. A lot of times it’ll start suggesting a lot more of other ones. Let’s just say like … What happens if someone fills this out. Let’s see. My name is … And … I guess full name.
Okay. If I hit request more information a lot of times they’re going to be giving you not just that one lead that’s filled out but other suggestions. And these things change a little bit, but basically these sites try to get you to fill out a lot of different things at once and then they’ll give recommendations of other things and then you end up selecting a ton of them kind of at once. Franchise Gator I think drives more leads than anybody else. It’s one of the more reputable ones. I don’t know exactly what the cost per lead is. It’s probably between 25 dollars and 50 dollars, depending on how much bulk of leads that you’re buying or what plan they sell you on. But if you haven’t tried Franchise Gator, definitely give that a try.
I think this is one of their bigger competitors, Franchise Direct. You’ll see the format is really similar, and that’s probably just because it works. You choose your industry, choose your area, how much money you have and then … Let’s see, do I want to use my location? Sure. So many different … That’s fine. Okay, same type of thing where just go through this and you’ll find it … I mean, I’m just going to go through some of these real fast but those two are definitely really similar – Franchise Gator, Franchise Direct.
America’s Best Franchises. I know these guys really well. We’ve done some stuff in the past together. Little bit of a different look. Pretty mobile friendly. See, this one is going to be a little bit more I think. Let’s see, if I say complete request then … See how they go through and they say recommended franchises and all these things are pre-checked? This is why a lead gets resold so many different times ’cause each of these is saying give me information for all of these so this basically gives them the right to resell this lead to one, two, three, four, five, six different companies.
From a franchise portal’s perspective, unless the lead is coming in organically a lot of times they’re having to pay something for that lead and it costs as much for them to drive that first lead. Maybe it costs them 10 dollars or maybe it costs them 20 dollars. They don’t make that much money the first time but when those leads get resold, they can resell it. Let’s say they’re selling the lead for 40 dollars and then that gets resold six times. So, 240 dollars on a lead that costs 20 dollars.
That’s kinda how that business model, in a way, semi has to work. And so, that’s one of the complications of working with franchise portals. They’re great because they have so many different leads but it’s tricky because the top things you’ll hear with franchise portals, people that use them, it’s hard to get a hold of people sometimes, which is anything off the internet, really. But it’s more difficult when a lead’s been called 10 or 15 times before you get that lead. You’re a little slower on response or something.
If you do buy portal leads, make sure to call them really fast. And then know that you’re only going to close about one out of 200 up to maybe one out of 25 or 50 of your leads. Maybe half a percent up to four percent, I would say, conversion rate. Just be aware that you kinda have to go through that process, which is why some people get outsourced franchise development companies to do their work so they don’t have to deal with all the leads or they work with broker companies who kind of prescreen those. But then again, you’re paying that broker company 20 grand, basically, to sell that franchise. That eats into a lot of your stuff.
I don’t know why I have so many pop-ups here. K. Entrepreneur.com. I like these guys. I think their leads are a little bit more expensive. Maybe they’re around 100 dollars. I don’t know exactly what their cost per lead is these days or how many of them you’re buying, but the magazines really reputable and when you get a lead through Entrepreneur.com they tend to be really pretty high quality. Let’s see if they have something. I don’t even know where their franch- … There we go, franchise section. Franchise home.
It’s a little bit of a different look. Close advertisement. That’s kinda funny. Let’s just try it. Let’s look for home care. Okay. It’s going to give us this. One thing I do like about their site, just from an in-user perspective, they have a lot of great information. They show you the investment amount right here, required net worth, liquid capital, ongoing fees, royalty fees. And this is something unique. You don’t see this one a lot of portal sites. You see how many units they actually have. Sometimes you’ll run across one that’s declining and you want to be really careful of that. Or you’ll want to know how many of these are corporate owned. This is interesting because to have 25 corporate stores and only two franchises … I mean, it’s probably a good franchise because they’ve really made that work for them and now they just want to scale and don’t want to use all their own profits to do that; want to go a little faster. Really like Entrepreneur.com.
Franchise.org. Yeah. This one, I think, is done by IFA and these guys are one of the authorities in franchising so you’re going to get good stuff there. It’s kinda just … Yeah, so there’s is category based, how much you can invest. I don’t this converts as well for them as some of these other styles ’cause it’s really kind of a clunky site to have somebody go through. Yeah. Let’s see what happens if I request more information. I think with these guys … I think you may only get … This may just be you. I don’t know if those leads get resold as much, but I don’t really know how their business model works behind the scenes.
