Thoughts on Leadership: A Franchise Sales Philosophy

By Gino Blefari

This week my travels found me in Denver, CO for the HSF Affiliates Franchise Sales Team Meeting. As it happens, Denver International Airport (DEN) has been named the most on-time airport in the U.S., and the city is known as the most educated in America, boasting the highest percentage of college graduates. What better location could we choose for a conference bringing together our punctual and skilled sales team members?

To kick off each day of our two-day meeting, I delivered presentations related to best practices in brokerage operations that set the stage for ongoing discussions about how to approach brokers interested in joining our network. You might be surprised that I didn’t speak about sales pitches or the most effective ways to market our offered systems and tools; I could’ve talked about all that for hours but it wouldn’t quite align with our HSF Affiliates franchise sales philosophy.

Our objective at HSF Affiliates is to bring together our sales team under a common playbook, with rules that are more about value-adds and coaching than they are the typical “here’s what we’ll do for you” or “here’s our stuff.” In other words, our goal is to fully understand the brokerage’s business model and the markets in which our prospective brokers operate so that when we do have initial sales conversations, we can talk less cold, hard numbers and more about relevant, hyper-local business approaches. These well-researched, personalized strategies for growth are not only tailored to today’s highly specific brokerage environment but also to the brokers’ needs in order to be brutally effective when helping them accomplish their goals.

So, what’s the message? To quote Zig Ziglar, “Stop selling. Start helping.” Because in the end, call it what you want—sales, marketing, pitching—at its core, this practice must be about guiding a brokerage toward greater success than they’d find on their own or anywhere else. And that’s the commitment our sales team has made at HSF Affiliates. Plus, when you’re talking franchise sales in a locale known as the “Mile High City,” you can’t really help but want to stretch your highest and farthest to help others succeed.

GINO BLEFARI is CEO of HSF Affiliates LLC. You can follow Gino on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.