The Simple Math for Why Phone Calls Aren’t Working

Most franchises find themselves interested in what we’re doing at FranFunnel due to one truth: Phone calls don’t work as well as they used to.

It’s uncontroversial to say that every single franchise relies on calls to some extent to make sales. If phone calls were as effective as they’ve been in the past, then almost every franchise’s sales approach would work.

Check out what FranchiseHelp said recently about Caller ID and the new realities of phone calls:

So what is it about caller ID? Why does this matter?

Well, something very interesting happens when you can see the number / name of every person that calls you. You start to get WAY MORE SELECTIVE about which calls you answer and which ones you don’t.

So I’ll ask one more time, when your cell phone rings and you don’t know the number, how often do you pick up the call?

And there may be no industry more sensitive to changes in users phone behaviors than us here in lead generation. As a business who provides phone numbers for potential leads, if no one answers the phone, then it’s a poor reflection on us.

This is only one reason. If you look around for opinions and data about the ineffectiveness of phone calls, you won’t be lacking.

But hearing various reasons why phone calls are less effective doesn’t do your franchise any good. You need answers. (Pun only slightly intended.)

Let me posit a very simple reason why you’re seeing a struggling call strategy: the rise of asynchronous communication.

We’ll get back to asynchrony in a moment, but let’s start with its opposite: synchronous communication. When the telephone became popularized around the turn of the 20th century, it was based on a very simple truth, one person has the ability to speak with another person at that very moment. You see, that was the beauty of phone communication. People, rather than relying on other mediums like mail or telegraphs, could correspond in real time.

And for much of the last 100 years, that’s exactly how our world evolved. And so we’ll define synchronous communication as interactions between two or more individuals where the respective parties are involved in the communication contemporaneously.

However, it’s important to note that the phone’s strength is ultimately what has become its downfall, it requires two people’s time at the same time.

So what is asynchronous communication?

Well, it’s just the opposite. Interactions between two or more individuals where the respective parties are not communicating at the same time.

As I mentioned, this type of communication has been around for longer than its younger relative. Couriers, postal services, telegrams, faxes, beepers, etc. You name it. The issue with all these were that they were pretty…crappy. (And some of them are still around, so who am I to judge?)

But over the course of the last 20 years, asynchronous communication has seen a complete revolution. Mediums like email, text messages, chat messages, and Snapchats have completely come to dominate the landscape. And they are so much better than their cousins: the letter, the fax, and the page.

So, society has evolved. Just about everyone these days prefers these new methods to the old methods. They can interact on their own terms and on their own time.

And now franchise sales processes are at a crossroads. You have a situation where almost every sales funnel is completely dependent on phone calls (synchrony) when the clear majority of potential franchisees prefer emails and texts (asynchrony).

That’s why we’ve developed FranFunnel. We’re the first platform that marries all these strategies to make you a more modern and effective franchise sales operation.

So let’s get started. Get FranFunnel today.

This article was written by Eli Robinson, General Manager of FranFunnel.

‍