BizBuySell. This is more of a marketplace. They do a lot. They’re most of the franchising events. The style of the site’s really similar. But you can actually sell your business here as well. It’s not just franchising; it’s literally anything. They have a big franchising section, but they have stuff that’s not just for that. If you wanted to actually sell your business you could do that there.
Franchising.com. Yeah, pretty similar. I don’t know these guys as well. Use a lot of pictures. I don’t know that I’m going to go through every single one of these, but … Franchise Grades a little interesting here ’cause I think that they give you an actual grade on your franchise. Really, this looks a lot like anything else. Let’s see. Okay. So, yeah. They give a grade on how they feel it meets their criteria, so that’s good to know. I guess it kinda … A lot of people do get into franchise and it didn’t go the way they wanted to, which is why you have all those bad reviews that exist out there, so that’s probably not a bad approach.
That’s one way to go. You got your apps here. You’ve got … Franchise Portal is another place to get leads. This one I put on here because this is what we do. I did just put a bunch of our competitors in there. I really like Wheat Creative, actually, so let’s … I mean, there’s us, obviously. Right? I would say our strongest points are … We’re really good at pay-per-click, so we’re not … We don’t do organic stuff. And I think what we’re probably best at is having a cost-per-lead that’s similar to what you’ll find with the portal, so our average cost-per-lead is like 32 dollars, basically what you have to spend on an ad or on clicks and stuff to generate a lead. And mainly that’s because our landing pages are really, really good.
And I’ll do another video on landing pages as far as what works and what doesn’t, but with landing pages you want to give something away like a free guide, free franchise handbook or something. Ask for very little info at the very beginning; just like email address or something. Then, using a multi-step form … After they request info you say first name, last name, phone number, zip code, net worth, and that’s really a lead. Then after that you can do a full franchise application and ask as many questions as you want to ’cause they already have their information right there that you kinda needed but it will help qualify those leads. Yeah. And a lot of people don’t know about us. We probably do more pay-per-click for franchise development than anything; than anybody out there.
Wheat Creative. I think Wheat is really an awesome company. Let me just close out some of these. Justin Baloun is the CEO over here. Really nice guy. I think they’re real strong at design, brand placement, SEL, website design. We collaborated with them on some stuff. Like, I definitely refer people to them if they need a new website a lot of times. They’re probably one of my top favorite providers for franchise development websites just ’cause everything … Like, everything’s spot on with brand, which is really important. They’re really good.
Curious Jane. I met these guys. It’s highly women-focused as far as the company goes. Really, really nice. Every time I’ve met them at different franchising shows they’re always the first to help. They do consumer ads as well, which is awesome. They do franchise development stuff like what we do. Yeah. I have nothing but great things to say about them.
Scorpion. These guys advertise a lot. We do some stuff in some other spaces like in the law space. These guys are probably the best, I think, at legal advertising. They’re really good. They give away a lot. They’re really reputable, have hundreds of employees. Probably one of the biggest players as far as lots of different industries. Let’s see what industries they say they’re in. Legal. Yeah, that’s their biggest. Healthcare, they do some franchise stuff, small business.
Another one, Great Franchise Leads. I don’t know these guys at all but I do see that they drive leads.
Fifth Avenue. I think these guys do call verified leads, maybe. Yeah, so they call these leads. That’s unique. We don’t call our leads. We send them directly to the company. So, that would be … That’s pretty good if you don’t want to … If you don’t have a good franchise development in-house crew, they’d be a good one to look at.
Executive Leads. I think they’re known … Yeah, I like that they say we generate franchisees. That’s really a smart thing to say. 20 thousand franchise leads later. That’s not a ton of leads, but it sounds like they know what they’re doing, too. I wish I knew more about them.
Anyway, so those are some different places out there. Obviously, this doesn’t mention franchise brokers. That’s groups like The Entrepreneur Source, FranNet, Franserve; lots of different broker networks out there. I think it’s best … Always start small with groups, so don’t spend more than two thousand dollars a month or whatever you can do to test these different things. Always keep track of what converted. For us, we track what key word a lead came from, what audience on Facebook they came from. So, if something starts to work really well you want to put your ad spend back into what’s working well. If you’re working with a portal, don’t be afraid to call them and be like, “Hey, these leads are not good. What can you do?” And then, yeah … Just try as many different sources as you can at a low cost and stick with your stuff that converts really well.
Yeah. I hope you enjoy this video. Thanks.
Entrepreneur with a focus on Lead Generation, Google Adwords, Bing Ads, and Conversion.
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